The towering buildings boxed them in as tightly as the crowd did.
Pale blue streetlamps cast dim shadows over the stone, but they didn't chase away the darkness. They outlined it.
And every face in that light—
Was wrong.
Smiles, too wide.
Eyes, too still.
Staring straight ahead.
But not seeing.
It wasn't them watching.
It was something behind the eyes.
Or inside them.
Like their gazes had been painted on glass—
And whatever lived on the other side…
Had finally decided to step through.
Avon fluttered down onto Doran's left shoulder, wings folding like parchment burned at the edges. He perched there—
A prophet on a crumbling statue.
His ember feathers pulsed faintly against the pale light.
"What's your move?" he asked, voice low—not teasing this time.
Not quite worried.
But close.
One wing extended slowly, deliberately—
Pointing at Ray.
"These aren't like the little guy over there," Avon murmured.
A faint hiss curled at the end of his words.
"Creepier than that."
Ray shifted his stance.
The fight left his frame.
Replaced by something tighter.
Smaller.
Focused.
His revolver remained raised—aimed at a woman in a crimson trench coat.
Her smile hadn't moved in a full minute.
Not a twitch.
Not a breath.
Unease slipped into his posture.
Good.
The crowd took another step.
A single, unified motion—
Forty pairs of shoes clicking once against stone.
Doran's jaw clenched.
His grip on both swords tightened.
Avon leaned closer.
His voice curled against Doran's ear like a whisper made of flame.
"I want to see what you can do without me."
Then louder—
Sharper—
A single command carved into the silence like a rune struck with fire:
"Attack them."
Avon's words echoed.
And for a moment—everything froze.
Even the crowd.
Even the air in Doran's lungs.
Even the static buzz of the streetlamps, which dimmed—
As if they, too, were holding their breath.
Avon hadn't just spoken.
He had commanded.
Doran turned slightly, one eye narrowing toward the flickering ember perched on his shoulder.
"…What?" he muttered. "No. I have a plan."
Avon chuckled.
Not his usual smug cackle.
This one was dry.
Low.
Disappointed.
"Your plan," he said flatly, "failed the second you brought those two along."
He stepped off Doran's shoulder in a slow, effortless glide—hovering just ahead at eye level.
Wings flared wide like molten glass, casting soft pulses of amber and blue into the stormlit dark.
"You're always doing this," Avon murmured, voice tight.
"Dragging people behind you like you're some leader. Like if you fight hard enough, if you bleed enough—somehow, they'll make it out too."
He tilted his head.
Ember eyes narrowing into a sharp, glowing line.
Orange bled into electric blue.
"They won't."
"You're not strong enough to save everyone, Doran. You're barely strong enough to save yourself."
He drifted closer—just a breath away now.
"Every time you play soldier… every time you try to strategize… you lose something you didn't mean to."
"You rely on me. On the abilities I gave you. And yet you pretend you're in control."
"You're weak because you care."
"You're slow because you keep looking back."
"And you'll die—because you still think someone's supposed to stand beside you when it happens."
His voice dropped colder than the air.
"I have one goal."
"And you will help me achieve it."
"So stop dragging me into your mortal attachments."
He flicked a wing toward the crowd—
To the synchronized bodies.
The hollow stares.
The too-wide smiles.
"This is what happens when you let people slow you down."
Then, quieter now. No fire in it. Just finality.
"So go ahead. Try your plan."
Avon floated back, just a few inches.
Just far enough.
A silhouette made of heat and judgment.
"Let's see how long it lasts."
Doran didn't speak.
Not at first.
He let the words sit—
Let them seep into his skin like old wounds cracking open in the cold.
His grip didn't loosen.
But his hands began to twitch.
The tips of his blades dipped slightly—
The steel brushing softly against the cobblestone with a faint metallic clink.
The sound echoed down the street like a cracked bell.
Small. Sharp.
Final.
The crowd took another step forward.
In perfect unison.
A single heartbeat of shoes against stone.
Doran exhaled slowly through his nose.
Eyes locked forward.
Then, finally—he broke the silence.
"…Hey, robot," he muttered, not looking back. "Looks like we've got the same enemy."
Ray's head tilted slightly.
His revolver didn't lower.
But his grin sharpened.
Doran raised both swords—slowly.
Their tips no longer dragged.
"I wanna propose another deal."
Ray snorted, shifting his stance.
"Sure," he said. "As long as you quit talking to yourself. That shit's weird."
Doran glanced over his shoulder.
"…It's…"
A pause.
His voice dropped softer. Barely a breath.
"Nevermind."
He turned back to face the crowd.
His breath steadied.
He surged forward.
Steel kissed air.
Boots struck stone.
And the stillness shattered.
Ray followed.
No words.
No questions.
Just motion.
Doran and Ray charged into the crowd—
No signal.
No plan.
Just violence waiting to be unleashed.
Doran let both swords drag behind him as he sprinted—
sparks spitting from the steel as they kissed the stone,
a scream of heat waiting to happen.
The first figure stepped into range.
SLASH—SLASH.
Blades rose in a vicious arc—
One arm severed.
The second figure split clean down the middle.
Before the armless one could fall, Doran twisted, reversed grip—
CRACK—
—and cleaved them both down in a single brutal chop.
Ray moved elsewhere.
Eyes locked on a familiar face.
The old man from the café.
Still smiling.
Still walking.
Not for long.
Ray sprinted.
Then leapt.
His boots crashed into the man's chest with the force of a missile—
WHAM!
The body flew backward—
CRASH—CRASH—CRASH—CRASH!
Four more civilians went down like bowling pins, limbs snapping, coolant spraying in wide arcs.
Doran didn't stop.
He hurled one of his blades like a spear.
"Ashen Barrier!"
The rune-carved steel ignited midair—red light flaring along its edge.
It tore through a man mid-stride—cutting him clean at the waist—
then slammed into the chest of the one behind him.
BOOM.
Ash exploded outward in a ring of heat and ember.
Five more bodies vanished inside it.
No screams.
Just silence.
And shrapnel.
Ray drew fire.
Bang.
Bang.
Bang.
Bang.
Four bodies dropped in rhythm, collapsing in perfect sequence.
A fifth lunged.
Ray met it with a brutal right hook—
SMASH!
The head twisted ninety degrees. Sparks burst from the neck.
As the body rebounded, he raised the revolver—
Bang. Bang.
Two more fell midair.
Doran sprinted through the chaos.
He reached the blade he'd thrown, yanked it free—
now dragging both swords again.
The steel hummed in his hands.
He swung upward with a roar.
SHHK-CRACK!
Two bodies split—vertical, skull to hip.
He twisted—
SLASH!
Two more fell—horizontal this time.
Clean.
Quiet.
Like the city had swallowed the sound before it could rise.
The street drank the silence.
Then—
THOOM.
Ray surged again.
Leapt.
His fists came down like wrecking hammers—
SNAP!
One head caved under the strike, sparks exploding from the spinal port.
BANG. BANG.
Two more dropped as he landed, revolver smoking.
The air was thick with ash, blood, and the sharp scent of melting coolant.
Doran hurled a blade—
THNK!
It drove straight through a woman's chest, pinning her to a lamppost.
He charged, gripping the other sword in both hands,
and plowed forward.
SHHK.
Two more bodies caught mid-stride, impaled on the blade's length.
He didn't stop.
He swung wide—
FWOOM.
The corpses flew off the steel like burning wreckage,
slamming into five others.
CRASH. CRACK. CRASH.
All went down.
The dust settled.
Silence returned.
Only eight figures remained.
Doran and Ray stood at the center of the ruined street,
chests heaving.
Metal slick with blood, ash, and oil.
Boots surrounded by twisted limbs and shattered smiles.
And then—
The eight remaining civilians stepped forward.
In perfect unison.
Their feet hit the stone in the same breath. Same timing. Same weight.
They stopped.
Raised their heads.
And spoke.
Together.
One voice. Eight mouths.
Braided into a single, inhuman harmony:
"You two are quite strong."
Their heads tilted. All at once. All the same angle.
Mechanical. Precise. Wrong.
"But I doubt you could keep that up against the whole city."
Doran didn't flinch.
But his breath slowed.
His grip on both swords eased—just slightly. A pause. A reset.
Then—his voice:
Low. Controlled.
Deadly.
"Where did you take our friend?"
The eight smiled.
Not wide. Not kind.
Just… wrong.
Then—
As one:
"He is a curious man," they said.
Their voices wove together like a net drawn tight.
"He wanted to see what was really pretend around here."
That word—
Pretend—
It cracked through the air like glass snapping in the cold.
Doran's eyes widened.
His hands clenched around the hilts of his blades.
White-knuckled.
A tide of heat surged beneath his skin,
panic riding its edges like a spark seeking flame.
"…No."
The word barely made it out.
The crowd answered with delighted unity.
"We haven't even started yet," they chimed.
"So you better hurry!"
Then—
All at once:
"HaHaHaHaHaHa—!"
The laughter tore through the air.
Dry. Mechanical.
Each voice misaligned—off in tone, timing, rhythm.
Like someone had spliced together broken recordings and called it joy.
They didn't move.
Didn't strike.
Didn't run.
They just watched.
Unblinking.
Studying every breath.
Every twitch.
Like puppeteers waiting to see who twitches first.
Above them, the blue streetlamps buzzed louder—
A hum that crawled down the spine.
Faint light bled across the cobblestones,
painting long, warped shadows beneath every boot and blade.
The city no longer breathed—it listened.
And somewhere nearby—
Gears turned.
Heavy. Slow.
Then—
The manhole covers began to tremble.
CLANK.
One.
CLANK. CLANK.
Another. Then a third.
Doran turned sharply. Ray's revolver arm twitched upward.
THWOOOOM.
The first manhole cover launched skyward in a storm of sparks and steam.
THWOOOOM.
The second followed.
THWOOOOM.
The third.
Geysers of white-hot mist burst into the street like smoke signals from hell. The air hissed and warped with the heat, veiling what came next.
THUD.
A massive armored form slammed onto the cobblestones.
THUD.
Another—taller, leaner, dragging something long and curved.
THUD.
The last landed hard, smaller but coiled like a spring wrapped in muscle and steel.
Three figures now sprawled across the broken street.
Steam curled around them like curtains parting on a stage.
The civilians didn't panic.
They smiled wider.
Then—without a word—they stepped back.
One foot.
Another.
Then another.
Silent retreat.
Ray clicked his tongue. "What the hell are those things?"
Doran's voice was low. Flat. "Bodies."
A pause.
"This isn't over."
The first to move… was the last to fall.
The smallest figure twitched—then stirred.
He rose slowly, painfully, like a puppet remembering how to stand. Limbs staggered, joints uncertain, until finally…
He locked into place.
Still. Listening.
As if something beneath the world had called him up.
Then the largest began to rise.
Each motion sounded like a slow quake. The ground seemed to shift beneath him—arms rolling forward, spine straightening with the groan of metal.
He stood like a fortress.
And the third—the tallest—moved differently.
No hesitation. No weight. Only drag.
His limbs hung long and limp, curtain cords over bone. He reached for the scythe beside him, using its curved blade as leverage. The sound of steel scraping stone whispered like bone against iron.
He rose.
Crooked.
Then straight.
They stood like statues unearthed from an old god's grave—silent. Watchful.
The crowd knew.
They stepped back in synchrony, boots tapping stone like drums in a funeral march. One by one, the civilians vanished into the mist and shadow, leaving only Doran, Ray, and the three figures at the heart of the city's pulse.
The smallest moved first.
His neck cracked. Red rings flickered behind his eyes—like commands echoing from a deeper voice.
Then he spoke.
Quiet. Precise.
"By our father's will… we stand again."
The tallest followed, dragging his scythe in a long arc against the stone. Sparks danced beneath its edge.
"The broken," he said, his voice empty as wind through hollow cathedrals. "Reforged by the lost."
Then the largest. His head rolled, spine clicking like a gear falling into place.
His voice rumbled like thunder being dragged through steel.
"For his vision… we march beyond the past."
And then—
All three moved.
Weapons rising in perfect sync.
Chained Sickle.
Scythe.
Whip.
Ray took a step back.
Just one.
His revolver leveled higher.
"…What the hell is this?" he muttered. "Something's off."
Doran didn't answer.
His breath slowed.
His grip tightened.
And deep in his chest…
Something cold began to rise.
Elsewhere
The sound of grinding gears and the hiss of steam were nothing more than a faint hum.
Low. Constant. Like a machine too large to see, breathing behind the walls.
Kellon's eyes snapped open.
Darkness.
No—not quite.
A dull, yellow light pulsed from above, flickering with a slow, artificial rhythm.
Like a heartbeat.
But not his.
He tried to move.
Couldn't.
Straps. Cold. Tight. Clamped across his chest, his wrists, his ankles—bolted to the slab beneath him like a specimen waiting for dissection.
The air was thick. Wet. Heavy with rust and rot.
And beneath it all, a stench like ammonia laced with something worse—
Something dead trying to stay fresh.
He turned his head—just barely.
To his left—rows of machines.
Tables.
Bodies.
Others strapped down just like him.
Unmoving.
Silent.
Waiting.
He turned right—
And froze.
A robot stood beside him. Short. Barely tall enough to see over the edge of the table.
Its body was shaped like a child.
Its face—painted innocence.
Its eyes—nothing but black glass, full of things that watched from beneath.
It didn't blink.
Didn't move.
Didn't speak.
Just stared.
"…Where the hell am I?" Kellon rasped, voice cracked from disuse.
No answer.
He yanked against the straps—once, twice—each pull met with resistance like concrete and wire. "Let me out! Get me out of here!"
The robot raised its arm.
Slowly. Deliberately.
In its hand—a baton. Seamless. Polished steel.
It didn't threaten.
It didn't warn.
It pressed.
ZZZTT!
The baton discharged with a sharp crack of current.
Pain ignited across Kellon's chest—jolting down his spine and through every joint. His back arched, vision flaring white, his scream caught halfway in his throat.
Stillness.
Kellon collapsed back into the slab, gasping—lungs burning, muscles twitching, vision swimming in dull static.
And then—
The robot spoke.
Its voice was pitched like a child's.
Sweet.
High.
Wrong.
The syllables stuttered through broken speakers—glitching in and out like a lullaby made of razor wire:
"You will be retrofitted soon."
Kellon's jaw clenched.
The words chilled him more than the shock.
"My body's fine the way it is," he growled. "Now let me go!"
The robot didn't flinch.
Didn't move.
Didn't blink.
It was like speaking to a doll with a voicebox—and the doll was answering without needing to understand.
"Then you will become an honorary citizen of Donum."
It turned, its legs making no sound against the grated floor as it glided toward the empty slab beside him.
Identical to his own.
Cold. Clean. Waiting.
"And a member of the Allasupa Family."
The final word hit harder than the voltage had.
Kellon froze.
His breath snagged.
The name carved itself into the space around him like a brand pressed into flesh.
The laughter.
The hollow stares.
The mannequin crowds.
The too-wide smiles.
All of it.
Pretend.
"…So this is what he meant," Kellon whispered, barely audible.
"You're turning people into robots."
He shook his head slowly, the disbelief slipping into something sharper. Sour.
Revulsion.
"No—you're not saving them," he said. "You're just turning people into things. Cogs and bolts in someone's delusion."
His teeth bared, voice rising despite the weight in his limbs.
"I'd rather die."
The robot stopped.
It turned back to face him—perfectly still.
Its black-glass eyes glinted beneath the pulsing yellow light.
Empty. Infinite. Watching.
"Technically," it said, in a voice flat enough to drain blood from bone,
"you will die."
Silence.
Real silence.
No whirring gears. No flickering lights.
Just the long, slow stretch of a truth settling into place like a body dropped into water.
Kellon didn't scream.
He didn't struggle.
He just stared—eyes wide, breath slowing.
The heat in his limbs began to fade.
Not from fear.
From understanding.
This wasn't imprisonment.
It was erasure.
He wasn't going to be broken.
He was going to be replaced.
The robot seemed to notice the tension fading from his frame.
Its posture relaxed ever so slightly.
When it spoke again, the voice was gentler.
Almost… tender.
Like a bedtime story for the damned.
"Isn't it easier to accept?"
It turned again, floating to the side of the slab it had been preparing.
Click.
Hiss.
Reset.
It adjusted the straps. Aligned the metal. Tested the restraints.
Preparing it.
For someone else.
Then, without turning back, the voice continued:
"Now we just need to get the other human."
It paused.
A beat.
Then slowly—mechanically—it turned its head again, rotating just a bit too far, like a doll with a faulty joint.
Its black lenses fixed on him.
"The really strong one."
A long pause.
"Father had to send all of my brothers to get him."
Kellon didn't move.
The words still echoed inside his skull.
Each syllable sank deeper than the last.
Tainting. Saturating. Suffocating.
Like oil soaking into cloth—ruining something that once tried to stay clean.
His limbs, already weak, lost what little fire remained.
His fingers twitched once against the restraints.
Then… nothing.
He didn't fight.
Didn't speak.
Just stared at the ceiling, eyes fixed on the flickering yellow light that pulsed overhead like a lazy heartbeat.
Not his own.
Not anymore.
I deserve to die.
The thought came quietly.
Uninvited.
Unannounced.
It arrived like a stranger in the night—and felt far too familiar once it did.
His lips parted, breath scraping past dry lungs.
His voice was no louder than a sigh.
No stronger than a ghost.
"I let too many people down…" he whispered.
"I let people die in my place."
He didn't blink.
But something deep within him—
Cracked.
A hairline fracture across the soul.
"How can I even call myself a man…"
"…if I can't face my fate head-on?"
He swallowed hard, the taste of metal rising in his throat.
"I knew death would come for me.
I just…
didn't think it would be this cruel."
Then—
Hiss—
The door to the lab slid open.
Silent. Soft. Like a secret being whispered.
Two pairs of footsteps entered.
One was measured. Adult.
Heavy boots tapping in practiced rhythm.
The other—
Lighter.
Mechanical.
Too perfect.
Too sweet.
The first figure emerged—a childlike robot, nearly identical to the one already standing beside his table.
Porcelain-white plating. Petite frame.
Black-glass lenses glowing faintly in place of eyes.
It stopped beside the slab and turned toward the door.
Then—
She entered.
Leyla.
Brown hair pulled back in a loose tie.
Work gloves hanging from her belt.
Her coat—scorched in places, dusted with soot and the soft silver-gray smear of metal dust.
Exhaustion hung off her like a second skin.
But her eyes—
Sharp.
Awake.
Searching.
The robot by Kellon turned instantly, posture straightening like a student greeting a teacher.
"Miss Leyla!" it chirped, voice bright and pitched too high, its edges flickering with glitched enthusiasm.
"We have one of the outsiders! But there's another one too! He's really strong! And he has a robot—but Daddy said to destroy that one because of its design!"
Leyla approached, her steps steady—precise.
Her boots clicked softly against the gridded metal floor.
She placed a hand on the robot's smooth head, giving it a gentle pat.
"Good job, Jade," she said.
The robot visibly beamed beneath her touch, like a dog wagging its tail.
Her eyes, however, didn't leave Kellon.
She studied him.
Not like a captor inspecting a prisoner.
Not like a scientist evaluating a specimen.
Like an engineer checking the damage on a machine someone else had broken.
His uniform.
His bruises.
The tension in his jaw.
The exhaustion leaking from his shoulders.
Her expression didn't soften.
But something behind her gaze… changed.
Then, without so much as a glance toward the robots, she spoke.
"Hey Jade," she said quietly.
"Can you and your sister go grab those two crates in the corner of my room?"
Jade's eyes brightened with giddy compliance.
"Of course!" it sang.
It twirled on its heel, circuits humming like a music box.
"Let's go, Ruby!"
The second robot—Ruby—skipped after it in perfect rhythm, replying in a nearly identical voice:
"Okay HeHeHe!"
Two dolls on strings.
Two puppets pretending to be free.
They vanished through the open door.
SLAM.
The door shut behind them.
The echo hadn't yet faded.
The door's slam still reverberated in the metal bones of the room, when Leyla turned.
The smile she'd worn moments before?
Gone.
In its place: stillness.
She stepped forward.
Quiet.
Measured.
Each movement deliberate, precise—like a watchmaker approaching a clock she already knew was broken.
She said nothing at first.
Just studied him.
Her gaze was surgical.
Not cruel.
Not cold.
But calculating.
As if she needed to know just how much of the man before her was still salvageable.
Then—finally:
"You're a soldier for the Practum Kingdom."
Not a question.
A dissection.
She folded her arms across her chest.
Her voice came sharp—flat.
Not a blade.
A scalpel.
"So what the hell are you doing on a planet that belongs to the Regnum Ignis?"
Kellon didn't respond right away.
His eyes stayed fixed on the ceiling—on the dull yellow light that pulsed like a countdown disguised as a heartbeat.
Tick.
Tick.
Tick.
"Me?" he muttered, the word barely more than breath.
"Following a man I'm still not sure I trust."
A beat.
His gaze dropped.
Met hers.
"But…"
"…I don't think there's anyone I trust more."
Leyla's brow twitched.
Not enough to break character.
But enough to prove the armor cracked.
"Then why here?" she asked, voice tighter now. "Why the city?"
Kellon turned back toward the ceiling.
Spoke like someone confessing to the dark:
"To save his mechanic."
The words dropped like a wrench into silence.
Leyla flinched.
Not visibly.
Not loudly.
But internally—something in her shifted.
Her stance.
Her posture.
Her breath.
Just enough.
Kellon didn't notice.
Not right away.
He added, softer now—almost to himself:
"…But now, it seems like we failed."
Another silence.
Longer.
Heavier.
Then—
She stepped forward.
Without hesitation.
And took his hand.
Her grip wasn't soft.
It wasn't comforting.
It was firm.
Serious.
Her eyes locked to his.
"Are you talking about… Doran?"
Kellon blinked.
Confusion flashed in his eyes like stormlight behind glass.
"How do you—?"
And then it clicked.
The puzzle.
The piece.
The truth.
"You're her. You're the mechan—"
She moved. Fast.
Her hand clamped over his mouth.
Her eyes narrowed.
Her whisper sliced clean through the sterile air.
"Yes. But don't say it."
Her gaze darted—left, right, up.
Toward the walls.
The ceiling.
The silent vents and the whirring yellow lights above.
"You need to stay quiet. Don't mention anything about saving me."
She leaned in—close.
Closer than trust.
Closer than safety.
Her voice dropped to a whisper not meant for ears.
Just nerves.
"They hear everything."
A breath.
"They see everything."
She pulled her hand away, slowly.
Eyes still scanning every corner.
Then her voice dipped even lower.
A secret spoken not in words—but in oxygen and fear.
"And I'm sure by now, you've noticed…"
Kellon didn't blink.
Didn't move.
Didn't need to.
He had noticed.
And Leyla—
She finished the thought anyway.
"…Everything on this planet is mechanical."