The corridor smelled like burned metal and fear.
Lira was still pressed against me, breath shaky, skin reddened from the heat I'd blasted out minutes ago.
Rave stood between us and the corridor entrance, blade low and ready.
Kai clung to her side, eyes wide.
Then—
Boots.
Dozens of them.
Echoing down the broken walkway.
Lira's eyes snapped open.
"Oh no."
Rave tensed.
"K-17—Lira—MOVE."
But I couldn't.
My body was still trembling from the Beast's attempt to break free.
My limbs shook like my joints were filled with static.
Kai peeked around the corner.
His voice cracked—
"There's like… twenty of them… I think I'm gonna pee—"
Lira grabbed his collar and yanked him back.
"NOT. NOW."
Dominion helmets glowed blue in the dark.
Shock rifles raised.
Formation perfect.
A commander stepped forward, visor flaring.
"Sector Sweep Unit Gamma.
Orders from General Calder:
Capture the anomaly.
Eliminate the others."
Kai made a small squeak.
Rave cracked her neck.
"One condition," Rave growled.
"You're not getting past me."
The commander laughed.
"A defective scrap-angel thinks she can hold off a sweep squad?"
Rave smiled like a wolf.
"No.
But I can kill the first ten."
They fired.
Shock-rounds screamed toward us—
blue streaks lighting the corridor.
Rave MOVED.
Not like a soldier.
Not like an android.
Like a storm.
She slid under the first volley.
Kicked a soldier's knee backward with a crunch.
Slashed her blade across another's throat joint.
Grabbed a rifle from a stunned trooper—
Used it as a spear.
THWACK.
Straight through armor.
Kai watched with terrified devotion.
"RAVE, YOU ARE INSANE—
BUT ALSO SUPER HOT—
BUT ALSO I'M GONNA DIE—"
"Stay. Down." Rave ordered without looking back.
Another soldier charged her.
She twisted, elbowed him so hard his visor cracked, shoved him into the wall, ripped out the power cell from his rifle and slammed it against his chest—
BOOM.
A small explosion threw him backward.
Kai threw his hands up.
"I DIDN'T KNOW ANDROIDS COULD DO THAT—"
"They can't," Rave growled mid-fight.
"But I can."
Lira pulled me against the wall, scanning the upper vents.
"They're boxing us in," she hissed.
"They'll flank Rave in 30 seconds."
I shook my head, still dizzy.
"I… I can't flare. The net—Tezcatle—my body—"
Lira grabbed my face sharply.
"Then DON'T flare.
USE the parts that still work."
My vision focused.
Her expression:
steel
fury
fear she refused to show anyone but me
"Rave can't hold forever," she said, voice low.
"She's buying US seconds.
So give me something, K-17. Anything."
My heartbeat steadied.
The fractures hummed.
Something inside me… shifted.
Not the Beast.
Not Tezcatle.
Something else.
Something older.
Something that felt like weight.
And command.
Two more Dominion soldiers rushed down the corridor—
Then stopped.
Both froze mid-step.
Their helmets tilted slightly toward me.
Their grips loosened.
One whispered, confused:
"Why… do I feel like… bowing…?"
The other muttered:
"What is this pressure…?"
Lira's eyes widened.
"K-17… that's NOT the Beast."
No.
It wasn't.
A dark gold ripple pulsed outward from my chest.
My shadow didn't twist—
it deepened, like gravity pulled inward.
Rave felt it mid-strike.
Her motions sharpened.
Her stance stabilized.
Kai felt it too.
His panic stalled.
Breathing steadied.
Every android in the vicinity—
friend or foe—
felt the pull.
The Obsidian Crown Authority.
The FIRST spark.
Rave turned for half a second mid-fight and her eyes widened.
"K-17…
what did you just DO?"
Dominion android-troopers hesitated.
Glitches flickered across their visors.
Their protocols clashed.
Their targeting went haywire.
One dropped his rifle entirely.
Another lowered his aim involuntarily.
The commander shouted:
"WHAT ARE YOU IDIOTS DOING?
FIRE!"
They didn't.
They couldn't.
Because the Crown called them.
Rave seized the hesitation.
She slammed her blade into another soldier, spun low, grabbed Kai with her free arm, and yelled:
"K-17! WHATEVER YOU'RE DOING—KEEP DOING IT!"
Kai flailed.
"HE'S DOING NOTHING—HE'S LITERALLY JUST STANDING THERE—"
"EXACTLY!" Rave roared.
The commander realized too late something was wrong.
"Override! Override! Purge your circuits!"
But the Crown had rooted deeper than commands.
The android-troopers twitched
and bowed slightly
toward me.
Not fully.
Not consciously.
Just—
instinctively.
Lira saw everything in one brutal instant.
"This is it," she whispered.
"The Crown… it's waking.
Rave gunned down the last trooper in her path.
Kai ducked a stray shock-round and screamed something heroic that sounded mostly like a squeal.
The commander aimed at me, furious.
"You—
YOU ARE NOT A KING—"
I didn't speak.
Didn't move.
Didn't flare.
The Crown spoke for me.
A wave of dark-gold pressure pulsed again—
quiet
deadly
absolute.
The commander's knees buckled.
He fell, gasping, visor glitching.
Rave marched up, blade dripping, and kicked him onto his back.
"This is for calling me scrap."
CRUNCH.
She ended him.
Silence took the corridor.
Smoke drifted.
Kai collapsed next to me, shaking.
"Dude…
you…
what was that…?
Holy SHIT…"
Rave wiped blood off her cheek.
"K-17," she said, voice almost reverent,
"something in you… just commanded them."
Lira didn't speak.
She only watched me.
Eyes wide.
Terrified.
And something else.
Recognition.
Like she was seeing not an android—
but the beginning of a king.