Rizer had trained for months on Tartarus, but nothing prepared him for the sheer force of the Odryix general standing across the ruined plains, Drelvak the Devourer. The alien’s silver-and-charcoal armor shimmered beneath the planet’s fractured light, and its hollow black eyes glowed faintly red, already tracking the beat of Rizer’s heart.

  "You feel it, don't you?" Drelvak hissed, taking a step forward. "Your pulse feeding mine. Your gift, I want it."

  Rizer’s fists clenched. The pressure in his skull returned, that unbearable surge behind the eyes he'd learned to fear. But something was different now, his breathing steadied. His fear didn’t shrink, it sharpened.

  From the ridge above, Elias and the strike team watched. Elias shifted, eyes narrowed. His bracelet, the one Kiera made, pulsed gently.

  Rizer took a step forward, the earth cracking beneath him.

  "Come and take it then," he growled.

  Drelvak launched first—blinding speed. Rizer ducked, sidestepped, and slammed his hand against the Odryix’s chest. A shockwave blasted outward. The dirt fractured. Trees twisted.

  The psionic energy flared, wild, barely contained. His vision blurred with blue light.

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  Rizer staggered back, coughing blood.

  Still too unstable.

  Drelvak grinned, unfazed. "You've got power, boy. But no control. It will kill you before I do."

  Before he could lunge again, the sound of breaking stone echoed. Elias dropped from the ledge behind Drelvak, silent, eyes glowing silver.

  The ground trembled.

  Drelvak turned—but too late.

  Elias screamed—not in fear, but rage—and drove his fist into Drelvak's chest. Not a punch, an impact. Like a gravitational collapse focused into one strike.

  The Odryix howled, armour cracking. His chest cavity folded in, ribs crushed like tin.

  But Elias wasn’t done. He stepped forward, seized the alien by the neck, and lifted him with unnatural strength.

  “Don’t touch my brother,” Elias growled, voice layered, human and something more.

  Then he crushed the Odryix’s throat and hurled the corpse into the ravine.

  Silence.

  The squad stared in awe.

  Rizer wiped blood from his chin, eyes wide. “Elias…”

  His little brother turned, breathing hard, and for a moment… he looked like something else entirely.

  Not evil. Not alien. Just..vast.

  Then he collapsed to one knee, shaking.

  Back at base, the reports flooded in. Gaia-9 had been attacked. A sabotage, internal. Three were dead. A reactor damaged. And someone was missing: a junior technician named Laziel Thorn, former engineer, turned traitor. The name was already being whispered in war rooms.

  And beneath the crust of Earth, in the drowned cities and suffocating dark, Adelpha Rae lit a single match in a cavern lined with hand-drawn maps.

  “We move at dawn,” she said to her rebels. “They won’t see us coming.”