0500 hours meant Saevus hadn't slept. Again.
The vehicle bay was all concrete and fluorescent hum, transport trucks lined up like sleeping animals. He found Team Seven loading gear into an armored carrier, and none of them looked happy to see him.
"You're joking," the red-haired woman said. She was smaller than Saevus expected, maybe five-four, but she moved like a knife. "Lyric's sending us a trainee? We're not a fucking daycare."
"Kalia," said the huge man—Orin—from inside the carrier. His voice rumbled like shifting rock. "Be nice."
"Nice? We're clearing a Class-3 rift and she sends us someone who integrated a week ago. That's not nice, that's liability management. When he dies, it's our problem."
"I'm not going to die," Saevus said.
Kalia turned. Her eyes were dark, sharp. "Oh, you can talk. Great. Here's what's going to happen: you stay in the carrier, you don't touch anything, and when we say run, you fucking sprint. Clear?"
"Crystal."
"Good." She went back to loading equipment. "At least you're not arguing. Last trainee we babysat thought he was special. Lasted forty seconds in the Hollow before a Remnant turned his lungs inside out."
Saevus decided not to ask what happened to the body.
The speedster—Trace—appeared next to him. Just suddenly there, no warning. Young, maybe twenty, with the kind of pretty face that probably got him into trouble. "Don't mind Kalia. She's always like this before missions. Something about mortality and fear of inadequacy." He grinned. "I'm Trace. Try to keep up."
Then he was gone, across the bay, back in a blur.
"Show-off," muttered Senna, the barrier user. She was tall, dark-skinned, and looked exhausted. "You're Saevus?"
"Yeah."
"Lyric says you're abnormal. That true, or is she just selling us damaged goods?"
"Probably both."
Senna almost smiled. "Honest. I like that. Stay behind my barriers and you might survive." She climbed into the carrier.
Orin leaned out, saw Saevus still standing there. "You coming or what?"
Saevus climbed in.
The interior was cramped—weapons racks, medical supplies, seats that looked like they'd been designed to be uncomfortable on purpose. Kalia sat across from him, strapping in, still radiating hostility.
"So," she said. "What can you even do? Single Vestige, right? Let me guess—strength enhancement? Speed?"
"Spatial cutting."
Her eyebrows went up. "Huh. Rare. Useful if you know what you're doing, lethal if you don't." She leaned back. "How many cuts can you manifest before you burn out?"
"Haven't hit a limit yet."
"He's lying," she told Orin.
"I'm not lying."
"Everyone has limits. You just haven't found yours, which means you will, at exactly the wrong moment, and probably cut one of us in half."
"I'll aim away from you."
Kalia stared at him. Then laughed, sharp and mean. "Okay. Maybe you're not completely useless."
The carrier lurched into motion. Through the reinforced window, Saevus watched Zenith Span slide past—upper levels first, all chrome and clean, then descending through the mid-tiers where things got dirtier, more cramped. Finally, the Lows.
Home.
"You're from down here," Orin said. Not a question.
"Yeah."
"That'll make evacuation easier. You know the area, the people. They'll trust you."
"No, they won't," Saevus said. "I show up in a Valdris carrier, wearing their gear, telling them to leave their homes? They'll think I sold out. They'll be right."
Silence in the carrier.
"Heavy," Trace said, appearing in the seat next to Saevus. "But like, accurate. Corporate Keepers aren't exactly beloved down here."
"Can you stay still for five seconds?" Kalia snapped.
"Physiologically? No. My Vestige keeps me moving. If I stop, I feel like I'm dying."
"Wish fulfillment."
"You wound me." Trace looked at Saevus. "What'd you do before? Before Valdris?"
"Scavenged. Sold scrap. Picked pockets when scrap was thin."
"Honest work," Orin said.
"Desperate work," Saevus corrected. "There's a difference."
"Is there?" Senna asked. She was checking her gear, not looking at him. "Both keep you alive. Both compromise something. Seems the same to me."
"Spoken like someone who's never been desperate," Kalia said.
"My entire family died in a rift breach when I was nine," Senna replied, still not looking up. "I integrated my first Remnant at ten because I was desperate to protect myself. Don't talk to me about desperation."
Kalia said nothing.
The carrier stopped.
"We're here," Orin announced. "Everyone remember the plan?"
"Secure perimeter," Kalia recited. "Evacuate civilians. Enter the rift. Clear Remnants. Seal the breach. Try not to die."
"That last one's optional," Trace added.
"For you, maybe." Orin stood, had to duck his head in the cramped space. "Saevus. You're with Senna. She keeps you alive, you help with evacuation. If shooting starts, you get behind her barriers and stay there. Understood?"
"Understood."
They exited into gray morning light. The street was familiar—three blocks from Idris's workshop, like Lyric said. Saevus had bought food from that vendor. Slept in that alley once when winter got bad. The faces in windows, watching the Valdris carrier with suspicion and fear, those were people he knew.
The rift was visible now, a tear in the air above an abandoned building. Smaller than the one from a week ago, but growing. The edges shimmered wrong, colors that hurt to look at.
"Class-3," Orin confirmed, checking a scanner. "Four, maybe five Remnants inside. We've got an hour before it destabilizes and attracts worse." He looked at his team. "Move."
Kalia phased and disappeared, scouting ahead. Trace blurred into motion, checking the perimeter. Orin started setting up containment equipment. Senna grabbed Saevus's arm.
"Come on. Let's play the bad guys."
They approached the first building. Senna knocked. The door cracked open—old woman, maybe seventy, staring at them with tired eyes.
"Valdris?" she said.
"Yes, ma'am," Senna replied. Professional. Gentle. "There's a rift nearby. We need to evacuate this block."
"For how long?"
"A few hours. We'll seal it and you can return."
"And if you can't seal it?"
Senna hesitated. "We'll discuss relocation."
"Relocation." The woman laughed, bitter. "You mean you'll bulldoze our homes and put up corporate housing we can't afford. I've seen this before."
"Ma'am, please—"
"I'm not leaving."
"Then we'll have to remove you by force," Senna said, and the gentleness was gone. "I don't want to, but those are my orders."
The woman looked at Saevus. Really looked. "You're Idris's boy. The scavenger."
"Was," Saevus said quietly.
"Now you're theirs." She shook her head. "Shame. I thought you were smarter than that." She closed the door.
Senna raised her hand, barrier manifesting to force entry.
"Wait," Saevus said.
"We don't have time—"
"Give me two minutes."
He knocked again. The door opened.
"Mrs. Halvor," he said. "You remember when the breach happened in sector twelve? Three years ago?"
"Yes."
"Twenty-three people died because they wouldn't evacuate. The rift destabilized, and Remnants came through, and—" He stopped. "Your daughter was friends with the Chen family. They all died."
Mrs. Halvor's face tightened.
"I'm not asking you to trust Valdris," Saevus continued. "I'm asking you to survive. Take your things. Go to the shelter on third street. When this is over, come back. If they try to relocate you, I'll fight it. But right now, you need to leave."
She studied him for a long moment. Then nodded. "Two minutes. I need to pack."
They moved to the next building. And the next. Saevus knew half the names, could speak their language, knew what mattered to them. Most left. A few refused. Senna had to use force twice—barriers pinning people, Orin carrying them bodily to transports.
It felt like betrayal every time.
By the time evacuation was complete, Saevus felt sick.
"You did good," Senna said.
"I feel like shit."
"Yeah. That's the job." She checked her gear. "Ready for the fun part?"
"No."
"Good. Neither am I."
The team assembled at the rift. Kalia materialized next to them, looking grim. "Scouted the interior. Five Remnants, like Orin said. Two Class-D, three Class-C. Nothing we can't handle."
"Formation?" Orin asked.
"Standard. I'll phase scout. Trace on intercept. Orin on heavy. Senna on defense. Trainee in the middle where he can't fuck up."
"I have a name," Saevus said.
"Prove you'll live long enough for me to use it."
Kalia stepped into the rift. Her body flickered, went translucent, disappeared.
"She's pleasant," Saevus muttered.
"She lost her entire squad last year," Senna said quietly. "Deep Hollow expedition. She was the only survivor. So yeah, she's a little protective about team composition."
"Oh."
"Oh." Senna manifested a barrier around herself. "Come on. Stay close."
They entered the rift.
The world inverted.
Not physically—the street was still there, the buildings, the sky. But everything was wrong. Colors too bright and too dark simultaneously. Gravity pulling from weird angles. The air tasted like copper and regret.
This was the Hollow.
"Don't touch anything," Trace said, appearing next to Saevus. "Hollow matter looks solid but it's not. You grab a wall, the wall grabs back. Very unpleasant."
A shriek split the air.
Remnant.
It came from above, something that looked like a bird made of teeth and broken promises. It dove at them, and Trace was already moving, intercepting, striking it mid-flight with impacts that cracked like thunder.
The Remnant exploded into light particles.
"One down," he called.
Two more appeared, crawling out of the building walls. Humanoid, sort of, but their limbs bent wrong and their faces were just screaming mouths.
Orin stepped forward. His arms—metal, Saevus realized, entirely replaced with prosthetics—glowed with internal light. He punched the ground.
The shockwave caught both Remnants, shattered them instantly.
"Two and three," Orin rumbled. "Where's four and five?"
"Found them," Kalia's voice came from nowhere. "They're bigger than expected. Upgrading classification to Class-B."
"Fuck," Senna breathed.
The building in front of them exploded outward. Not from force—from something inside, something massive, forcing its way through. Saevus saw writhing tendrils, too many eyes, geometry that made his brain hurt.
"Get the trainee out!" Kalia shouted.
Senna grabbed Saevus, started pulling him back toward the rift exit.
The second Remnant emerged behind them.
It looked almost human. Tall, thin, wearing tatters of a business suit. But its head was a spiral of screaming faces, rotating slowly, and when it saw them it smiled with too many mouths.
"Oh no," Senna whispered.
The Remnant spoke. Its voice was every voice, layered and wrong.
"KEEPERS. THIEVES. WE REMEMBER YOU."
It raised one hand.
Reality bent.
Senna's barrier shattered like glass. She screamed, thrown back. Saevus saw her hit the ground, not moving.
The Remnant walked toward him.
Trace tried to intercept. The Remnant caught him mid-movement, held him in the air with nothing, squeezed. Trace gasped, struggling, and Saevus heard bones crack.
"WHICH ONE OF YOU TOOK MY NAME?" the Remnant asked.
Kalia phased through it. Attacks passed through like it was smoke.
Orin's punch connected. The Remnant didn't even flinch.
"GIVE IT BACK."
It was going to kill them. All of them. Saevus could see it, the certainty of violence, the mathematics of death.
Tomas was screaming in his head, terror and memory, the moment machinery came down and crushed—
No.
Not terror.
Information.
*Structural weaknesses,* Tomas whispered. *Everything has joints. Everything can be severed.*
Saevus looked at the Remnant. Saw it not as a monster but as a structure. And structures had weak points.
He raised his hand.
"Hey," he said.
The Remnant looked at him.
Saevus pulled.
The spatial cut appeared. Not at the Remnant's body. At the air around it. At the connection between it and the Hollow, the thread that kept it anchored to this reality.
He severed it.
The Remnant froze. The spiral of faces stopped rotating. It looked down at itself, confused.
Then it unraveled. Came apart like badly woven cloth, dissolving into light particles, into nothing.
Silence.
Trace dropped, gasping. Orin stared. Kalia rematerialized, looking at Saevus like he'd grown a second head.
"What," she said, "the fuck was that?"
"I don't know," Saevus said honestly. His nose was bleeding. His head felt like it was splitting. "I just—I saw where to cut."
"That was a Class-B," Orin said. "They don't go down from one hit. Ever."
"Yeah, well." Saevus sat down hard. The world was spinning. "First time for everything."
Senna groaned, sitting up. "Did we win?"
"Trainee won," Kalia said. She sounded offended by the fact.
"Of course he did." Senna stood, wobbled. "What about the other Class-B?"
The building shuddered. The tendril-thing was still inside, thrashing, growing.
"Still a problem," Orin confirmed. "But now we know what we're dealing with. Trainee—Saevus—can you do that again?"
"Maybe. Probably not without passing out."
"Good enough." Orin looked at his team. "Standard formation. Draw it out, hold it down, Saevus cuts the anchor. Everyone agree?"
They agreed.
What happened next was brutal, efficient, and lasted six minutes.
Kalia phased inside the building, provoked the Remnant, led it out.
Orin's metal fists hammered it, keeping it grounded.
Trace struck weak points, over and over, faster than sight.
Senna's barriers contained it, prevented escape.
And when it was pinned, thrashing, screaming in frequencies that made Saevus's ears bleed, he found the anchor point.
He cut.
The Remnant died.
The rift began sealing itself, reality knitting back together.
They stood in a demolished street, covered in blood and Hollow residue, and nobody said anything for a long moment.
"Okay," Kalia said finally. "You can stay."
Saevus nodded.
Then threw up.
"That's fair," Trace said.
---
The carrier ride back was quieter. Senna was asleep, Trace was reading on his phone, Orin was doing maintenance on his prosthetics. Kalia sat across from Saevus, studying him.
"You shouldn't have been able to do that," she said.
"Which part?"
"Any of it. You're an Initiate. One Remnant. You shouldn't be able to perceive anchor points, much less cut them. That's Master-tier shit."
"Maybe I got lucky."
"Luck doesn't work like that in the Hollow." She leaned forward. "What are you?"
"Tired," Saevus said. "And confused. And really hoping I don't have to do that again soon."
"You will. Lyric's going to hear about this. She's going to want to know what makes you special." Kalia smiled, and it wasn't mean this time. "Welcome to the interesting life, kid. It doesn't get easier."
"Great."
"But hey." She leaned back. "You saved our asses. That counts for something."
The carrier pulled into Valdris tower. They unloaded, debriefed, filed reports. Casimir found Saevus in the medical bay getting his nose checked.
"Heard you did well," the trainer said.
"Heard I almost died."
"Same thing in this job." Casimir sat down. "How do you feel?"
"Like I got hit by a train."
"Good. That means you're paying attention." He paused. "The cutting. The anchor points. Did Tomas show you that?"
"Yeah. He knows structures. Weak points. I just... applied it."
"Hmm." Casimir stood. "Get some rest. Tomorrow we train harder. You've proven you can improvise. Now we make sure you can do it consistently."
He left.
Saevus sat alone in the medical bay, staring at his hands. They were shaking. He'd killed two Class-B Remnants today. Saved his team. Helped evict people from their homes.
What the fuck was he becoming?
His phone buzzed. Text from Nox: *heard you were awesome! proud of you!*
And from Idris: *we need to talk. tonight. important.*
Saevus sighed, pocketed the phone, and went to find out what fresh crisis was waiting.
He was starting to think they'd never stop.