The central sanctum of the Bastion was never meant to be reached. It was built beneath layers of security — pressure-locked steel, biometric seals, kinetic-null zones — the kind of fortress meant to withstand even the worst-case uprisings.
But they hadn't planned for Asher and the Shatterborn.
Smoke and flickering lights followed in their wake. Sirens spun in confused, conflicting tones. Echo's seismic tremors still vibrated beneath the foundation, a constant reminder that the undercity had risen.
Rafe knelt at the last major lock, his amplifier gauntlet wired into the vault's ancient tech interface. "Give me ten seconds."
"You've got five," Zara said, her voice steady, her gaze on the corridor behind them. Already she could feel the ripple of new energy signatures closing in — reinforcements, no doubt triggered by the central breach.
Rafe smiled. "Four and a half, then."
Mira had already mapped the sanctum's layout — a vast chamber known as the Mindcore, the data heart of the Bastion. Not just records, not just surveillance. It was the digital brain of the Regime. Containing archives, Shatterborn histories, control algorithms — and the evidence they needed to bring the Enclave's truth into the light.
The lock hissed open with a metallic groan.
The doors slid apart, revealing a vast circular chamber with a descending glass floor and walls wrapped in glowing data streams — pulses of light and code cascading around them in silence.
At the center stood a pedestal, humming with dormant energy. It looked almost ordinary — like a simple server console — but Mira's breath caught the moment she stepped inside.
"That's it," she whispered. "The Mindcore."
Silas moved to the far side, taking up position by the only other entrance. His eye glinted beneath his scope. "We don't have long."
Asher stepped forward slowly, eyes locked on the pedestal.
He could feel it — a pulse that matched the Judgement inside him. This wasn't just code or memory. It was conscious data. Ancient. Alive.
"What are we looking for?" he asked, turning to Mira.
She connected her tablet to the pedestal. Screens came to life around them, swirling projections of names, locations, coordinates… and then faces.
Thousands of faces.
"Every Shatterborn that's ever lived," Mira murmured. "This is where they tracked them. Categorized them. Assigned threat levels. Chose who disappeared. Who lived."
Rafe's brows furrowed. "They built an entire system on our blood."
Zara didn't speak. She just walked up beside Mira and touched one of the projections — a young girl, no older than thirteen. Her name flashed across the screen, her power classification below it.
Terminated.
Asher felt the rage surge again — that fire, always there, always coiled just beneath the surface. But this wasn't the time for fire. Not yet.
"Download everything," he said. "We expose this to the world. No more shadows."
Mira worked quickly, her fingers a blur. "On it."
Outside, the tremors grew louder.
Then the alarms stopped.
All of them.
The lights stabilized. The pulse of the Mindcore dimmed — as if holding its breath.
Silas's voice crackled through the comms: "Company."
Asher turned.
The entrance behind them lit up in red, and then the floor opened.
A column of light rose from the center of the Mindcore, splitting the data stream like a knife. From it emerged a figure — tall, robed in black and silver, with a face hidden behind an obsidian mask.
The air shifted.
Zara narrowed her eyes. "That's not Regime."
"No," Mira whispered. "That's an Architect."
Asher stepped forward, fists crackling with light. "What the hell is an Architect?"
The figure's voice echoed like thunder wrapped in silk. "I am the Remnant of Function. You have trespassed upon sacred data. You were warned. You ignored."
"I don't recall any warnings," Asher said.
"Your kind never listens," the Architect replied. "That is why you were buried."
Suddenly, the light in the Mindcore intensified — and everything locked down. Doors sealed. The floor shifted, revealing circular runes inscribed into the glass. The Architect raised a hand, and the entire room trembled.
He wasn't a man.
He was code incarnate.
"Brace!" Mira shouted.
The battle began.
It was unlike any fight they'd ever faced. The Architect didn't attack with strength — it warped the space around them. Code claws tore through the air. Gravity warped sideways. Each pulse of energy disrupted their abilities, canceling out threads of power for seconds at a time.
Asher charged anyway.
He ducked a distortion wave, vaulting over a shifting floor panel and slamming his palm into the Architect's chest. The Judgement surged — but met resistance.
Not metal. Not flesh.
Code.
The Architect staggered, flickered, then reformed behind him.
Zara unleashed a wave of telekinetic force, but it bent mid-air, ricocheting into the wall. Echo tried to leap forward, but the floor fragmented beneath his feet, tossing him backward like a ragdoll.
Mira yelled over the noise, "It's not physical! He's bound to the Mindcore! We need to disconnect him!"
"Working on it!" Rafe shouted, back at the terminal, rerouting data flow as fast as his gauntlet allowed.
Silas fired a blast toward the ceiling's emitter node. The light beam flickered.
"Now!" he shouted.
Mira slammed a disruption key into the pedestal, and the Mindcore screamed — a sound like tearing data and wind.
The Architect roared as his form twisted — collapsing into static, then reconstituting.
Asher didn't wait.
He leapt through the distortion, grabbed the Architect by the mask, and let loose the Judgement.
The blast tore through the chamber.
Light cracked.
Walls shattered.
And the Architect was gone.
Silence.
Smoke curled from the shattered floor.
Rafe dropped to one knee, catching his breath. "Is everyone—?"
"Alive," Silas muttered. "Barely."
Zara moved beside Asher, who was kneeling amid the fragments of the pedestal, staring at the data core — fractured, but not destroyed.
Mira checked the feed. "We got it. Not everything, but enough."
Asher rose, brushing the blood from his mouth. "Then we move. We leak it. We burn the truth into the sky."
Outside, the war was still raging.
But inside the Bastion, something ancient had just cracked.
The world had been built on a lie.
And now — the lie was bleeding.