Instructor Idris Kade expected the morning to be uneventful.
At Helius Prime, that expectation rarely survived contact with reality.
The corridor outside his office was quiet in a way that only existed before the academy fully woke—before cadets filled the halls, before the Crucible rotations began cycling, before noise replaced the steady mechanical hum that lived beneath everything. It wasn't silence. Helius Prime never truly went silent.
But it was close enough to make patterns easier to notice.
Kade stepped into his office just after 0500, setting his datapad down without thinking, his other hand already reaching for the coffee he had picked up on the way in. Fresh. Still hot. That mattered more than it should have.
He sat.
Lifted the cup slightly.
Let the warmth settle.
Routine.
Predictable.
Controlled.
Then his datapad flickered.
Kade's eyes shifted.
He hadn't activated it.
That—
that was the first sign something was off.
He reached forward, tapping the screen lightly. It was already active—live feed engaged, no input required. The timestamp sat in the upper corner, steady and unremarkable.
A Crucible feed.
That wasn't unusual.
The Crucible system ran diagnostics at all hours, internal calibrations, automated environment resets, system checks that ensured everything functioned exactly as designed before cadets stepped into it.
But this—
wasn't a diagnostic.
The camera angle was wrong.
It wasn't inside the arena.
It was positioned at the staging area.
Kade leaned forward slightly, setting the coffee down without realizing he had done it.
And then—
he saw them.
The Elite.
All of them.
At 0503.
Standing outside Crucible 6.
For a moment, Kade didn't move.
Didn't react.
Because there were only two possibilities.
Either the system was malfunctioning—
or Kael Ardent had decided to do something.
Kade exhaled slowly.
"…of course," he murmured.
On the screen, Torres stood with his arms crossed, posture slouched in a way that communicated complete dissatisfaction with reality itself.
"…it's too early," Torres said, voice carrying faintly through the external mic. "There should be regulations. Laws. Something. This is a violation of human rights."
Aria stood a few steps away, arms folded, expression sharp—but tired in a way she would never admit out loud.
"If I die," she muttered, "I'm blaming you."
"I support this," Torres added immediately.
Lucian said nothing.
He didn't need to.
He was already watching the Crucible entrance like he was trying to understand something that hadn't happened yet.
Calder and Kane stood as they always did—already present, already grounded, already ready.
The Forest twins—
still.
Watching.
Mei looked awake.
Which meant she had been awake longer than everyone else.
Hana—
barely.
But present.
And Ryven—
looked exactly the same as he always did.
Which, somehow, made the entire situation worse.
Kade watched for another second.
Then Kael spoke.
"I thought of something."
The tone was casual.
Too casual.
"I want to test it."
A pause.
"It'll be fun."
From behind him, Ryven didn't move.
"More like a disaster."
Kael turned, grinning like this was exactly the response he had expected.
"It's never simple when Ardent does things."
Kade closed his eyes briefly.
Then opened them again.
Decision made.
He reached for his comm.
"Volkov."
She answered immediately.
"I saw it."
Of course she had.
"Garrick?" Kade asked.
"Already awake," she replied. "Calling him now."
Kade didn't wait.
He was already moving.
The conference room systems activated the moment he entered.
Lights adjusted.
Displays powered on.
Six monitors expanded across the primary wall, automatically syncing to the Crucible feed Kade had already flagged.
He moved quickly, hands efficient, pulling up additional angles, overlaying tracking data, isolating each Elite member into separate feed windows before recombining them into a unified view.
By the time Garrick entered—
everything was already live.
"Monitor only," Garrick said as he stepped inside.
Kade nodded.
"Already configured."
Volkov entered behind him.
Then—
more.
The doors didn't stop.
Hale.
Solis.
Kade paused.
Because they kept coming.
The guest instructors.
All of them.
No one had called them.
No one had needed to.
They had seen the system activation.
And they had followed it.
Kade blinked once.
"…I'll make more coffee."
No one objected.
Because no one was looking at him.
By the time he returned, the room had filled—not crowded, not chaotic, but dense with attention. Every seat taken, every standing position occupied, every line of sight directed toward the monitors.
Garrick stood at the center.
"What is he doing?" one of the Aces asked.
Kade set the coffee down.
"An idea," he replied.
Volkov exhaled.
"…that's never a good sign."
On the screen—
Kael stepped forward.
The Crucible interface lit in response to his proximity.
Solis frowned slightly.
"…he doesn't have access clearance for custom input."
Hale's gaze narrowed.
"…he shouldn't."
Kael didn't hesitate.
He reached the console.
And typed.
No override request.
No system warning.
The Crucible—
accepted it.
The system flickered.
Then—
loaded.
Solis turned toward Garrick.
"…you enabled that?"
Garrick didn't look away.
"I had nothing to do with it."
Silence settled.
Because that—
was worse.
Below—
the doors opened.
The Elite moved.
No hesitation.
No discussion.
They entered.
One by one.
And the feed—
shifted.
The monitors flickered, transitioning from external staging view to internal environment capture. Lighting recalibrated. Sensor overlays adjusted. Audio channels synchronized.
Kade leaned forward, expanding the central display instinctively.
"…focus center feed."
The image stabilized.
And for a moment—
no one spoke.
Because what appeared—
was not a training scenario.
It was a battlefield.
A fleet vessel—
half destroyed.
Corridors ruptured open to vacuum-sealed emergency fields barely holding. Bulkheads torn apart, metal twisted in ways that suggested impact far beyond controlled simulation parameters. Fires burned in irregular bursts, suppression systems failing mid-cycle.
Lighting flickered.
Not rhythmically.
Randomly.
Red.
Dark.
Red again.
The sound came next.
Metal strain.
Distant impacts.
System warnings overlapping into a distorted chorus that made it difficult to isolate any single alert.
"…this is a boarding scenario," Hale said quietly.
"No," one of the Aces replied.
"…this is a collapse."
Because the ship wasn't being attacked.
It had already been broken.
And then—
the drop.
The Elite didn't enter together.
They were scattered.
Different sectors.
Different entry points.
No centralized start.
No unified formation.
Kade's eyes sharpened.
"…he split them."
Garrick didn't respond.
Because it was obvious.
Kael landed hard in a damaged corridor, immediately moving, scanning, adjusting without hesitation.
Ryven dropped into a junction, already repositioning.
Aria—
mid-deck.
Lucian—
near a breach.
Kane and Calder—
separated.
Torres—
"…I already hate this," his voice came through the comm.
"…why are we always separated?!"
No one answered.
Because they were already moving.
No mechs.
No heavy systems.
Just suits.
Just survival.
The first hostile contact appeared.
Fast.
Unstable.
Unpredictable.
Aria engaged first.
Clean.
Precise.
Holding just long enough to redirect pressure before disengaging.
Lucian shifted.
Kane held.
Calder anchored.
And Kael—
moved.
Not toward safety.
Toward convergence.
"Link up," he said.
Not loud.
Not forced.
Just—
clear.
And somehow—
they heard him.
And moved.