Chapter 501: Fever Dream

The hover cut through the traffic lanes cleanly, altitude steady, engine tuned low enough that it blended into the flow instead of announcing itself. Klatos sat angled toward Xavier, one arm resting against the door frame as he talked, voice steady, carrying the kind of information that only came from living somewhere long enough to hate it.

“Ashfall connects to Glassreach through three unofficial corridors,” Klatos said. “Two of them are watched, not by law enforcement, but by locals who sell information. The third one is quieter, but it cuts close to old infrastructure. If Kylus pushes heavy units—”

He stopped mid-sentence.

Xavier hadn’t responded.

“Kylus,” Klatos repeated. “If he commits numbers—”

Still nothing.

Klatos frowned and leaned slightly closer. “Xavier.”

No reaction.

He leaned further, enough to see Xavier’s face properly, and his stomach tightened. Xavier’s eyes were open, too open, pupils fixed on nothing ahead of the windshield. His lips were moving, barely, words spilling out under his breath in a rapid, broken stream that didn’t form anything Klatos recognized.

“…seven don’t line up, no, not there, too late, too late—”

Klatos swore and reached out, grabbing Xavier’s shoulder. “Xavier.”

He shook him harder.

Xavier jolted violently, hands jerking on the controls as the hover lurched sideways for a split second before the stabilizers corrected. Klatos slammed his palm against the console to steady himself.

“Shit,” Xavier said sharply. “What the hell?!”

Klatos stared at him. “You tell me.”

Xavier blinked, breathing a little fast now. “What happened?”

“That’s the fifth time,” Klatos said. “You just check out. Eyes open. Talking nonsense. You don’t hear anything.”

Xavier ran a hand through his hair, jaw tightening. “I don’t remember it happening.”

“That’s not comforting,” Klatos replied. “Are you alright?”

Xavier hesitated, then shook his head once. “I don’t know. It just… happens. I don’t feel it coming.”

Klatos studied him for a moment, then said, “You haven’t slept since Aurex.”

“I’m fine,” Xavier said automatically.

“You’re not,” Klatos replied. “Your body’s running on momentum and whatever the hell keeps you upright. That catches up to people.”

Xavier opened his mouth to argue, then stopped. He looked forward at the road, at the route markers sliding past, and exhaled slowly.

“Five minutes,” he said.

“That’s not a nap,” Klatos replied.

“It’s what I can give,” Xavier said.

He disengaged the controls and climbed awkwardly into the back seat. Klatos slid into the driver’s position and took over the hover.

The hover smoothed out again and kept moving.

Xavier closed his eyes and immediately drifted off to sleep.

Darkness didn’t come all at once. It pressed in slowly as Xavier slept. Something glowed ahead of him, faint at first, then steadier, like it had always been there and he’d only just noticed it.

He moved toward it without urgency.

There was no pull, no pressure, none of the weight that came with the visions he’d learned to recognize. This didn’t feel like a warning or a memory being shoved into him. It felt unimportant in the way dreams often did while you were inside them.

Then, the glow slowly resolved into a figure.

Someone sat on a raised structure, rough stone or metal shaped into something altar-like, old and uneven. The body looked young, small enough to be mistaken for fragile, but the way she sat said otherwise. Her head was lowered. Her hair hid her face completely, but Xavier didn’t need to see it to know.

It was a little girl.

Then he heard the sound.

Quiet at first, broken breaths that didn’t try to be silent. Sobbing that wasn’t dramatic or loud, like it had been going on for a long time with no one listening.

“Hey,” Xavier said, stepping closer.

She didn’t react.

He reached out, not thinking much about it, fingers stretching toward her shoulder.

The world immediately tore sideways as he woke up.

Pain hit before awareness did. Xavier sucked in a sharp breath and rolled onto his side, the ground hard beneath him, gravel biting into his skin. His vision swam as his body caught up, nerves screaming from his left side and thigh all at once.

He groaned and planted a hand to push himself up, then froze when fresh pain flared.

Something had plunged into him.

He blinked and forced his eyes to focus.

The hover lay on its side several meters away, one flank torn open, panels bent and cracked like peeled skin. Smoke drifted from the engine housing. Scorch marks streaked the ground where it had skidded and finally stopped.

Blood soaked his clothes.

Blood soaked his clothes.

“Shit,” he muttered.

He looked down and found the problem fast enough. A metal shard of composite plating had driven into his side, another smaller piece buried deep in his thigh. His hands shook as he wrapped his fingers around the first one and yanked it free.

He screamed before he could stop himself.

Steam hissed from the wound immediately, flesh knitting together in ugly, uneven pulses as the regeneration kicked in. It wasn’t instant. He pulled the second shard free and dropped it, teeth clenched, breathing through the pain while his body dragged itself back together.

It took longer than he liked.

When he could stand without swaying, Xavier straightened slowly and looked around.

“Klatos,” he called, voice rough.

No answer.

He turned toward the wreck and started moving, every step reminding him that healing didn’t mean comfort. His eyes scanned the ground, the debris, the dark stretch beyond the crash site.

“Klatos,” he said again, louder this time.

The dream lingered at the back of his mind, the glow, the sobbing, unfinished and irritating in a way that made his skin crawl.

He shook it off and kept moving.

Finding Klatos mattered more.

Xavier found Klatos a short distance away from the wreck.

He was on his knees, one hand pressed against his side, blood dark against his feathers and armor. His posture was wrong, tense in a way that had nothing to do with pain. His eyes were wide and locked forward, unblinking.

“Klatos,” Xavier said quietly.

Klatos didn’t answer.

Xavier followed his line of sight and saw movement through the trees and broken rock ahead. Not a person yet. Just the unmistakable outline of a weapon’s barrel shifting slightly, catching light for a fraction of a second.

Xavier didn’t hesitate.

Serpent’s Fang slid into his hand like it had always been there. He snapped his wrist and the weapon unfolded into its chain form, segments screaming outward in a brutal arc. Trees split. Rock shattered. Whatever cover existed stopped existing.

The chain recoiled a second later.

A body hit the ground.

The head followed, severed cleanly, rolling to a stop beside Klatos’ knee.

Klatos sucked in a sharp breath and then everything broke loose at once. He scrambled to his feet and rushed toward Xavier, grabbing his shoulders hard enough to hurt.

“You good?” he demanded. “You are bleeding anywhere bad.”

“Don’t worry. It’s just the blood.” Xavier pushed his hands away. “You look worse than me.”

Klatos huffed out a laugh that turned into a cough. “Airbags saved me. Hit was on the back end. Where you were.”

Xavier’s expression tightened. “What happened?”

“We crossed Ashfall’s outer boundary,” Klatos said. “Not even deep into Glassreach airspace. Then the warning alarms screamed and the next second we were spinning.”

Xavier glanced back at the wrecked hover. “City defense?”

Klatos shook his head immediately. “No. They don’t shoot without hailing. They don’t miss either.”

He turned back toward the body and limped over, crouching despite the pain. He pulled back the sleeve, then paused, eyes narrowing.

“Fuck,” he muttered.

Xavier stepped closer. “What?”

Klatos tilted the arm so Xavier could see it. Burned into the skin near the wrist was a small emblem. A mark that didn’t belong to any city authority.

“This,” Klatos said, voice flat now, “is AIL.”

Xavier stared at it for a moment longer than necessary.

“So they’re done pretending,” he said.

Klatos pushed himself upright, jaw set. “They shot us down outside the jurisdiction. They must have been watching us and waiting. But they didn’t kill us right away. It seems they want to hunt us.”

Xavier looked past him, toward the trees, the mountains, the empty stretch of land where the road ended and something else began.

“Good,” he said quietly. “Then I don’t have to hold back anymore. I like me some hunting.”

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