The Triangle did not strike back immediately.
That hesitation was not mercy.
It was accounting.
For the first time since Oversight had noticed Dreyden Stella as something more than a statistical anomaly, it had encountered resistance that did not spike, flare, or protest. No threats had been issued. No rules had been broken. No language had been used that could be cleanly categorized as hostile.
Which meant retaliation would have to be justified.
And justification required an audience.
By morning, the academy's internal messaging layers began to synchronize.
Schedules aligned.
Evaluation windows widened.
Observation permissions escalated quietly across multiple departments.
Nothing announced.
Everything prepared.
Dreyden sensed it the way one sensed pressure before a storm—not through instinct or emotion, but through alignment. Too many systems were adjusting toward a single point in time.
Lucas felt it differently.
