It was the rhythm of the train that woke .
Not violently, but steadily. Like a heartbeat that wasn’t mine. tal humming beneath , the vibrations curling through my sore muscles, reminding that I was barely alive and still moving forward.
I opened my eyes to the ceiling of the train cabin. Fluorescent lights flickered weakly above, the dim blue of early morning leaking through the windows. The world outside sped past in blurs of trees and tal and smoke.
I shifted slightly.
Pain reminded I wasn’t out of the woods. Literally or taphorically.
My ribs were wrapped, but sloppily. My thigh wound had clotted, but not cleanly. There was dried blood on my fingers, on my chest, crusted along my jaw. My coat had been peeled off and lay folded on the seat across from , half-torn, still soaked. The rest of my gear looked like it had crawled through hell which, in a sense, it had.
I wasn’t alone.
Anthony sat in the seat opposite, arms crossed, eyes shut but not asleep. His foot tapped in restless intervals. Elliot leaned by the window nearby, his head against the glass, eyes tracking the landscape. And Anika sat between them, arms tucked around herself. Her blindfold laid on her eyes.
I sat up with a grunt.
That got their attention.
"Still alive," I said, voice rough.
"Barely," Anthony muttered, not opening his eyes.
"You really ran a marathon straight out of a forest brawl with a bear?" Elliot asked, incredulous.
"More like sprinted into insanity," I muttered, pulling my coat toward . "The bear was... not planned. Actually...how did you know I fought a bear?"
My earlier response provoked a small, reluctant laugh from Anika which I took as a win.
Anthony’s eyes finally opened as he got up and pointed at the claw marks on my body. "Boss...It sure isn’t a deer that did that. You alright?"
"Define ’alright.’" I stretched, winced. "I’ll live."
I dug into my coat’s interior, finding the small dkit I’d bought less than 24 hours ago. I snapped it open, pulling out disinfectant, gauze, and stitching thread.
"Still wish Alexis was here," I said under my breath. "She was good at this part."
Elliot blinked. "You an the patching-you-up part?"
"No. I an the fixing-things-when-I-break part." I hissed as I poured the antiseptic over my ribs. "And yes, that includes ."
"You said a bear," Anika said slowly, eyes narrowed. "What happened?"
I paused for a mont, reeling back through the haze. "After I left you three at the park... I ran for an hour or two through the trees. I didn’t know how far I needed to go to be completely out of sight, but I figured going for as far as possible was a no brainer."
I started threading the needle.
"Everything was good, since I went in a straight line, the way back was equally simple. Then I heard it. A growl behind ."
I gestured to a long gouge across my shoulder. "Clawed down the back. Had to slide beneath it and jab it in the eye with a branch. Broke my knife earlier, and... well, let’s just say bears aren’t fans of surprises."
Anika winced. Elliot looked vaguely nauseated.
"And you won?" Anthony asked.
I tried stretching, but quickly realized I couldn’t. "Yeah, after knocking it over, it stopped moving. That counts as a win."
"Damn Boss," Anthony muttered. "You’ve got either a death wish or guardian angels."
"Maybe both."
I paused, setting down the needle halfway through a stitch.
"I’ve been thinking about the attack," I said. "Back in the park. It was clear that the subjects were from the Cain Protocol from how they moved and how they didn’t attack anyone else."
"You think it was planned?" Elliot asked.
"No. I think it was a last second decision."
They all looked at .
"The Cain Protocol was made to be hidden. Why would they want to put the subjects into public? Unless, sothing is happening to so facilities and they can no longer keep them. And what if they assud that Connor had successfully captured ? Now from their perspective, they have a bunch of suspects that they don’t need and they can easily release them as long as their mories are wiped, since with being captured, they can never activate."
Anthony’s face darkened. "You’re saying they dumped mory-wiped weapons into cities just to cover their tracks?"
"Or to minimize the fallout," I said quietly. "If the containnt failed, soone gave the order to let them blend into the population. Bet they thought most of them would never activate again."
"But we activated them," Anika whispered.
I nodded. "When we walked into that park, the civilians saw and their inner protocol was activated. That caused more attention and more and more hidden subjects kept on looking at ."
Anthony cursed.
"I thought," I continued, "that with you back," I said, glancing at him, "and Elliot and Anika safe, with the skills I’ve developed since the station, we’d have so kind of advantage."
I glanced down at my hands, the stained gauze between my fingers.
"But sothing’s wrong."
Elliot frowned. "What do you an?"
"My Instinct skill. It’s leveled to 8 now. But even at level 7, it was strong enough that I should be able to tell, subconsciously, which direction leads to safety, opportunity, danger, or death. It usually whispers to when I’m about to make the wrong call and sotis it makes decisions that are straight up predicting the future. But when I was initially debating my choices, when I had to decide whether to head to Evelyn or stop for supplies..."
I paused. That mory haunted more than the bear.
"It didn’t say anything. No nudge. No tingle. Just... silence."
Anthony leaned forward. "You think it’s broken?"
"No," I said. "I think it ans that I was unsure."
Elliot caught on. "That both options lead to bad things. Since we got Anthony here and so of your skills levelled up...It ans that sothing bad is going to happen to balance all this out and explain why your Instinct skill wasn’t sure about choosing to make a pit stop."
I nodded slowly. "Sothing big is coming. Big enough to shake the scales. And it’s coming soon."
We all went quiet.
Only the sound of the train and the distant moan of tal curves broke the silence.
I pulled the last stitch tight and bit the thread off with my teeth. Leaned back.
"That’s why we need to be ready," I said. "Because the mont we get off this train, things change."
—
The next morning, the world outside the train had brightened into dull gray.
City buildings rose like teeth in the fog, industrial lines and banners hanging loose in the wind. We had gone so far eastward that there wasn’t many countries left as stops. Just this one where Evelyn is and one more right after.
Connor had said Evelyn was being held here, the thought made slightly anxious.
I stood in the train hallway, coat back on, shoulders squared despite the pain. I’d taken a minute to fix my hair, clean the worst of the blood, look like soone with control even if I felt none of it.
Anthony ca up beside , eyes forward.
"You ready for this?"
"No," I said honestly. "But that hasn’t stopped before."
Elliot joined us, Anika behind him, the blindfold now around her eyes again. She walked more carefully now, her head tilted slightly like she was listening to everything.
The train slowed.
And then, at last, it hissed to a stop.
We stepped onto the platform—and imdiately noticed sothing was off.
No guards. No checkpoints. Just a few pedestrians. So news drones hovered overhead. A few journalists in long coats stood further down the street, peering past the chain-link fences ahead.
I moved forward, the others at my side until we reached the center of the city.
The Ministry building should have been towering, intact, fortified.
Instead...
It was rubble.
Half-demolished.
Steel and concrete torn apart like soone had decided to make a point. Dust lingered in the air. Construction crews were still hauling debris.
"What the hell?" Anthony muttered.
And then—
A ping.
Bright. Sharp. System-born.
[SYSTEM NOTIFICATION: Event Quest Received]
I blinked, and the words unfolded in front of like a banner of fire.
[EVENT QUEST: Ministry on the Move]
The Ministry Building has fallen and the reasoning has not been publicly disclosed.
Objective:
Uncover the new location of the Ministry.
Deliver the truth to the public before misinformation spreads.
Optional: Secure an interview with a Ministry official.
Reward:
Journalist (A-Rank)
???
Tir: 48:00:00
I exhaled, staring at the ruins.
"So much for walking in," Elliot said grimly.
I turned toward the journalists, already whispering among themselves, raising caras as they all started reading the Event Quest.
I squared my shoulders.
"As if so rubble is going to stop us..." I muttered.
I looked back at the others.
"Ti to find Evelyn."
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