War raged inside the sphere.
Not movement—impact.
Collision.
Allium's predatory gaze locked onto Khelos with a focus that stripped away hesitation entirely. There was no rhythm to his strikes, no discipline to anticipate—only violence delivered with intent sharp enough to cut thought in half.
Every swing was brutal.
No grace. No restraint.
This wasn't a duel.
It wasn't combat.
This was two creatures trying to end the other.
Before the cage decided it for them.
Allium moved like something feral, his own distortion turning the sphere into a ring too small to escape. His unpredictability was the weapon—wide arcs followed by sudden lunges, reckless momentum broken into jagged, brutal direction changes. Khelos dodged what he could, phased where possible, but even that came at a cost.
Damage stacked.
Relentless.
Each missed strike shattered the sphere's interior, sending warped shockwaves back into Allium's body. His ribs screamed under repeated impacts. Bone bent. Muscles tore. He didn't slow.
Khelos answered with volume.
Not strength.
Frequency.
Thousands of micro-strikes landed in the space of heartbeats—legs, spines, shifting limbs slamming into Allium from every angle at once. It was like being crushed under a storm that learned how to aim.
Allium staggered.
Another hit.
Another.
His ribs threatened to give way completely.
—and then he bit.
Not calculated.
Not technique.
Instinct.
His teeth sank into Khelos's leg with animal force, pressure snapping through layered matter and distortion alike. The shriek that followed wasn't sound—it was a violent recoil in reality itself.
The sphere convulsed.
Seconds.
That was all this nightmare lasted.
Outside, Jax watched the distortion cycle violently between orange and red.
His jaw tightened.
"I've got eyes on the storm," he snapped to Thane. "You help pull that node—now!"
Thane didn't argue. He ran.
Finding them was easy.
You could see Rose from half the garden away—sky-blue light flaring around her as she strained against the impossible weight. Weaver's threads wrapped the node in trembling layers, every pull threatening to snap them apart.
Thane empowered himself mid-stride, Solara energy igniting through his shield as he slammed his weight into the effort and grabbed hold.
The node lurched.
Ten meters.
Still too far.
Weaver gritted his teeth, arms numb, threads fraying as they dragged the planet itself along with them. Every breath felt like lifting gravity by hand.
Rose screamed, voice tearing raw from her throat.
"We have to get this there! Or this is all for nothing—pull! PULL!"
They did.
Cassidy dropped into position beside them, hands burning as she added her weight. Jax followed without hesitation, boots digging deep, shoulders braced.
Everyone pulled.
The node crept closer.
Inch by inch.
Then—
A scream tore through the distortion.
Thin.
Broken.
Barely there.
Blood ran cold.
Inside the sphere, Khelos finally found leverage.
Spiked limbs pinned Allium in place, impaling him against warped space as he thrashed violently. The predator edge in his eyes flickered—but the pressure was too much.
Khelos leaned close.
Evolved.
Focused.
Waves slammed into Allium's mind—precise, invasive, stripping defenses layer by layer. White surged violently now, flooding the distortion, erasing orange as it spread.
Khelos clicked, satisfied.
"…overload… then destroy…."
Again.
Again.
Again.
Allium screamed as the pressure mounted, his consciousness buckling under the assault. He couldn't move. Couldn't strike. Could barely think.
Outside—
The node slammed into position.
Cassidy drove the stake into the ground with shaking hands.
They collapsed.
Rose's grip finally gave out. Threads had torn through her palms; blood streaked down her fingers as she fell backward, breath ragged, vision swimming.
Weaver's threads dissolved into nothing, their limits spent.
Cassidy looked around wildly.
"Okay—okay, it's here—how do we activate it?!"
No answer.
Rose—empty.
Weaver—spent.
And time did not wait.
Thane surged forward, shield blazing as Solara energy peaked violently around him.
"Get down!" he shouted.
They hit the ground.
Thane brought the shield down on the node with everything he had.
Light exploded upward.
The distortion screamed as cracks raced across its surface, white light pulsing violently outward as the cage failed.
Reality tore itself open.
And when the light cleared—
There was only Allium.
Standing.
Glowing.
White.
Full Overload.
The garden did not return to normal when the sphere broke.
It only pretended.
Leaves hung in the air a second too long.
Dust fell in slow, reluctant spirals.
The leylines underfoot throbbed like a bruise being pressed—alive, resentful, and newly afraid.
And where the distortion had been—
Allium stood.
White.
Not Solara-bright.
Not Virel-cold.
Not Nexon-quiet.
White like correction.
Like judgment.
Like a rule enforced without mercy.
Across from him, the thing that had caused it clicked softly, almost delighted—Khelos' body damaged, split and leaking luminous blood where Allium's brutal slashes and tearing strikes had carved into him inside the cage. Its joints stuttered. Its wings trembled. It looked hurt.
And it looked… pleased.
Rose's hand lifted to her mouth without her noticing.
She stared at Allium like she was looking at someone she loved through a pane of thick glass.
"Allium…" Her voice came out too calm, like calm could be a rope. "Please be you."
Allium's gaze shifted toward her.
The white did not soften.
Not even a little.
His mouth moved, and the word that fell out was clean—too clean—like it had been filed into shape.
"Seraphim."
It hit Rose harder than any blow.
Her sky-blue presence faltered, not extinguished—wounded. Her throat tightened. Her eyes flashed with something that looked like grief trying to stand upright.
"No," she breathed. "No, Allium— it's me. Rose. Please—please fight this."
Allium raised a hand.
No warning. No hesitation.
A blast formed instantly. White compressing with the calm certainty of something that did not believe it could be wrong.
Thane moved before thought could become prayer.
"Rose—DOWN!"
He threw himself in front of her, shield up.
The blast hit.
The shield screamed.
The impact launched them both—Thane and Rose—through trees like they were made of paper. Bark exploded. Branches snapped and spun. Frost shattered off Rose in a spray of desperate blue as she tumbled, breath ripped from her chest.
Weaver's voice cut through the clearing—raw, furious, terrified.
"Allium, STOP!"
Allium turned his head.
Not like a man recognizing a voice—
like a force recognizing resistance.
He looked at Weaver the way a ledger looks at debt.
His gaze darkened, focused.
"You take," he said, voice deep as bedrock, "and steal my energy, thief."
Weaver flinched—not from the accusation, but from the sound of it. From the way it didn't feel like Allium speaking, and yet felt like something true had been sharpened into a weapon.
Weaver shook his head once, as if shaking could dislodge the nightmare.
"This isn't you," he demanded again, stepping forward on instinct like he could physically place himself between Allium and ruin. "Allium—stop."
Then the Dream Weaver's voice cracked open into something older than strategy.
"Release my son now."
The words weren't hidden. They weren't careful.
They were pure.
They struck the white the way a name strikes a person drowning.
For half a breath—half—
something in Allium's posture wavered.
And then the white answered with radiant force.
Allium did not rush.
He stepped.
And reality obeyed him.
No time passed. No distance mattered. The world simply updated.
Weaver gasped—because Allium was suddenly inches away.
Cassidy's scream tore free like a warning flare.
"ALLIUM! Remember the music! Remember who you are! You wouldn't kill him— you wouldn't hurt Rose— STOP!"
Allium did not hear her.
Or rather—he heard her, and the white measured her words, and found them irrelevant.
He was the Balance Keeper.
And balance, in this state, did not negotiate.
He backhanded Weaver.
It was simple.
Almost casual.
The sound was not.
A brutal crack, like concrete splitting under a sledgehammer.
Weaver hit the ground hard enough to jolt the forest. His face turned instantly, swelling with ugly speed. Teeth skittered across the sand—white little pieces of proof. Blood spread beneath him in a dark, stunned bloom.
Allium stood over him.
No remorse.
Almost… satisfaction.
And deep, deep inside that white, where the real Allium was trapped like a man behind locked glass—
something screamed.
No one heard it.
Horror without voice.
Terror without control.
Khelos watched with all its eyes, clicking and creaking in a sound that resembled a wet laugh.
It leaned, fascinated.
It had done it.
It had pushed the right pressure in the right place—
Until Allium turned and looked directly at it.
Khelos froze mid-click.
Allium did not speak.
There was no line. No vow. No threat.
Just certainty.
A death sentence written in motion.
Allium launched.
Khelos tried to slip sideways into shadow—into the spaces between—
And Allium simply reached into that wrongness and yanked him back out like dragging a thought into daylight.
Khelos struck—legs, blades, webbing, distortion—
Nothing mattered.
Every hit landed like raindrops on a furnace.
Allium grabbed a leg.
Ripped it off.
One.
Another.
Two.
Three.
Khelos thrashed, clicking in sudden panic as its escape routes refused to exist.
Allium seized him down the center and tore.
No strain. No effort.
Just a body split like paper.
And then a blast—white, absolute—erased what remained.
No resistance.
The air whined in its wake.
The garden dimmed as if the world itself blinked.
Khelos was gone.
Dead.
Silence tried to return.
It failed.
Completely.
Allium turned.
Not toward the battlefield.
Toward Cassidy.
Cassidy's heart stopped.
Her Mark burned hot—warning, warning, warning—like it wanted to crawl out of her skin and run.
She backed up.
Tripped on a root hidden under grass and sand.
Fell hard.
Her breath shattered.
"ALLIUM—PLEASE DON'T DO THIS!"
She didn't sound brave. She sounded human.
White eyes pinned her.
The vision from HQ flashed through her mind so vividly she could taste the ash again.
Death was coming.
Footsteps—fast, not slow.
Allium was already moving.
And then—
Rose stepped between them.
She was battered. Dusty. Frost-streaked. One side of her face already swelling. Blood at her lip.
She stood anyway.
"I'm not…" she said, voice breaking with pain and choice, "…giving up on you, Allium."
Allium didn't answer.
He struck.
A brutal hit to her gut that stole the air from her body. Rose folded forward—
—and Allium double-fisted, locked hands, and slammed her down.
The ground cracked.
A shockwave split the sand and rattled leaves off branches.
Rose choked, coughed, tried to drag air back into broken ribs.
Allium moved to continue—
Rose grabbed him from behind.
Bloodied arms around him like a vow.
He elbowed her side.
A loud, sick pop echoed.
Too loud.
Rose dropped—hard—staggered—
And stood back up anyway, shaking.
"Ugh… Allium— stop…" Her voice was a rasp. "I know you're in there…"
She grabbed his arm and pulled, trying to turn him, trying to redirect the storm.
For a half-second, he went with it.
Then his fist slammed down.
The impact split the sand like lightning.
Rose hit the ground again and the world blurred.
She lay there a heartbeat.
Then pushed up.
Tears fell—not dramatic—automatic, pain pulling water from her eyes the way fire pulls breath from lungs.
Allium looked at her.
"Would you die," he said, voice flat and merciless, "already?"
Rose shook her head.
Her right side was swelling fast. Bruising crawled across her cheekbone. One eye struggled to stay open.
Still—she moved forward.
"Allium…" she whispered, and the name sounded like a prayer spoken through broken teeth. "I… I know you're in there. This isn't you. You'd never hurt me."
Inside the white—
the real Allium slammed against the inside of himself.
Again. Again.
No one heard him.
Cassidy watched, frozen in terror and grief, her Mark screaming heat.
Jax forced himself upright, ears ringing from the blast that had broken the sphere. He saw Rose—
saw her taking it—
and something in him snapped into purpose.
He charged the weapon, aimed with shaking hands, fired an electric round.
It hit Allium.
Did nothing.
Allium's head turned.
The killing intent landed on Jax like a hand around his throat.
Jax didn't back up.
"Allium!" he shouted, voice hoarse but steady. "Don't be what they want you to be! Fight!"
Allium raised a hand.
A blast formed.
Rose moved without thought.
She threw her arms up and took it.
The white scorched her forearms into angry red, skin burning, nerves screaming. She hissed, nearly dropping—
but she held.
Allium's face tightened in irritation.
He formed a fist.
Charged.
One hit would finish it.
Before he could make contact—
a stake went off.
A pulse snapped through the air, vibrating the leyline pattern around Allium's body.
He grunted.
For a second—
orange flickered through the white like a drowning man surfacing.
Then it vanished again.
Cassidy.
Somehow on her feet, shaking, eyes wet, hands trembling as she adjusted one of the remaining stakes like her life depended on math and hope.
Because it did.
She armed another.
Fired.
Allium jerked—discomfort, not damage—orange flashing again, swallowed again.
Jax fired again—timing it with Cassidy—
and for one breath, Allium locked in place.
Weaver—bloodied, face swelling, words mangled—forced himself upright like bones were optional.
"Hit him," he gargled, voice broken but intent unbroken. "We need to help him… distract the tri-energies—so Allium can escape!"
Rose staggered forward.
Ignored the screaming in her ribs.
And struck—clean, precise—like she was hitting the white for Allium, not for herself.
Thane limped in, a branch stabbed through his leg, teeth clenched so hard his jaw trembled. He joined anyway, swinging his shield, trying to disrupt, trying to buy seconds.
Cassidy stepped in point-blank.
One more stake.
One more pulse.
The blast crippled her fingers.
Pain detonated up her hand and into her wrist. She screamed and fell back, clutching her hand as if holding it together could keep the future from happening.
And then—
the white began to lose ground.
Not because they won.
Because inside, Allium finally found a crack.
The white drained away like a tide retreating from shore.
Orange rushed back in—terrified, shaking, horrified.
Allium stood there.
Breathing hard.
Looking at what he'd done.
Weaver barely upright, blood on his teeth, face ruined.
Thane splintered and bleeding, still standing out of stubbornness.
Rose broken, faint sky-blue glow flickering like a dying candle.
Cassidy on the ground, terrified, hand ruined.
Jax frozen in shock, weapon lowered without realizing it.
Allium's shoulders sagged.
His head fell forward.
Tears dropped—hot and real—into the sand.
A small voice slipped out of his lips.
"I'm sorry…"
And then he collapsed.
Exhaustion had taken him,
But shock kept a commander standing.
The night did not erase itself.
It lingered.
Across the garden, small distortions trembled in place—subtle bends in the air where reality no longer fully trusted its own shape. Leaves drifted too slowly through them. Light fractured at the edges, refracting in ways that would never quite settle again.
These were not wounds time would heal.
They were reminders.
The garden floor was scattered with bodies.
Not fallen in formation.
Not posed by victory.
Just people.
Just bodies.
Allium lay at the center of it, heat radiating off his unconscious form in dense, uneven waves that warped the air above him. His breathing was slow but present, each rise of his chest heavy, strained. Rose lay several meters away, her body twisted where she had been thrown, frost scorched into the stone beneath her. Her face was bruised, one side swelling badly, breath shallow but steady.
Thane lay near the treeline, pinned where he'd landed—a thick, splintered branch driven clean through his leg, anchoring him to the earth. Blood soaked the soil beneath him, dark and steady. He did not stir.
Unconscious.
All of them.
Jax moved through the wreckage alone.
Boots crunching softly over broken stone and snapped branches. He checked pulses. Breathing. Pupils. He kept moving—because stopping meant thinking, and thinking could wait.
A voice cut through his comms, sharp and frantic.
"Why isn't anyone answering me?!" Nina's voice cracked through the static. "Tell me you're alive—damn it!"
Jax lifted his hand to the mic.
"Nina," he said, keeping his voice level by force of will. "We're alive. But we need medical here fast. I'm pinging my location. Definitely three ICU beds—open and ready."
There was silence.
Just long enough for the weight of it to press in.
"I'll be there," Nina said, disbelief audible in the way she breathed. "As fast as I can. Hold tight."
Jax turned and dropped to one knee beside Cassidy.
She was sitting where she'd fallen, shoulders drawn inward, staring at her hands like they belonged to someone else. When she lifted them, her fingers shook.
"Cass," Jax said quietly. "Let me see."
She hesitated—then showed him.
Blistered skin. Raw and swollen. Fingers bent at painful angles, already darkening with bruises. Jax didn't flinch. He gently took her uninjured hand and guided it over the damaged one, anchoring her to the moment.
"Stay focused," he said. "I need you with me. Help me get everyone evaluated."
Cassidy swallowed and nodded.
She forced herself up and moved toward Weaver.
He was awake.
Barely.
Weaver sat slumped against a fractured section of wall, blood drying along his mouth and chin. His eyes struggled to focus, his breathing shallow and uneven.
Cassidy knelt in front of him.
"Weaver," she said firmly. "Look at me."
She flicked on a small light and swept it across his eyes. He winced, turning away.
"Weaver," she asked, "where are we?"
He frowned, confusion tightening his expression.
"…outside?" he guessed. "The hall?"
Cassidy didn't hesitate.
"Concussion," she said quietly. "Bad one. Weaver—don't fall asleep."
She glanced over her shoulder.
"He's got a serious concussion," she called to Jax. "I'm staying with him—watching for seizures. He can't go under."
Jax acknowledged without looking back.
He stopped beside Allium.
Heat rolled off him—dense, heavy, dangerous in its stillness. Jax hesitated, fear flickering sharp and instinctive.
A sleeping giant.
Dangerous.
One who had nearly ended them all.
He pushed through it.
Carefully, he placed two fingers at Allium's neck. Another hand pressed lightly to his side.
"Deep cuts," Jax muttered. "Internal bleeding."
He exhaled slowly.
"…He's out.
But alive."
Cassidy looked over.
Not angry.
Worried.
"He…" Her voice caught.
"He nearly killed us."
Jax lowered himself onto the stone, sitting heavily.
There was a pause.
Not long—but full.
"…Yeah," he said at last. "But that wasn't him."
His eyes stayed on Allium.
"That was something horrible," Jax continued quietly. "Something evil wearing his power."
The garden shifted.
Branches rustled. Footsteps multiplied—dozens, then more. Shapes emerged from the treeline: paramedics and EMTs riding low-profile transport platforms. Instead of wheels, dozens of rapid, articulated legs adjusted to the terrain with every step, matching stone, soil, and root without slowing.
Stretchers unfolded from the backs—beds built not for comfort, but containment. Restraint systems. Stabilizers. Safeguards for bodies that might convulse or burn.
Medical teams swarmed the clearing.
Jax and Cassidy spoke quickly—injuries, priorities, risks. Orders were followed without question.
Thane was freed first. The branch was carefully cut away, his leg stabilized before he was moved.
Then Allium.
Then Rose.
Separate transports.
Separate rooms.
ICU.
Reserved for those whose bodies—or existence—might fail without constant intervention.
Cassidy and Weaver were taken to the main medical bay. Nina was already there when they arrived, sleeves rolled up, eyes sharp despite the exhaustion etched deep into her face.
She examined Cassidy's hand carefully.
"Any feeling left in there?" Nina asked softly. "Second time this hand's been through hell."
She waited.
Cassidy didn't answer.
Her gaze stayed fixed on nothing.
Nina's expression softened. She placed a hand gently over Cassidy's good one.
"Cassidy," she said quietly. "Would you like to talk to someone? Someone to hear you?"
Cassidy shook her head once.
Nina nodded. She didn't push.
Weaver was conscious—but barely. The pain in his mouth was unbearable, every breath measured and careful.
Nina sent him straight into dental surgery.
She worked with meticulous care—cleaning each tooth, each root, saving what she could. One by one, she placed them back where they belonged.
The quiet scrape of tools filling the room.
"Bite down slowly," she instructed. "Just enough. Don't force it."
When it was done, Weaver was moved to recovery—jaw stabilized, consciousness monitored.
Nina didn't rest.
She went straight to ICU.
Elsewhere, behind reinforced glass and sealed doors, Jax waited.
An office.
Bare. Quiet.
He stood when the doors slid open.
Commander Dorian Hawk entered first, expression hard, eyes already cataloging damage.
Sable followed close behind.
They had just touched down.
The garden still remembered.
And now—
so would command.