Keegan woke before the monitors changed rhythm. The room was quiet, dimmed to a sterile twilight that made it difficult to tell how much time had passed. His body felt heavier than before, not with pain, but with awareness. Every breath came easily now, supported, regulated, measured. The blood transfusion had finished sometime during his sleep, leaving behind a faint warmth in his chest. He flexed his fingers slowly, testing sensation and control. Everything responded, but nothing felt entirely his anymore.
A Guild examiner entered without knocking. Their coat bore the insignia of field oversight rather than medical staff, and their eyes immediately went to the IV port, then to Keegan's pupils. "You're conscious earlier than expected," they noted, voice neutral. Keegan didn't respond, watching instead as the examiner activated a recording slate. "This is not disciplinary," they continued. "This is an assessment." That single word carried more weight than any threat. Assessment decides futures.
The examiner began listing facts rather than questions. Mid-tier Hemarch neutralized. One E-rank Knife Hemarch eliminated post-collapse. Severe blood depletion followed by spontaneous shutdown of Pact activity. Keegan listened in silence, jaw tight. Each sentence confirmed what he already knew but hadn't yet accepted. He had survived, yes—but survival had come dangerously close to becoming a liability. The Guild did not reward instability.
"You exceeded your biological tolerance," the examiner said calmly. "Your Hemarch did not." That sentence lingered. Keegan glanced at his arm, where the fragment lay dormant beneath skin and muscle. There was no response, no flicker of shadow, no panther eyes watching the room. The Blink Hemarch was conserving, not absent. That distinction mattered more than comfort.
The examiner adjusted the slate. "Your Pact is blood-reactive," they said. "It does not activate from will alone." Keegan finally spoke, his voice quiet. "So if I run dry," he said, "I will die." The examiner shook their head slightly. "No," they corrected. "If you run dry, you become ordinary." That was worse.
After the evaluation concluded, the room felt smaller. Keegan lay back, staring at the ceiling tiles, replaying the dockyard in fragments. Rage. Collapse. Silence. Power had not saved him—timing had. If help had arrived later, no amount of Blink would have mattered. That realization settled heavily in his chest. Strength without planning was just a faster way to fail.
A nurse returned to disconnect the IV, movements efficient and impersonal. "You'll be released to monitored recovery," she said. "No field activity for forty-eight hours." Keegan nodded, though the restriction grated against him. Two days felt like an eternity in a city that produced Hemarchs daily. But his body agreed with the decision even if his mind didn't. The fragment remained quiet.
When he stood for the first time, his legs held—but only barely. Weakness tremored through his muscles, subtle but persistent. He took a few careful steps, leaning against the bedframe until the dizziness passed. No Blink. No reflex enhancement. Just balance and breath. It felt honest, in a way the power hadn't.
Later, alone again, Keegan tested the edge of the Pact. He focused inward, reaching for the familiar tension that preceded Blink activation. Nothing responded. No whisper. No shadow. The Hemarch was locked down, either by design or by choice. For the first time since the docks, Keegan felt something close to relief.
That relief didn't last. He understood now that the Blink Hemarch wasn't a weapon he wielded. It was a system that responded to supply and demand. Blood in, power out. No exceptions. No heroics. That clarity stripped the fantasy away, leaving only arithmetic. And arithmetic didn't care how angry he was.
As evening settled, a faint pulse stirred beneath his skin. Not activation—acknowledgment. The panther didn't emerge, but Keegan felt its attention return, distant and controlled. It had learned something from the collapse. So had he. That mutual adjustment felt dangerous in a way raw hostility never was.
Keegan lay back down, eyes open, breathing steady. He had survived evaluation, surgery, and scrutiny. Tomorrow would bring training restrictions, monitoring tags, and a reputation he hadn't asked for. Power hadn't made things simpler. It had made them narrower. And somewhere in that narrowing space, Keegan would either learn discipline—or run out of blood again.