Kaiden sat on the edge of the bunk, staring at his reflection in a knife blade.
His eye had stopped twitching. That was new.
The rest of him still ticked — faint pulses from the core in his chest, a soft hum through the spinal housing. But for the first time in days, everything felt still.
Too still.
He flipped the blade and caught it by the hilt. Not bad reflexes for a half-dead accident.
"You survived," a voice said.
He didn't look up.
"You survived a confrontation with one of the Four-Circle mages of the human realm. With a broken leg, no left arm, and half your systems in critical failure."
The demon commander stood in the doorway, arms crossed. His tone was unreadable. Praise? Suspicion? Containment?
Kaiden finally met his eyes.
"Should I apologize?"
"You were spared."
That word again.
Spared.
It landed heavier than any blow Arvan had dealt. Deeper than any sword.
The commander stepped closer, voice quieter.
"We don't like variables, Kaiden. The war doesn't reward unpredictability."
Kaiden didn't respond.
Not until the commander tossed him something — a stamped disk, iron and rune-carved.
A mission sigil.
"You're being redeployed. Not with your old unit."
Kaiden turned the disk in his hand. The sigil was different — lesser. A scouting squad. Disposable.
"Why the switch?"
"Your presence unnerves the others. They say your systems are cursed. That you glow wrong."
Kaiden's grip tightened around the sigil.
"And what do you think?"
The commander didn't blink.
"I think you're useful. Until you're not."
The new squad didn't speak much.
Not out of hate — just detachment. Like they'd already decided Kaiden didn't matter. Or wouldn't for long.
He didn't learn their names.
They moved through fractured terrain on the outer edge of demon territory — all scorched stone, twisted leyroots, and broken spellglass. Nothing grew here. Nothing healed.
The silence gave Kaiden space.
Too much space.
Why did Arvan let me live?
Why did I feel something… wrong when he said I wasn't meant to be here?
And why do I still hear his voice?
It happened again that night.
Mid-patrol, as they passed a ruined waystation half-swallowed by leyline rot, Kaiden's vision blurred.
Just for a second.
But long enough.
He saw Earth.
A flicker of his old apartment. Bathroom mirror. His own face, younger, blood on his knuckles. A cracked phone screen. A name flashing on it.
Then nothing.
He blinked hard.
But the image lingered in his chest like an echo.
He wasn't dreaming.
He was remembering something that had never happened.
That night, at camp, Kaiden sat apart from the others. The silence was mutual.
He turned the sigil in his hand. The mission disc glowed faintly — a soft blue edge.
Then, as he tilted it — it flickered red.
Then back to blue.
His brow furrowed.
That wasn't normal.
He checked a few backup sigils from the supply crate. All steady. All unchanging.
Only his… pulsed.
They're tracking me.
Or testing.
Or watching for something they don't understand.
Kaiden stared at the sigil.
"You weren't meant to be here."
Arvan's voice again.
Not just in his memory. But in his circuitry. In his code.
Recognition. Revulsion. Like Kaiden was a sentence written in the wrong language.
He clenched the sigil until the metal dented. Sparks bit his palm.
"I'll write my own fate."
The Dog They Won't Unleash
Kaiden crouched near the edge of a ruined ridge, overlooking a glowing fracture in the earth.
A leyline — unstable, raw, and pulsing. Still volatile from the last spellstorm. The kind of arcane wound that made reality flicker if you stared too long.
His orders were simple:
"Observe. Don't engage. Report if the energy shifts."
No squad. No backup. No one bound to his vitals.
He was alone.
Again.
He adjusted his posture. The weight in his leg shifted wrong — servo delay.
His systems had stabilized after the Arvan incident, technically. But "stabilized" just meant "quietly failing."
His left knee still jittered on impact. His shoulder clicked when he breathed too deep. And sometimes… his thoughts lagged. Like a delay. Like someone else was inside the code with him.
He scanned the leyline again.
Its rhythm had changed.
So had the air.
Footsteps.
He turned sharply, hand flexed — ready.
Not an ambush.
Just two demon enforcers — junior rank, badly armored, walking like they didn't want to be there.
"We were sent to verify your status," one mumbled, eyes averted. "Command said you might've… malfunctioned."
Kaiden didn't answer.
He stared.
"And if I had?"
Neither soldier responded.
They didn't have to.
After they left, Kaiden remained at the ridge.
Alone again.
The leyline still pulsed.
So did the realization.
He wasn't here to scout.
He was here to be monitored.
To see if the broken dog still barked.
If the human mistake — the one not meant to exist — would obey, defect, or die.
Not a soldier.
Not even a weapon.
Just a glitch wrapped in flesh and steel.
Too dangerous to unleash.
Too interesting to destroy.
Yet.