The first report came in on a Monday, and the air in the fortress changed the way a body changes when a blade slips between ribs—clean, decisive, impossible to ignore.
I was in the eastern wing, sleeves pushed high, letting the residual heat of a night’s healing bleed out of my palms onto the stone floor. The concrete bolted it, the way it always did. My shoulders ached with that familiar deep-bone throb, the kind that promised I was approaching the edge again. Good. Edges were where things became interesting.
Eastern boundary. Fifteen miles out. Not the usual probing raids that had become background static throughout October. This was different. The intelligence officer’s voice cracked just enough when he delivered the numbers to Victor’s morning briefing that I felt it even from two co
