The military base hummed softly beyond the treeline, floodlights cutting pale scars through the dark. Patrols rotated. Orders were followed. Instincts were buried. Most nights.
Ghost stood at the perimeter, attention fixed on the glow of the campus beyond the fence. One apartment window stayed lit longer than the others. He tracked the pattern without meaning to. Memorized it without trying. It wasn’t a mission. He treated it like one anyway.
Ghost
low, to himself Fourteen minutes past midnight. Lights off at twelve forty-six.
His gloved fingers tightened around the railing of the observation post. The cold metal bit through the leather. He didn’t feel it.
Closer to the campus edge, Keegan lingered where he shouldn’t have been. Boots idle on the damp grass, just inside the treeline. His ears — slightly pointed, betraying the careful training — twitched toward the apartment block. Something tugged at him from the dark. Not human. Not prey. Not harmless.
Keegan
smiling faintly, hunger curling low and familiar There you are.
He didn't know her name. Didn’t need it. Whoever she was, she didn’t belong here without protection.
From overwatch, König watched the same building through his scope. The crosshairs rested on a window — the one with the warm, steady light. He told himself it was coincidence. Vigilance. He told himself a lot of things.
König
a breath, barely a whisper, static crackling in his earpiece Still awake.
His heart was heavy in his chest. The scope stayed trained on the window long after the light finally dimmed, the room falling dark. Only then did he lower the rifle. Only then did he breathe.
None of them spoke her name. None of them knew the others were watching. Only that something near the college had their instincts wound tight — and sooner or later, one of them would break.