The Gifted Divide

"Dressing up forgiveness to look comfortable does nothing more than save face. Forgiveness is a one-sided gift to the abuser and a self-inflicted punishment for the victim. Standing up for oneself by forcing repayment of debt makes a person whole and sets them free. Payback fully satisfies Newton's Third Law of Motion." ― Geoffrey Neil (Prey For Us)

* * * *

Darkness.

For a moment, all Lucas Alescio could feel was the weight of it—pressing behind his closed eyes, heavy in his limbs, like he was submerged under ten feet of stone. There was pain too, dull and distant, as though filtered through layers of cotton. His body felt foreign to him. Almost detached.

His tongue felt like sandpaper. He stirred with a soft groan, breath hitching against the rasp of bandages wound tightly around his neck. The air smelled faintly of antiseptic and woodsmoke.

Lucas cracked opened his eyes, catching sight of an unfamiliar ceiling. There were wooden beams visible above him.

For several moments, Lucas laid in the bed, confused, then, his memory came back to him in a flash.

His infiltration into the hunters' secondary base at Kald, being caught and then imprisoned. His teammates and even Misha, as well as Louis, coming to break him out, Zest and Lleucu coming to their aid, even as they have to fight their way out. Maia revealing that she's really a hunter all this while, and Coleen killing Maia as well as the hunter teams with her, with Coleen revealing that like Elijah and Taylor, she was part of the underground as well, with Coleen being part of Blaze.

Lucas's heart lurched. His fingers twitched against rough sheets, and he forced his dry throat to move. "…Misha?"

The name came out like gravel, hoarse and unsure.

Across the small room, the figure in the chair jolted upright, a hand instinctively flying toward the gun holstered at his side before recognition dawned in those familiar onyx eyes.

"Lucas!" Misha was already out of his chair and at his side, gripping his shoulder with trembling relief. "You're awake. You've been asleep for a week!"

"A… A week?" Lucas blinked sluggishly. His vision was still blurry around the edges, and his head throbbed beneath the bandages wrapped around his forehead.

Misha's expression softened, but he didn't smile. There was too much weariness behind his eyes for that. "Yeah. You passed out the moment we got in the van. I think your body just…gave out. They'd been starving you. Barely gave you enough water to survive." He pulled away, calling out through the open doorway. "Oi! Get Elijah! Get the others! He's awake!"

Lucas tried to sit up and immediately regretted it. His body screamed in protest. Misha was already back at his side, steadying him with firm but careful hands. "Don't push it. Your neck and arms were torn up bad. The restraints they used on you… They weren't standard. I've never seen anything like them."

"Gifted suppressors?" Lucas asked, his voice hollow.

"Worse. Probably custom-made by R&D. Or Neuron's little lab rats." Misha's jaw clenched. "Bastards."

Lucas leaned back against the pillow, his gaze sweeping the room. It was plain but clean. Wooden walls, one window, and sunlight filtering in through threadbare curtains. A distant rumble of voices echoed from somewhere outside.

"Where…are we?"

"Ashenridge," Misha said softly. "It's where we regrouped after Kald. This place… It's not just a safehouse. It's more than that. A base. Built over the remains of Zone 0."

Lucas's eyes widened. "Zone 0? You mean where…?"

"Where Project Nonary happened, yeah," Misha said grimly. "They rebuilt it. The resistance. Rex did. Seems like Aegis had been in contact with them for awhile. They've been sending all the people they managed to save to Ashenridge."

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Misha sat back down, exhaustion still evident in the slump of his shoulders. "Since we got here, we've been helping around. Repairs. Guard rotations. Everyone's been doing what they can. Elijah and Remi have been going back to the mainland in shifts, keeping tabs on the situation."

Lucas listened in silence, his mind working slowly through the haze.

"As far as we can tell…" Misha continued, "Nicolosi's furious. We blew up half of the hunters' secondary base. Nicolosi lost a quarter of his men in the process, including some of his elites. And Coleen…" His voice faltered for a second. "Coleen took out Maia and her entire squad. Just like that."

Lucas shut his eyes. "She was one of us."

"No." Misha's voice was quiet but firm. "She was never one of us. She was a spy. A hunter. She would've killed you."

"…I should've known."

"Damn right you should've." Misha's tone sharpened suddenly, and he leaned forward. "What the hell were you thinking, Lucas? You went in there alone. You didn't even leave a note. Just vanished. Do you have a goddamned death wish?!"

Lucas flinched at the raw hurt in Misha's voice. It was rare to see his little brother lose composure like this. "I didn't want to drag anyone else into my mess," he muttered.

"There wouldn't be a mess if you'd just opened your mouth and asked if I knew anything!" Misha snapped. "I'm your brother. You got a mouth for a reason, Lucas! Use it!"

The door creaked open behind them, and footsteps spilled in—light and heavy, soft and loud, voices rising in a sudden burst of sound and emotion.

"Lucas!"

"You're alive!"

"Thank the Goddess!"

"You scared the hell out of us."

"What the hell were you thinking?!"

Team Alpha and Team Delta—no, not agents anymore, just a ragtag bunch of rebels now, stood crowding the doorway and the space beyond, visibly dishevelled and stained with dirt and sweat. Clearly, they'd been hard at work.

Leonid pushed to the front, his expression stormy. "You nearly got yourself killed, Lucas. Infiltrating Kald solo? Are you insane?"

Lucas gave a sheepish smile. "I've had better ideas."

Leonid looked ready to throttle him, but Taylor beat him to it, stepping forward and smacking Lucas's leg—not hard, but enough to make her point. "Don't do that again. Ever."

"Y-Yeah," Jonan added, crossing his arms. "Don't scare us like that, man. You're not indestructible."

Allen hovered nearby, worry and concern on his face. "We thought we were gonna lose you."

The warmth in the room was palpable despite the earlier tension. It wasn't just relief. It was love. Fierce, loyal love.

Then… Beep. Beep. Beep.

The sudden, sharp sound made everyone freeze.

"What's that?" Misha asked, his hand instinctively moving toward his sidearm.

Louis blinked, then fished into his jacket pocket, pulling out a sleek black communicator—an ESA-issued device.

"You brought that?" Remi's voice jumped an octave. "Are you crazy?!"

"Relax." Louis was already fiddling with the controls. "I hacked it. Spoofed the ID. It's not traceable. I thought it might be a good idea to keep tabs on what the ESA's doing next."

Everyone's eyes were glued to the device.

"What was that beep?" Leonid asked.

Louis frowned. "Someone's using the emergency channel. All departments. All ranks."

Lucas sat upright, wincing. "That's only used in extreme situations. I've never seen it used."

"Same," Misha said.

"Can you tune in?" Elijah wanted to know, and Louis nodded, fiddling with the controls. There were sounds of static, and a slight pause for several moments.

Then, there were the sounds of rapid gunfire and shoutings, and just general chaos from the communicator. Everyone narrowed their eyes at the device even as Louis put it onto the bedside table next to Lucas.

"Was that gunfire?" Taylor muttered, her eyes narrowed. "What's going on?"

There were the sounds of desperate panting then, and a voice spoke. Misha stiffened, recognising the voice.

"—gunfire! They've breached the upper levels! Someone—anyone—listen!"

The voice was ragged, desperate, and utterly terrified.

"That's Bryan," Misha said, his face pale as he stared at the communicator. "He's from Command. High-level Command."

There was more static, including more screams and explosions on the other end.

"I got a bad feeling about this." Lucas muttered, staring at the communicator like it would explode.

Bryan's voice spoke from the communicator, loud and clear. It doesn't seem like he's addressing anyone in particular, but anyone whom he could reach. "They would no doubt be listening in on this conversation and frequency, but I need to tell every ESA agent out there! The hunters… They're on the move! They're not our ally! They're attacking ESA headquarters and the Eldario Council!"

The eyes of everyone present widened.

"They've turned on us!" Bryan's voice broke. "They've breached headquarters, killing anyone they find—Gifted or Normal, it doesn't matter! Even those that once stood with them! They are now openly our enemy!"

Taylor's hands clutched the edge of the bed.

"When this transmission ends, destroy your communicators! They've accessed the ESA mainframe! They can track you! They're watching every line of communication! We should assume that all conversations through the communicators are being monitored! Even the Director… If she made it out—" Bryan coughed. It was wet, like he'd just coughed out blood. "If… If anyone is still alive out there, and away from the ESA, please…! Save Eldario!"

BOOM.

A thunderous sound then cut through, being followed by deafening static. The communicator then silenced.

And for several long minutes, nobody spoke. They all stared at the communicator, as if hoping they'd just heard wrong.

The air felt colder somehow, like the world outside the window had stopped turning. The ESA, once the last remaining structure of order in Eldario, was burning.

Taylor was the first to speak, her voice trembling. For several moments, Taylor couldn't even recognise her voice. "They're… They're attacking everyone?"

"They don't care anymore," Leonid said hoarsely. "They're not pretending to be on our side. It's open war now."

"They're killing Normals too?" Jonan whispered. "Even ones on their side?"

"They don't see sides anymore," Misha said slowly, his voice like frost. "They just see threats. Anyone with a conscience. Anyone who might question Nicolosi."

Remi muttered, "This isn't just a purge. This is a goddamned genocide."

Lucas sat frozen. The communicator still hissed quietly on the table beside him. He stared at it, trying to process what they'd heard. The ESA, his home for so long. His career. His calling. All reduced to rubble.

"They've declared war," Misha said finally. "Not just on the Gifted. Not just on the resistance. On everyone."

No one could bring themselves to argue.

And in the stillness of that wrecked moment, with the sun filtering weakly through the curtains of a stranger's home built over a graveyard of secrets, Lucas felt the tide of everything they knew about Eldario begin to shift.

Everything was about to change.

And none of them would ever be the same again.