She awoke in the clinic just four hours after the surgery, sliding out of the narrow hospital bed, grateful to no longer feel the pinch or pull of the illegal mods buried in her core. She stretched gently, silently, half-expecting the old aches to snap back like a whip—but nothing came. The discomfort she'd lived with for years was simply... gone. It would've drawn a smile from her lips if she didn't know Asrell would feed on it, his snarky comments already echoing in her mind.

  Careful not to stir the bedding too loudly, she crept to the door and opened it just a crack. Night had fallen fully over the town, bnketing everything in a soft, cold hush. Through the thin opening, she spotted the back of Elian's head. He was hunched over his desk, stylus scratching quietly across his tablet. He looked focused, but the slope of his shoulders gave him away—he was exhausted, no doubt drained from a long day, a day she made longer by her te-night visit.

  It reminded her of her father, working through long shifts at that very same desk, doing what needed to be done no matter the hour. That memory pulled at something inside her. Guilt, maybe, for all the times she'd resented his absence as a child, not understanding the weight he carried trying to keep their family safe and fed.

  The truth was, she was fine. More than fine. Dr. Elian was good at what he did—skilled hands, calm voice. And Asrell had clearly done the rest with whatever cosmic abilities he possessed. No pain. Not even a flicker of discomfort left for the symbiote to siphon. That, more than anything, likely annoyed him, robbing him of his chance to mock her suffering.

  She'd even caught a few hours of sleep. But comfort had never made her feel safe. Not really. Especially not in pces that smelled like antiseptic, even Dr. Elian's clinic—his quiet, tucked-away sanctuary—she felt too exposed, too vulnerable. The sterile scent triggered memories of being strapped to tables, subjected to experiments that stripped her of humanity.

  It wasn't about Elian. He'd shown her nothing but kindness and care. It was about her, the scars that ran deeper than any surgery could heal.

  Though she'd be hard-pressed to put words to it, she didn't trust calm. After years of imprisonment, where every second teetered on the edge of violence, where guards pyed mind games or assaulted inmates just because they could, tranquility felt like a setup. It felt like bait in a trap, and she couldn't stay. Not here, not when everything was too quiet, too easy. It made her skin crawl with the phantom memory of shackles.

  Turning back, she left the door cracked just enough to hear if Elian stirred. Then she slipped out of the dressing gown and into her own clothes. They smelled like metal and dust and her workshop—home, the only pce she'd ever felt a sense of control.

  From the notebook in her coat pocket, she tore a scrap of paper and scribbled a quick note. Just enough to tell him she'd left by choice. That she was okay, or as okay as she could be given the circumstances. She owed him at least that much after his care.

  No awkward conversations. No goodbyes, not yet. She wasn't ready.

  She slipped through the same back door she'd entered hours earlier. The chill in the night air bit at her skin, but it felt good—real, a reminder that she was free. After being locked away with only recycled air, she would never compin about fresh air again, even if it was cold. It was a luxury she'd once taken for granted.

  She didn't want Elian tangled in her aftermath. Not with the sheriff already watching her sideways, eyes narrowed with suspicion. Elian had helped without hesitation—no judgment, no fear, no questions about Asrell and the impossible things he represented. And for that kindness, that trust, she owed him more gratitude than she could ever properly express.

  But she couldn't stay, not in this pce that held too many ghosts. Dane's gruff voice reverberated through the empty spaces of her mind, sharp and steady: "Don't be a burden." The words cut deep, a reminder that her presence brought only trouble. No, it was better to move on before she disrupted the fragile order here, before her existence caused more upheaval.

  She had to go, had to keep moving. The open road beckoned, vast and unknown, but infinitely preferable to the cloying confines of these walls that knew her shame. Staying meant more conflict, more pain. Leaving was the only path.

  The Walk Home

  The road stretched quietly under a thinning night sky. The stars above shimmered through the filter-dome haze, weak and pale. Dust kicked underfoot with each step. She wrapped her arms tighter around her ribs, walking slower than she liked. Walking this path always stirred up memories of a younger version of herself, making this same trek nearly every day. Running errands for her mother. Sneaking off to see Tav before he left for the university. Those days felt like a different lifetime now, blurred by pain and distance, but the path was remembered. Her feet still knew the way, even when everything else felt foreign. It made her miss the innocence—those moments when her mind wasn't overwhelmed with what-ifs, when she wasn't cautious and constantly scanning her surroundings.

  Asrell's voice drifted in, low and disapproving.

  "You could have waited. Let the doctor take you."

  "I didn't want to stay," she muttered. "Didn't want to be seen."

  That was the truth, just not the whole of it. She had seen that protective, tender look the sheriff had given the doctor, and there was no way she was going to get in between that. Not with the sheriff already hating her.

  So as soon as she was able, she left to prevent the doctor from being pced in a difficult position. She wasn't going to burden the doctor with her presence, wasn't going to make him choose between professional obligation and personal loyalty. The st thing Mia needed was another reason for people in this town to resent her. She'd rather walk the path alone, her feet remembering what her heart wished to forget, than force someone else into her orbit of complications.

  She kept walking. The wind cut through her thin jacket, and the night was filled with sound. Far in the distance, just barely visible in the moonlight, the mining drills loomed—towering machines, unmanned and mostly unwatched. Skeletal giants with spindly legs and spinning cores, burrowing endlessly into the cracked earth. Their whirring and groaning echoed like a slow, metallic chant, a mechanical grinding that never stopped. They never slept. They never paused. Just drones, endlessly carving into the pnet's surface. Digging for resources no one even pretended to track anymore.

  Further still, the low hum of power-generating windmills turned slow and steady. She could hear the subtle rhythm of their bdes slicing the air in hypnotic intervals—constant, patient, emotionless.

  Beneath her boots, the dry sand crunched with every step. Familiar. Tangible. The kind of sound that grounded her in the now, even as her thoughts drifted back to everything she had survived. She had grown up with these sounds—the constant thrum of the drills, the grind of metal on stone, the windmills humming like distant giants. Years ago, they had become background noise, something she trained herself to ignore. But now, after everything, she found herself grateful for them. The noise meant life. Movement. That the world kept turning, even if she wasn't ready to catch up to it yet.

  Asrell didn't argue again. But she felt his discontent. He curled in the corners of her mind—tight, restrained. He hated how much he understood.

  Back in the Workshop

  The door creaked open. The smell of metal, oil, and sage greeted her as soon as she stepped inside. This was hers, and it felt so damn good. The familiar scent wrapped around her like an old friend, grounding her in the reality that she'd made it back after everything.

  She peeled off her dusty clothes and tossed them in the bin, then stepped into the tiny shower stall. The concrete floor was cold against her bare feet, a small shock of reality. She twisted the valve and waited until the water sputtered to life, pipes groaning in protest. Real water. Not steam. Not sonic pulses. Real water, however fwed.

  It struck her skin like gravel, sharp and cold. She braced her arms against the wall, let the sting hit her fully, watching rivulets carve paths down her arms. It wasn't comfortable, but it was honest. She missed this kind of pain. It meant her nerves still worked, that her body was responding to something natural instead of manufactured sensations.

  She cupped some of it in her hands and stared. But this water—this wasn't the water from her childhood. That water came from rivers, from wells dug deep into healthy ground. This was filtered water from the upper reservoir—chemically scrubbed, reused, recycled, and while technically was safe, it wasn't safe enough. She knew SVC said they'd fixed the water, promised the town it was cleaner now. But it was still wrong. Tasted off. Felt heavier on the skin. Just another half-assed patch job. Like everything else SVC touched that didn't directly make them money—they did the bare minimum and acted like heroes for it.

  The cloudy swirl pooled in her palms. Barely drinkable. Definitely not clean. But it was what she had. And she had pns to change that. She let it slip through her fingers, watching it spiral down the drain.

  The first obstacle was gone. The illegal mods were out. She was still standing. Her body ached in pces where flesh had been opened and closed, but it was a healing pain. Asrell was doing what he did best, he numbed the pain, so really, she convinced herself she felt nothing.

  For the first time in what felt like forever, her body was quiet—no more sharp jolts or nausea, no more mechanical whispers under her skin. Just her. Just the woman she'd been before they tried to turn her into something else. The silence inside her was deafening and beautiful all at once.

  She grabbed a towel, wiped the water off her arms, and moved to her bench. Her eyes drifted to the list scribbled in thick strokes on the wall panel above her tools. Scraps of notes, taped-up sketches, broken-down systems she wanted to rebuild. Every time she'd tried to focus on it before, the mods got in the way. Not from physical pain—they weren't agony, just uncomfortable. Always there. Always shifting under her skin. A constant reminder of where she'd been and what had been done to her. They pulled her back to darker pces, made her feel watched, owned.

  Anytime she sat down to fix something, they were there. Nudging at her core. Stealing her focus. Dragging her back.

  Now? That noise was gone. Now she had no excuse.

  Pushing herself away from the bench, she went digging through the drawers for her clean-ish clothes—long-sleeve shirts, coveralls that still smelled faintly like burned circuits and solvent. She knew Asrell wanted her to rest, to sleep off the recovery, but her mind was already spinning. Already calcuting.

  There was a list. And now she could finally start crossing things off it.

  Later

  Back in the workshop, Asrell watched her through a reflection in the metal pting above her workbench. He had learned that he could see through her eyes when there was a reflective surface, and he found himself constantly looking for surfaces to see her.

  She moved slowly, deliberately. Her hands still trembled, but her grip was steadying. She rewired a motor casing, lips set in that stubborn line he was starting to know too well. That expression told him she was humoring him, but not really listening.

  "You're overexerting."

  He felt the need to say it because he could feel the tension in her spine.

  "No," she said, sharper this time. "I'm finding my rhythm again. It's been so long since I've been able to do this. I—we've been tired before, Asrell."

  He let it go, mostly because he knew no amount of back-and-forth would pull her away from that bench unless he completely took over.

  She reached for a tablet and began sketching—rough lines at first, then sharper, more focused ones. It was a design. Something new.

  Asrell didn't speak. Just watched—wary, but curious.

  There was peace in her. And excitement. He didn't know the name for it, but he liked the feel of it. It wasn't as rich as fear or anger—those were stronger, more filling—but this had its own weight. This was different. And it still tasted good.

  "I'm gd it's gone," he said at st. "That thing..."

  She didn't answer. Not because she disagreed, but because, as far as she was concerned, it was behind her now. Gone.

  And she was done thinking about it.

  She kept working long after the hum of the windmills changed tone, after the drills slowed for scheduled maintenance cycles she didn't need to check. The moonlight that had been cutting through her workshop window faded to a dull glow, repced by the orange-pink stretch of early sunrise creeping in across the concrete floor.

  When she finally put the sketch tablet down, her back cracked sharply from leaning over too long. Her neck was stiff. Her fingers ached.

  "You have engaged in continuous physical bor exceeding eight sor hours. This is inefficient."

  Asrell's voice was clipped, more machine-like than usual, cold and exacting. He was annoyed.

  She groaned and rolled her shoulder. "Could've said something sooner."

  "You ignored repeated advisories. Also, I require sustenance. Your energy stores are depleted. Mine are impacted."

  "Yeah, yeah, alright." She smirked as she pushed herself to her feet. "We'll eat. Calm down."

  "I am not uncalm. I am under-fueled."

  He was slipping. Back into the more formal cadence. It happened when he was irritated—or trying to hide concern. And she noticed.

  "You're getting twitchy again," she muttered. "Go ahead, say something about 'organic inefficiency' next."

  He didn't answer.

  But in her chest, she felt the flicker of something amused. Maybe even sheepish.

  And that was enough.