The Hidden Meeting
In the ruined underlevels of Sector 17-D, a group gathered by candlelight.
Not a cult.
Not a rebellion.
A conversation.
Ordinary citizens—dockworkers, medics, technicians—sat cross-legged, sharing strange, similar stories:
Dreams of bridges and glyphs.
Moments of sudden clarity.
A presence they couldn't name but somehow trusted.
At the center, Jalen raised a trembling hand and said:
"I don't know what this means.
But I know we're not crazy."
They weren't forming a doctrine.
They were forming trust.
And that made them dangerous.
The Strike Team
At 02:47 AM, Lysa authorized a soft intervention.
No lethal force.
Just dispersal gas and memory scrubs.
A Sterile Response Unit deployed—silent and masked.
Their orders were clear:
"No speaking. No engagement. No recognition. They are vectors, not people."
But orders meant little when reality refused to cooperate.
Because when the strike team moved in—
—half of them froze.
Froze mid-step, glyph patterns flickering in their retinal implants.
They had been touched too.
Broken Formation
The team fractured instantly.
Some agents ripped off their masks and fled into the night.
Some knelt beside the gathering citizens, openly weeping.
One officer dropped his scrambler unit and whispered:
"It's beautiful."
Only a handful remained loyal to protocol.
Shots were fired.
Tear gas bloomed.
But the citizens didn't fight back.
They stood.
Silent.
Unyielding.
And the glyph shimmered faintly above them, a collective act of will.
Lysa's Breaking Point
Watching the chaos unfold through surveillance feeds, Lysa gripped the edge of her console until her knuckles whitened.
This wasn't supposed to happen.
They were supposed to be isolated anomalies. Not... a choir.
Her superior's voice barked in her ear:
"Escalate to lethal! Wipe them now!"
But Lysa didn't move.
She couldn't.
Because on one screen, among the faces illuminated by glyph-light, she saw her sister.
Standing tall.
Unafraid.
Free.
Elior's Vigil
Miles away, Elior stood beneath the sanctuary's crumbling dome, feeling the ripples of conflict.
He didn't smile.
He didn't celebrate.
He simply whispered:
"Now they'll show their true faces."
Mira approached, wide-eyed:
"We need to prepare. If they start hunting the Awakened—"
Elior shook his head slowly.
"We don't prepare for war, Mira.
We prepare for witness."
He looked up at the stars—or where stars should have been.
"Faith isn't a weapon. It's a mirror."
And tonight, everyone would see what was reflected.