"Sol Mercer dropped two ranks in fourteen days."
Lucian Voss didn't look up from the tablet when he said it. He traced the edge of the screen with his thumb. Once. Twice. The rhythm was slow, deliberate. A metronome for bad news.
I sat on the other side of the metal table. My hands were flat on the surface. Palms down. Fingers spread. If I curled them, the cold in my right hand might leak into the aluminum. Might leave a frost pattern someone would notice.
"Dark Flame is locking it down," Lucian said. "Internal memo only. But the rumors are already in the cafeteria. His C-rank draw is falling apart — hitting D-tier precision on the line. Trending worse."
He finally looked at me. His eyes were gray. Not the soft gray of rain. The gray of steel right before it breaks.
"The Association released their preliminary findings an hour ago," he continued. "Systemic overuse. Imprint exhaustion. They're calling it a 'structural risk.' Dark Flame has been ordered to submit to external auditing within the week."
A snort came from the corner of the room. Brant Kessler leaned against the wall, arms crossed. He was Iron Edge, rank C, and he smelled like cheap coffee and schadenfreude.
"Good," Brant said. "Dark Flame treats healers like batteries. Burn them out, toss them in the bin, grab a new one. Maybe this puts a dent in Gideon Roarke's ego."
"Roarke isn't losing ego," Lucian said. His voice didn't rise. It just got heavier. "He's losing revenue. And control. He's furious. We intercept comms suggesting he's looking for a scapegoat. Someone inside the guild who 'failed to monitor' Mercer's decline."
Brant pushed off the wall. "Mercer brought it on himself. Pushing A-rank rifts with a B-rank core. Everyone knew he was cutting corners."
"Did they?" Lucian asked.
The question hung there. It wasn't rhetorical. Lucian actually wanted to know if everyone really knew. That was the thing about him. He treated lies like data points. He collected them, weighed them, and waited until he had enough to build a bridge across them.
I kept my breathing even. In. Out. Four seconds each.
*Healing Pool: 98.7%.*
The number sat in the back of my mind. A bright, steady anchor. It hadn't moved since Dean Holt. Since the first name crossed off. The cost of that kill was gone, permanent, carved out of my ceiling. But the reservoir itself was full again. Topped up by days of mundane work. Minor scrapes. Bruised ribs. Sprained ankles. The boring work of an E-rank healer.
The work that made me invisible.
"Vera," Lucian said.
My name. Just my name. No title. No 'healer.'
"You were in Dark Flame for three years before the transfer," he said. "Before you came to us on the probationary contract."
"I was," I said.
"You know their people. Their routines." He paused. The tablet stopped moving in his hand. The thumb froze. "You know Sol Mercer."
Brant shifted his weight. The floor creaked. "Why ask her? She's E-rank. She patched scrapes. She didn't run high-level ops with Mercer."
"I'm asking," Lucian said, looking at Brant now, "because I want to know how he treated her. Not how he treated the guild. Not how he treated the mission logs. How he treated *her*."
The air in the room changed. It got thinner. Brant blinked, confused by the shift in axis. He expected a tactical query. He got a personal one.
I didn't blink. I didn't look away. I focused on the grain of the metal table. A scratch near my left pinky. Deep. Old.
"Sol Mercer led a squad," I said. My voice was flat. Dry. "I was attached to his unit for support. Standard rotation."
"And?" Lucian pressed.
"He called me 'Battery Lady,'" I said.
Brant let out a short, sharp laugh. "Classic Sol. Thought he was funny."
"He called me that every time my pool dipped below forty percent," I said. "Every time I had to sit down because my legs wouldn't hold me. He'd laugh. He'd make a show of checking his watch. Asking if I needed a recharge. Asking if I was going to expire before the rift closed."
I lifted my gaze. I looked straight at Lucian.
"When I collapsed after the Ash Valley run, he was the first one to joke about it. Said I was heavy. Said carrying dead weight slowed the extraction team down."
I didn't add anything. I didn't describe the pain. I didn't describe the humiliation of being dragged by the collar while the rest of the squad watched. I didn't need to. The facts were heavy enough on their own.
Lucian's hand tightened on the tablet. The plastic casing groaned. A low, stressed sound.
His jaw worked. A muscle jumped near his ear. He wasn't looking at me anymore. He was looking at a point somewhere over my left shoulder. His eyes had gone dark. The gray steel had turned to something hotter. Something volatile.
"...This kind of person," Lucian said. His voice was quiet. Too quiet. "Deserves what's coming."
The silence hit the room like a physical blow.
Brant stopped smiling. He looked from Lucian to me, his expression shifting from amusement to confusion.
Lucian froze.
He realized what he'd said. *Deserves what's coming.*
It wasn't professional language. It wasn't the language of a Silver Peak liaison discussing guild politics. It was the language of a man who wanted someone to suffer. And he'd said it in front of a witness. In front of me.
He slowly set the tablet down. The groan of the plastic stopped. He smoothed his hands over his knees. A reset. A recalibration.
"That was out of line," he said. He didn't look at Brant. He looked at me. "I apologize. Personal bias regarding the treatment of support staff."
"It's fine," I said.
"It's not," he corrected. "But noted."
He stood up. The chair scraped against the floor. "Meeting adjourned. Brant, draft the response to the Association's audit request. Emphasize our willingness to cooperate. Vera, stay. I have a question about the rotation logs."
Brant hesitated. He looked at Lucian, then at me. He shrugged, grabbed his jacket, and headed for the door.
"Try not to kill anyone while I'm gone, boss," Brant muttered. He didn't mean it. Or maybe he did. In this city, jokes were just truths wearing masks.
The door clicked shut.
Lucian didn't sit back down. He walked to the window. The blinds were drawn, slats angled to let in slivers of gray afternoon light. He stood with his back to me, watching the dust motes dance in the slices of illumination.
"You didn't tell me about the Ash Valley run," he said. His back was straight. Rigid. "The report said you were injured by a stray shockwave."
"The report was wrong," I said.
"Mercer dropped you."
"He dropped me. Then he laughed."
Lucian turned around. He leaned back against the windowsill, crossing his ankles. He looked tired. Not the tired of a long day. The tired of carrying a weight for years and finally feeling the strain in the bones.
"Why didn't you file a complaint?" he asked. "Back then. You had grounds."
"Complaints get filed," I said. "Investigations get opened. And then they get closed." I tapped my finger on the table. Tap. Tap. "Gideon Roarke signed off on Mercer's promotion two weeks after Ash Valley. A complaint would have ended my career. Or my life."
Lucian nodded. Once. Slow. "Roarke protects his own. Until they break."
"Until they break," I agreed.
"And now Mercer is breaking." Lucian pushed off the sill. He walked toward me. He stopped a foot away. Close enough that I could smell the soap on his skin. Clean. Sharp. "The Association audit is a hammer. But it's a slow hammer. Roarke will find a way to spin it. He'll blame Mercer's 'recklessness.' He'll sacrifice him to save the guild."
"Maybe," I said.
"You don't think so?"
"I think Mercer is already past the point of saving."
Lucian studied my face. He was looking for something. A crack. A flicker of satisfaction. A sign that I knew more than I was saying.
"You're very calm about this," he said. "A man who mocked you, who endangered you, is facing the end of his career. Possibly his life, if the decay progresses to organ failure. And you're sitting there like you're discussing the weather."
"It is the weather," I said. "In this city, people rise and fall. It rains. It stops. We work."
"That's not human," Lucian said.
"It's survival," I corrected.
He held my gaze for a long moment. Neither of us moved. It wasn't comfortable. It was a test. He was pressing against the wall I'd built, looking for a loose brick.
"Be careful, Vera," he said finally. His voice dropped lower. "Roarke is looking for a scapegoat. If he finds out you have a history with Mercer... if he thinks you might have a motive..."
"I'm an E-rank healer," I said. "What motive could I possibly have that Roarke would fear?"
Lucian didn't answer. He just looked at me. And for a second, the mask slipped. Just a fraction. I saw the worry there. Real worry. Not for the guild. Not for the investigation.
For me.
He turned away. "Check your rotation logs. Make sure there are no gaps. I'll send Brant back in five."
"I'll wait until you're free," I said.
He paused at the door. He didn't turn around. "Don't wait. Go home. Rest."
He left.
I sat there for a minute. Two minutes. I listened to the footsteps fade down the hall. Then I stood up.
The chill in my right palm had gone past cold into numb. I pushed it into my jacket pocket where it wouldn't show, curling my fingers around the lining. Needed to stop the spread before it reached the wrist.
I walked out of the conference room. Down the corridor. Past the break room where Brant was laughing with two other healers. They didn't look at me. I was invisible. Just another E-rank. Just Battery Lady.
Good.
I took the stairs. Two flights down to the locker room. Empty. The lights hummed. A flickering bulb in the corner buzzed like a dying insect.
I went to my locker. Combination: 4-7-1. My old ID number.
I opened the door. Took out my bag. Checked the contents. Water bottle. Towel. A change of clothes.
And the packet.
It was still there. Tucked in the side pocket of my bag. The medication Sol had given me two weeks ago. Before the drop. Before the collapse.
*Take this if you feel dizzy.*
I hadn't thrown it away. I hadn't used it. It sat there, a small white rectangle of guilt that wasn't mine.
I touched it with my left hand. Then pulled my hand back.
*Healing Pool: 98.7%.*
I closed the locker. Locked it.
A notice was pinned inside the locker door I had not read before today: *All pool-draws logged to ledger. The ledger is older than the guild.* Standard-issue sticker. Someone had underlined *older.*
Time to go home.
***
The apartment was quiet. Too quiet. The radiator clanked in the corner, fighting a losing battle against the evening chill. I didn't turn on the main light. Just the lamp by the bed. Warm. Yellow.
I sat on the edge of the mattress. Took off my boots. One. Two.
My right hand was still cold. I rubbed it against my thigh. Friction. Heat. It didn't help much. The cold came from inside. From the core.
I pulled out my terminal. The screen glowed in the dim room. Blue light washed over my face.
Logged in.
Checked the guild board. Nothing new. Roarke hadn't issued a statement yet. The silence was louder than any press release. He was scrambling. Trying to contain the bleed.
I opened the monitoring script.
It was a simple piece of code. Kiran Vale had helped me refine it three months ago. *Just a tool for tracking public energy signatures,* he'd said. *Nothing illegal. Just... efficient.*
It scanned the public registry. Looked for specific frequency patterns. Imprint decay signatures.
I typed in the ID.
*Sol Mercer.*
The cursor blinked.
*Loading...*
*Connecting to Public Health Node...*
*Access Granted.*
The graph appeared. A jagged red line sliding downward. Steep. Too steep.
Two weeks ago, it had been a gentle slope. A natural decline for a healer pushing past their limits.
Now, it was a cliff.
I leaned closer. Squinted at the numbers.
*Current Stability: 42%.*
*Trend: Critical.*
*Projected Collapse: 74 hours.*
I frowned. That didn't make sense. The Association report said C-rank precision to D-tier. That was a significant drop, yes. But this trajectory... this wasn't just exhaustion. This was acceleration.
Something was feeding the decay.
I ran the diagnostic again. Checked for errors.
No errors.
The line kept dropping. In real-time. I watched the percentage tick down. 41.9%. 41.8%.
My heart didn't race. My palms didn't sweat. I just watched.
This was faster than Dean Holt. Holt had taken three weeks to fade. Mercer was doing it in days.
Why?
Had Roarke done something? Tried to suppress the scandal by forcing a stabilization that backfired? Or was it the decay itself? Had my touch lingered deeper than I thought? Had the seed I planted in that handshake three weeks ago finally found the root?
I remembered the moment. The crowded hall. Sol shaking my hand, clapping me on the shoulder. *Good to see you, Battery Lady.*
My skin against his. A fraction of a second. Enough to plant the seed. Enough to reverse the flow.
But this speed...
A notification popped up on the screen. A system alert from the monitoring script.
*Anomaly Detected.*
*Secondary Frequency Match.*
I froze.
Secondary frequency?
I tapped the alert. Expanded the window.
There it was. A faint ripple underneath the main decay curve. A signature that shouldn't be there. It was faint. Buried under the noise of Sol's collapsing imprint.
But it was there.
And it matched a pattern I recognized.
*Dark Flame Internal Protocol 9.*
Roarke.
He wasn't just watching Sol fail. He was intervening. He was using guild resources to accelerate the process. To make it look like a natural, rapid burnout. To ensure Sol couldn't talk. Couldn't testify. Couldn't drag the guild down with him.
Roarke was killing him. Actively.
My breath caught. Just for a second.
I looked at my right hand. The hand that had touched Sol. The hand that had started this.
I had intended to let him fade. Slowly. Painfully. But naturally. A consequence of his own arrogance.
Roarke was stealing my revenge. Turning it into an execution.
And worse.
If Roarke was using Protocol 9... if he was pumping high-grade decay agents into Sol's system... the forensic signature would be messy. Chaotic.
It might mask my own trace. Or it might highlight it. If the scanners picked up the interaction between my decay and Roarke's chemical agents...
*Exposure risk.*
The thought landed cold in my stomach.
I minimized the window. Closed the terminal.
The room was dark again. Just the hum of the radiator. The beat of my own blood in my ears.
Seventy-two hours.
That's all I had.
If Sol died before I could cross his name off properly... if Roarke claimed the kill... then what?
Did it matter? A dead man was a dead man. The list got shorter.
But it wasn't about the list. Not really.
*Your Power Stone is Vera's knife. Keep it sharp.*