Wind moved steadily across the tower, threading through the metal lattice and humming softly in the crossbeams. From this height Groom Lake looked orderly, almost peaceful — clean lines of light, slow vehicle movement, patrols tracing predictable paths along the perimeter. Distance made everything appear controlled.

  Eric rested his forearms against the railing and let his gaze drift across the base. The lights stretched outward into the desert until they thinned into darkness. Beyond that, only open land and sky remained. The air carried a dry chill that sharpened his breathing and kept his thoughts clear whether he wanted them clear or not.

  Celeste stood beside him, close enough that he could feel her presence through the cold air. She faced the horizon, posture steady, hands resting along the rail. She had not spoken since he arrived.

  Footsteps and engines moved far below them, faint and distant. A truck crossed a floodlit lane. Two soldiers paused to watch it pass, then resumed their patrol. Life continued beneath them, organized and methodical.

  He searched for another subject to speak about and found none worth using.

  “—Oryx.”

  Eric’s shoulders tightened before he could stop the reaction. His eyes closed briefly, and he drew a slow breath through his nose. The cold air settled in his chest and stayed there.

  He turned his head toward her.

  Moonlight caught her eyes, bright and unwavering. She waited without prompting, without accusation, giving him space that felt narrower than any confinement.

  His attention dropped to the railing between his hands. Metal cooled his palms through the skin.

  “You remember Sacra,” he said quietly.

  Her expression changed by a fraction. Recognition reached her before any question did.

  “The Cave of Sacra,” she said.

  Eric nodded once.

  “His Majesty sent all of us,” he continued. “Shard production stopped. No warning. Every team that entered before us disappeared.”

  Her gaze held steady on him. “I remember.”

  “We expected resistance,” Eric said. “A rebel force. Sabotage. Something we could see.”

  He paused, eyes fixed on the desert beyond the lights.

  “The wells were intact. The condensers were still running. Storage crates still sealed. Nothing broken. Nothing disturbed.”

  He swallowed, voice tightening slightly.

  “There were no workers.”

  Wind passed between them again, stirring strands of Celeste’s hair.

  “No bodies,” he added.

  Celeste said nothing.

  Eric’s hands closed around the railing, fingers whitening against the metal.

  “It was quiet,” he said. “Too quiet for a place that should have been full of life.”

  He hesitated, jaw setting as the memory continued to surface.

  “We spread out,” he went on. “Standard search pattern. I thought we would find signs deeper inside.”

  His breathing slowed deliberately.

  “Vaelor spoke first.”

  Celeste’s eyes sharpened.

  “He called out from the second chamber,” Eric said. “I turned to answer him.”

  A pause.

  “When I reached him… he was already drawing power.”

  Eric’s gaze lowered.

  “I thought he had found an enemy.”

  His voice softened.

  “There was no enemy.”

  He lifted his head slightly, meeting her eyes again.

  “He looked at me,” Eric said, “and he didn’t know who I was.”

  Celeste did not interrupt him.

  The wind moved steadily across the tower, tugging lightly at their clothes, but neither of them noticed it anymore. Eric’s focus had shifted inward, fixed on a place far removed from the desert and the lights below.

  “Vaelor kept gathering mana,” Eric said. “Not channeling it. Pulling it in.”

  He stared past the horizon, seeing stone instead of sand.

  “At first I thought he had discovered something — a hidden chamber, a creature, a defense mechanism. I called his name.” His fingers tightened slightly along the railing. “He didn’t answer. He just… kept drawing.”

  Celeste’s voice came quietly. “He attacked you.”

  Eric shook his head.

  “No. Not at first.”

  He swallowed, remembering.

  “He turned toward me slowly. There was no recognition in his eyes. No anger. No command challenge. He looked at me the same way a hunter looks at prey it doesn’t understand yet.”

  A breath left him unsteadily.

  “I kept talking to him. I thought if I could get him to focus, if I could ground him, whatever had affected him might pass.” He closed his eyes briefly. “I stepped closer.”

  His jaw tightened.

  “He struck before I finished his name.”

  Celeste’s hand shifted slightly on the railing, but she stayed silent.

  “I didn’t strike back,” Eric continued. “I restrained him. I thought he was confused, injured, poisoned. I tried to pin him, to burn off the excess mana he was pulling in.”

  He exhaled slowly.

  “He screamed when I did.”

  Not a sound of pain — the memory carried something else.

  The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

  “Not pain,” Eric said quietly. “Hunger.”

  The word lingered between them.

  “I realized then something was wrong in a way I didn’t understand.”

  His gaze drifted downward toward the base lights far below.

  “The Galea Panzer Sharia came next. She attacked me while I was still holding Vaelor.” His voice roughened. “I thought she was trying to help him.”

  He paused.

  “She went for my throat.”

  Celeste’s breathing slowed slightly.

  “I still wouldn’t fight them,” Eric said. “They were ours. I kept calling their names. I tried to restrain them, disarm them, slow them. Every moment I delayed, another joined.”

  His shoulders lowered as the memory settled fully into him.

  “One became three. Three became five.”

  The tower felt colder.

  “They weren’t coordinating,” he said. “They weren’t thinking tactically. They weren’t even attacking each other. They all focused on me.”

  Celeste frowned slightly. “Why you?”

  Eric’s answer came quietly.

  “I was the strongest source of mana in the cavern.”

  Silence followed that realization.

  “I was feeding them,” he said.

  He looked at his hands.

  “Every time I blocked, they drew more. Every time I pushed them away, they pulled harder. The wells weren’t empty — they were priming them. Something in Sacra was turning them into vessels and I stood in the center of it.”

  His breathing grew slower, more controlled, as if he were pacing himself through the memory.

  “I tried to flee deeper into the cavern to draw them away from the entrance,” he said. “I hoped distance might break whatever hold the place had on them.”

  He shook his head faintly.

  “They followed. All of them. No hesitation. No coordination. Just hunger.”

  Celeste’s voice softened. “You could have ended it early.”

  Eric closed his eyes.

  “Yes.”

  The admission came without defense.

  “I should have.”

  His voice dropped.

  “I didn’t.”

  He drew a slow breath.

  “I kept trying to bring them back. I kept believing if I held long enough, they would recognize me again.”

  The wind passed over them again, colder now.

  “They never did.”

  His grip tightened along the rail.

  “The fighting stopped feeling like fighting,” he said quietly. “It started feeling like something else.”

  He hesitated.

  “Like… I understood what they were doing.”

  Celeste watched him carefully.

  “They weren’t just attacking,” Eric continued. “They were reaching for something. And a part of me… reached back.”

  His voice lowered further.

  “I remember the moment I realized I wasn’t only resisting anymore.”

  He stared at the ground far below.

  “I was answering.”

  The words hung in the air.

  Celeste didn’t speak. She didn’t move away either.

  Eric kept his eyes on the lights below the tower, but they were no longer Groom Lake. In his mind the ground had become uneven stone, the air thick with gathered mana, the cavern echoing with impacts that never quite stopped.

  “I tried to pull back,” he said quietly. “I knew something was wrong the moment I felt it answer me.”

  His fingers flexed once along the railing, as if remembering resistance against his grip.

  “They kept drawing power from me. I told myself I could endure it — hold them until the surge burned out. I stopped striking altogether. I focused on defense. Restraint. Anything that kept them alive long enough to recover.”

  His breathing slowed deliberately.

  “Vaelor broke free first.”

  He swallowed.

  “He spoke. I thought for a moment he had come back.” A faint tremor touched his voice. “He said my name.”

  Eric paused.

  “He wasn’t speaking to me. He was reacting to what he sensed.”

  Celeste watched him carefully. “What did he sense?”

  Eric closed his eyes.

  “Food.”

  The wind brushed across the tower again, and this time he noticed it.

  “I remember trying to leave the chamber,” he continued. “If I could get far enough away, I thought they might stop. I moved toward a lower well corridor and they followed. Every one of them. Not strategy. Instinct.”

  His hands tightened.

  “The deeper we went, the stronger it became. The cavern amplified everything. Their power. Mine.”

  He shook his head faintly.

  “I started drawing too.”

  He did not look at her when he said it.

  “I didn’t decide to. I didn’t want to. But once it began… I understood how to do it. I understood what they were doing because I could feel the same hunger inside me.”

  His voice grew quieter.

  “I was no longer only trying to save them. I was trying to stop myself.”

  Celeste’s posture shifted, barely perceptible.

  “What happened then?” she asked softly.

  Eric’s jaw tightened.

  “I remember fighting to keep control. Every strike I turned aside, every blast I deflected. I refused to strike with intent to kill.” His voice strained slightly. “I kept calling their names. I kept telling them to focus, to recognize me.”

  His eyes opened slowly.

  “They kept coming.”

  A pause.

  “And then… I stopped feeling tired.”

  He looked at his hands again.

  “The pain faded first. Then the effort. Everything became clear. Simple.” His breathing slowed further. “The hunger stopped hurting.”

  Celeste’s fingers curled slightly around the railing.

  “I realized I wasn’t holding them back anymore,” Eric said. “I was matching them.”

  The words came slower now.

  “Then… nothing.”

  He drew a long breath.

  “I don’t remember the end of the fight.”

  Silence returned to the tower.

  “When I came to,” he continued, “the cavern was still.”

  His voice was almost steady.

  “No echoes. No impacts. No power surges.”

  He stared straight ahead.

  “There were scorch marks along the stone. Claw furrows in the floor. Collapsed pillars. The wells were cracked from the strain.”

  His throat tightened.

  “And there was no one left.”

  Celeste didn’t move.

  “I searched the chamber,” he said. “I called their names. I kept expecting one of them to answer.”

  His eyes closed again.

  “There were no bodies.”

  A long pause followed.

  “Only traces of mana,” he said. “Faint. Residual.”

  His shoulders lowered slightly.

  “And mine… was everywhere.”

  The wind brushed across the tower again.

  Eric’s voice dropped to nearly a whisper.

  “It has been almost twenty years.”

  He finally looked at her.

  His eyes were wet, but steady.

  “I still remember the taste.”

  Celeste’s breath caught.

  Eric held her gaze.

  “I can’t forget it.”

  For a long moment Celeste didn’t move.

  The wind passed between them, carrying the dry scent of desert sand up to the tower, but the night around them felt heavy and close. Her hands remained on the railing, knuckles pale against the metal.

  “You left after that,” she said at last, her voice quiet but steady. “You didn’t come back.”

  Eric lowered his gaze.

  “No,” he said. “I didn’t.”

  She turned toward him fully now. “Why?”

  He didn't answer immediately. The question had waited years; it deserved more than the first words he found.

  “I reported it,” he said finally.

  Her brow tightened slightly. “To who?”

  “To His Majesty.”

  The title came naturally, without hesitation.

  “I went straight to him after Sacra. I didn’t stop anywhere else. I didn’t speak to the others. I didn’t even clean the blood from my armor before entering the hall.” His hands rested loosely against the rail now, no longer gripping. “I told him everything.”

  Celeste watched him closely.

  “I did not claim confusion. I did not claim loss of control,” he continued. “It didn’t matter whether I remembered each moment clearly. The result was the same. Five under my command were dead because I had failed to stop what I had become.”

  He drew a slow breath.

  “A weapon that cannot be trusted cannot remain in the field.”

  Her voice sharpened. “You were not a weapon. You were—”

  “I was responsible,” Eric said gently.

  The interruption carried no force, only certainty.

  “I stood before him and asked for exile before I became something worse.” His gaze remained fixed beyond the tower, on a point she could not see. “He refused.”

  Celeste’s eyes narrowed slightly. “Refused?”

  “A ruler does not exile a catastrophe,” Eric said. “He ends it.”

  Silence followed.

  “He listened,” Eric went on. “He asked no comfort of me and offered none. When I finished, he pronounced judgment.”

  His voice remained level.

  “I was to be executed for crimes against the realm and those placed under my command.”

  The words did not shake him now. He had lived with them too long.

  Celeste’s lips parted slightly. “And you… accepted it?”

  “Yes.”

  The answer came without hesitation.

  “I had already judged myself before I entered that hall,” he said. “His words only confirmed what I knew.”

  Her eyes searched his face. “You didn’t argue?”

  “There was nothing to argue.” A faint breath escaped him. “I did not ask mercy. I did not deserve it.”

  He looked down at his hands.

  “I prepared for death.”

  The wind shifted again, stirring his hair. Far below, a vehicle crossed the base road and vanished behind a hangar.

  “I remember kneeling,” he said quietly. “I remember the hall. The light on the stone. I remember thinking the others would be safe after that.”

  He paused.

  “And then I woke up.”

  Celeste’s brow tightened. “Where?”

  “Here,” he said simply. “Earth.”

  He looked up at her.

  “No armor. No wings. No power. Just… human.”

  Her expression shifted from anger to confusion. “You never tried to come back.”

  Eric shook his head.

  “I couldn’t,” he said. “I had no power left, and no path between worlds. But that was not why I stayed.”

  He held her gaze.

  “The judgment was complete. Whatever His Majesty did, it removed what I was. Returning would have meant risking its return as well.”

  His voice softened.

  “I believed I had already died to your world.”

  The admission lingered in the air.

  “I stayed away because it was the only way I knew to keep you safe,” he said.

  The tower fell silent again. Below them, the base continued its quiet routine, unaware of the weight carried above it.

  Eric exhaled slowly.

  “I never stopped remembering you,” he added. “I simply believed you were safer if I remained gone.”

  Celeste did not answer immediately.

  She stepped closer instead, the distance between them narrowing to almost nothing. Moonlight reflected in her eyes — no longer only anger, but something deeper and far harder to read.

  Eric waited.

  For the first time since she had arrived, he had nothing left to hide.

  And now the answer was hers.