Mercer
With Jorak gone, I head back to my office, immediately pulling up the asset’s location.
I’ve sent at least four guards to the campus as well to ensure that Jorak doesn’t try anything stupid.
However, something always happens with that Enigma and I wouldn’t be surprised if it happens on campus this time.
I blow out a heavy breath and look toward the door, Dr. Elian Rue standing there, vibrating a little.
If I didn’t know better, I’d have thought he was an Omega.
He’s a man of high intellect and low courage, the kind of asset who requires constant recalibration to remain effective.
I let the silence stretch between us, returning my attention back to my desk, until I hear the faint, rhythmic tap of his shoe against the carpet.
"You're early, Elian," I say, keeping my voice level. "I appreciate the dedication. Most of your colleagues are still nursing their first coffee."
I look up again, leaning back in my seat. "Show me."
He moves forward, laying the tablet on my desk. The screen glows with the stark, blue-white light of a Vesper House medical summary. It’s a sealed notice, the kind protected by a dozen layers of privacy legislation and medical ethics codes.
"An S-Class Alpha rut match," I murmur, scanning the intake timestamps. "The window lines up with his disappearance. Just as the sedative levels in Jorak's blood would have hit the floor."
"It's a clinical summary, Mercer," Rue says, his hands moving restlessly at his sides.
"Vesper House uses their own internal metrics.
'S-Class Alpha' in their system is a measure of hormonal volatility and rut-risk, not necessarily an Esper classification.
It could be a high-functioning Alpha with a particularly aggressive cycle. It doesn't have to be Jorak."
I trace the curve of the discharge note with my thumb. "And the Omega?"
"Matched by blood compatibility," Rue says. He’s trying to sound reasonable, trying to offer me a way out of the conclusion he knows I’ve already reached.
"But look at the outcome. No emergency intervention.
No trauma protocols activated. The Omega left under their own power, uninjured and stable.
That isn't how an encounter with Jorak ends.
Not when he's in a Black Current surge."
I lean back in my chair, the leather creaking under my weight.
Elian doesn't understand. He sees the world through the lens of a lab technician, focused on the safety of the individual.
I see the world as a system of pressures and reliefs.
If Jorak returned to the facility as calm as a summer morning, it isn't because the drugs finally worked. It’s because he found a vent for the pressure.
Jorak’s never found a match, a guide for his essence. And during a rut? He’s known to be nearly lethal.
"The fact that the Omega survived is exactly why it has to be him," I say. I tap the tablet screen. "Jorak doesn't need more suppression, Elian. He needs a sink. This report suggests he found one that didn't burn out after ten minutes of contact."
"Even if it is him, the privacy laws—"
"The privacy laws ended the moment an S-Class Enigma walked out of containment," I cut him off.
I don't raise my voice. I don't have to.
"I want the full record. Not just the summary.
I want the blood compatibility sequence, the intake biometrics, and the discharge notes.
I want to know exactly what kind of Omega walks into a room with a starving wolf and comes out without a scratch. "
Rue hesitates. "Requesting those files under emergency authority will leave a digital trail a mile wide. If the Board finds out we're subpoenaing clinical records for a classified asset..."
"The Board wants Redbrook stable," I reply. "They don't care how the gears turn, as long as the clock keeps ticking. File the request. Use my personal override code. Tell them it's a matter of containment integrity."
Before he can respond, the console on my desk chirps.
A red light pulses in the corner of my vision, a steady, rhythmic heartbeat that signals a new crisis.
I tap the display, bringing up the city map.
A suppression node near the university district glows amber, the energy readings spiking into the danger zone.
"Another one?" Rue asks, his face paling as he looks at the screen.
"Flare-sick civilians in the residential blocks," I say, watching the data stream. "The fucking Unbound group have already released a statement, calling it environmental poisoning. They're claiming we're burying the city in its own rot."
I stand up and walk to the window, looking out toward the university spikes. The infrastructure is failing faster than our models predicted. The nodes were never meant to hold this much stray power for this long. We’re trying to hold back an ocean with a crumbling dam.
"We don't have time for a delicate approach," I say, my reflection staring back at me from the glass. "Jorak's placement at Redbrook University will continue. The nodes there are critical; if they fail, we lose the entire northern grid."
"He's not ready," Rue argues, though his voice lacks conviction. "I know we sent him this morning but his stabilization levels are... well, we don't know why they're stable. Pushing him into a high-stress zone near failing nodes could trigger a catastrophic discharge."
"He needs to stay active," I counter. "He's a weapon, Elian. You don't keep a blade in a velvet box when the enemy is at the gates. You use it. If he's found a way to balance his own current, I want to know if it holds under field conditions."
Rue sighs, a long, defeated sound. He looks older than he did ten minutes ago, the weight of the system finally beginning to crush his remaining ethics. He picks up the tablet, standing there for a moment, looking at the door, then back at me.
"If this Omega is real," he says, his voice dropping to a whisper.
"If there is someone out there who can actually stabilize him...
bringing them into this, Mercer. Pulling them into Jorak's file.
It will destroy their life. They'll be turned into a state resource.
A battery. They'll never have a choice again. "
I walk over to him, stopping just inside his personal space. I’m a head taller than him, and I make sure he feels the full weight of that presence. Every choice I make is a calculation meant to keep eight million people from burning in a power surge they don't even believe in.
"If that Omega survived a night with Jorak Thorn," I say, my voice as cold and hard as the glass behind me. "Their life is already involved. They just don't know it yet. Now, go and get me that name."
He nods once, a sharp, jerky movement, and flees the office. I watch the door close behind him, the latch clicking into place with a finality that pleases me. I walk back to my desk and sit down, my eyes drawn back to the amber light pulsing on the map.
I pull up the university district schematic, the blue lines overlapping with the heat signatures of the failing nodes.
The pulse is erratic, a jagged heartbeat that mirrors the rising tension in the streets.
Silas is clever; he knows exactly which nerves to pinch to make the public scream.
By framing the nodes as a source of sickness rather than a shield against it, he is turning the city's life support into a public enemy.
If the civilians start sabotaging the nodes to 'stop the poisoning,' the resulting flare will level three city blocks within seconds.
My fingers dance across the holographic interface, isolating Node 42-B.
It’s located in the basement of the university's physics wing, a relic of the first expansion that was never properly decommissioned. It’s leaking more than just static; the atmospheric radiation levels are climbing, creating that sickly sweet ozone smell that precedes a total containment breach.
I need Jorak there, not just as a deterrent against Unbound protestors, but because his very presence acts as a grounding rod for the excess energy.
His body can absorb the leak where a human technician would simply liquefy.
The screen flickers, a priority message blinking in the corner of my eye. A camera screen appears, showing the inside of the car Jorak took earlier. There’s four cars following him and another already at the campus but it’s the lack of expression on Jorak’s face that surprises me.
He’s not angry, breathing too hard, or even boiling over. He’s just... driving.
I lean in, magnifying the image. There’s no tremor in his fingers.
The raw, violent hum that usually vibrates through the audio sensors when he’s near is hushed, replaced by a low, stable frequency.
It’s the biological equivalent of a storm system suddenly turning into a light breeze.
Whatever happened at Vesper House hasn't just sated him; it recalibrated him.
"What did you find, Jorak?" I whisper to the camera. He can't hear me, but for a second, his eyes shift toward the camera lens. He knows I’m watching. He always knows. He doesn't look like a weapon in need of repair anymore. He looks like a weapon that’s finally found its target.
Unable to sit still, I pull up my email, smiling as a new notification from Rue shows up. Damn, he’s good. The intake from Vesper House opens up, the one hidden by firewalls we’re not supposed to be able to circumvent.
Vesper House Intake Record - Transaction 8849-Z*
I bypass the financial records and go straight to the blood compatibility metrics.
The clinic uses a proprietary algorithm to match scent and pheromonal signatures with blood pH and hormonal spikes.
The match for the Alpha, identified only as 'Client A' for now, is a staggering 99.
8%. I have never seen a number that high.
Even state-mandated pairings for S-Class assets rarely break 85%.
At 99.8%, the two subjects aren't just compatible; they are biologically resonant.
Their systems will recognize each other as parts of a whole.
I scroll down to the Omega's biometrics.
The data is encrypted with a secondary key, one that requires a physical token I don't yet have.
But the intake timestamp for the Omega's blood draw is visible.
They arrived a few hours after the Alpha.
They were processed through the standard screening.
And then, the discharge time: nearly twelve hours later.
Long enough for a full rut cycle to reach its peak and begin its descent.
Long enough for a lethal amount of energy to pass between two people.
I stare at the screen, my mind already weaving the implications into a broader strategy. If I can secure this Omega, I won't just have a way to stabilize Jorak; I’ll have a way to enhance him.
A resonant Guide can act as a lens, focusing an Esper’s power into a surgical strike rather than a blunt instrument of destruction. We would be able to stabilize the nodes without the risk of civilian casualties.
But Rue is right about one thing: the Omega's life will be over.
The moment I put a name to that blood profile, they become ESA property.
They will be moved to a high-security facility.
Their movements will be monitored, their diet controlled, their very heartbeat logged.
They will be the chain that holds the wolf.
And the wolf, in turn, will never let them go.
A 99.8% match creates a dependency that borders on the religious.
Jorak won't just need them; he will hunt anyone who tries to stand between them.