The reef felt wrong the moment I swam through the outer arches. The currents dragged as if weighed down, carrying sounds in sluggish waves. Usually, the city hummed with layers of motion, pod lines weaving, water chimes echoing from the upper ridges, but tonight everything hung still. Even the glow from the runic arches seemed to scatter slower.
I passed a pair of hatchery workers carrying nutrient wraps toward the pods. Their eyes looked tired, their fins drooping. One of them paused and nodded to me. "The bleed held, they said. But the lanes still feel heavy."
"They're not wrong," I muttered. My pearl pulsed faint green, but the beat behind it wasn't steady.
Inside the council rotunda, the air shifted again, charged with argument. The elders sat perched on their dais while artisans lined the lower tier. A projection of the bleed readings floated above the table, pulsing amber-green with flickering interruptions.
"The conduit holds pressure," Fin said, tapping a slate, "but anomalies ripple through secondary nursery channels. If those lanes crack, our coolant flow collapses."
Shemril's staff scraped coral. "Close the lanes until we trace the fault. Better a dry trough than dead hatchlings."
"And kill a third of our supply? We can't starve the reef to protect it," Fin snapped back.
Talos leaned forward, voice sharp. "Exiles poisoned our veins once. If those readings track to their work, we burn every cloth they brought."
Yera's voice cut clean through the noise. "Enough. We send a field team to see the fracture up close. No more speeches. Kaelen, you take the same crew. You've already felt this rhythm."
I nodded. Orders carried weight, but fear curled under my ribs. If the reef's own lifelines were turning hostile, the problems were deeper than cracks.
In the equipment bay, the team assembled quietly. Lis tightened anchor hooks onto her pack, fins twitching. "Why do they keep sending us back into holes? Half the city can fight."
"Half the city can fight," Ashekan said, strapping his spear to his back, "but not half can come back."
Veshra approached me with a slim crystal threaded into a frame. "This scanner tunes to motes before they form eddies. Keep it close. It hums if decay's in the water."
Saar floated near the shadows, folding mirrored cloth with careful hands. "The air smells like Destruction's teeth," he said, not looking at me. "We'll find what we need, or we won't come back."
I checked my brace and sensor. My pearl gave a steady pulse, masking its own doubt.
The lanes grew tighter the deeper we swam. These weren't broad arteries but narrow veins cut through coral, barely wide enough to pass one at a time. Light from our crystals caught silt dancing in lazy spirals. Each bend narrowed until the walls brushed my shoulders. The smell of mineral decay clung to the water.
The scanner in my hand thrummed faintly. "We're close," I said.
Ahead, Echo-Hand pressed fingers to a wall seam. "Coral sings wrong here. Hollow. Thin." He ran a hand along the cracks.
The crystal pulsed harder. "Something's moving," I said, shifting my grip on the blade.
From the walls, black motes peeled free, spinning in the current like ash. They stretched into eel shapes, snapping as they swam, their bodies made of shadow threaded with glassy veins.
"Shadowspawn!" Lis shouted, firing an anchor upward to hold her position.
The first eel lunged for her, teeth snapping. She twisted, letting the anchor line swing her wide, then fired a burst of light from her cannon. The eel writhed, dissolving into mist.
Two more came from the walls. Ashekan speared one through the midsection, his blade sparking with mana. The creature coiled around the shaft, biting down. Ashekan ripped it free, shaking shards from his armguard. The second eel darted at Veshra. I pulled water into a tight spiral, spinning it around her. The creature slammed into the current, slowing just enough for her to fire a frost dart into its head.
The walls groaned. More motes swirled, but Saar spread his mirrored cloth, its light scattering the motes into fragments. One eel slipped past and bit my brace. Pain flashed up my arm. My pearl flared yellow, heat running through my veins. I twisted the current tighter, forcing it against the eel until it broke apart.
The fight left the water cloudy with shadow threads that slowly unraveled. I felt my limbs shake.
Behind the spawn, a fracture gaped along the conduit wall. Shadow motes leaked from the crack, drawn from the mechanical debris lodged in the gap. The metal looked alien—angular and blackened, edges marked by scorch lines.
Echo-Hand knelt, tracing the break. "Not natural. This is cut."
The Exile medic hovered close, voice low. "Invader scrap. They planted something here."
"They're manipulating decay," I said. The thought sat heavy. If they were seeding breaches, every heart was at risk.
We patched the crack with resin cloth, but it wouldn't hold long. The scanner's hum faded, but the edges still glowed faintly with decay.
"We need to report now," Ashekan said. "This isn't a random crack."
We turned back. My pearl dimmed, vision blurring at the edges. Every kick felt heavier.
By the time we reached the outer lanes, tremors rolled through the water. Faint at first, then stronger. Debris floated from the ceilings.
We burst into the open, alarms blaring crimson across every current lane. A runner flew past, shouting, "Secondary nursery! Currents ripping out to the ridges!"
I saw the flow ahead twisting violently, pulling water and debris toward the outer dark.
Lis drew her weapon. "Kaelen—"
I was already swimming. The hatchery domes loomed in the distance, currents tearing at their anchors.
The reef wasn't breaking in one place. It was breaking everywhere.