Bianca was done waiting.
She stormed into the briefing room the next morning with Maya trailing behind her like a quiet shadow.
Ward was already there, along with two other Horizon agents and — of course — Evelyn Voss standing at the front like she owned the damn mountain.
Bianca didn’t sit down.
“I’m not doing any more therapy sessions or gentle conversations. I want a mission. Real one. Something that actually gets me closer to my mom.”
Ward rubbed his temples.
“Bianca—”
“No.” She cut him off.
“You people keep telling me fragments. I’m tired of it. Give me a lead and let me move.”
Evelyn studied her for a long moment, then nodded once.
“There is a site. An old secondary lab your mother used in her final months. It’s been dark for years, but we picked up anomalous energy readings two days ago. Same signature as the fractures.”
Bianca’s pulse jumped.
The System flickered immediately.
> [ High Risk Location ]
> [ Survival Probability: 47% ]
“Perfect,” Bianca said.
“We’re going.”
Maya stepped forward before anyone could speak.
“I’m coming too.”
Bianca turned sharply.
“Maya—”
“I’m not staying behind again.” Maya’s voice was quiet but steel-hard.
“You keep protecting me like I’m still a little kid from the Red Room. I want to help. I *can* help.”
Bianca stared at her.
The kid had grown a spine in the last few weeks.
It made her proud and terrified at the same time.
Ward looked ready to argue, but Evelyn raised a hand.
“She may come. But both of you stay behind the security team. This is reconnaissance only.”
Bianca snorted.
“Yeah, sure. Recon.”
Three hours later they were in a reinforced transport cutting through a narrow mountain pass.
Snow whipped sideways across the windshield.
Maya sat beside Bianca, checking and re-checking the small tablet they’d given her for mapping.
Ward rode up front.
Two armed agents sat in the back with them, quiet and professional.
The System had been unusually talkative the whole ride.
> [ Fracture Activity Rising ]
> [ Keep Maya at safe distance ]
> [ Do not let Evelyn near any active breach ]
Bianca muttered, “You’re getting bossy.”
> [ You are reckless. Someone has to compensate. ]
The site appeared through the snow like a ghost — a squat concrete bunker half-sunk into the mountainside, doors hanging open, lights long dead.
They parked at a distance and approached on foot.
The wind howled like it was trying to warn them off.
Inside, the air tasted wrong.
Metallic.
Old.
Like something had died here years ago and never quite left.
They moved through corridors lined with broken equipment and faded warning signs.
Maya stuck close to Bianca’s side, tablet glowing softly in her hands.
“Power signatures are strongest this way,” Maya whispered, pointing.
Bianca gave her a proud little nod.
The kid was actually useful.
Scary, but useful.
They reached a sealed lab door at the end of the hall.
One of the agents pried it open.
The room beyond was a mess of shattered glass and overturned tables.
In the center of the floor, faint blue cracks glowed faintly in the concrete — not fully open, but pulsing like a slow heartbeat.
Bianca felt them react to her the second she stepped inside.
A cold pressure pushed against her skull.
The System screamed.
> [ ACTIVE RESONANCE DETECTED ]
> [ Host Adaptation Initiating — ]
One of the cracks widened with a sharp cracking sound.
Cold wind that wasn’t wind poured out.
Through the fracture Bianca glimpsed movement — something long and dark shifting between impossible stars.
“Back up!” Ward barked.
Too late.
The fracture spat out a burst of raw energy.
One of the agents was thrown backward like a ragdoll.
Maya cried out.
Bianca moved without thinking.
She lunged forward, grabbed Maya, and shoved her behind a overturned desk.
Pain exploded through her shoulder as something invisible slammed into her.
But she didn’t fall.
Instead her body reacted on pure instinct.
The world slowed for half a second.
She felt the energy, felt the fracture like it was part of her own nervous system.
The System flooded her mind.
> [ Void Resonance Stabilizing ]
> [ Redirecting — ]
Bianca thrust her hand out toward the widening crack.
Blue light flared under her skin.
The fracture shuddered, then snapped shut with a sound like thunder trapped in a bottle. You are reading on novelping.com, the official source.
Silence crashed back into the room.
Everyone stared at her.
Bianca lowered her shaking hand and looked down at her glowing fingertips as the light slowly faded.
“…okay,” she said, voice hoarse.
“That was new.”
Maya peeked out from behind the desk, eyes wide.
“You just… closed it.”
Ward helped the dazed agent to his feet.
“You alright?”
Bianca nodded, but her legs felt shaky.
The System was quiet again, almost exhausted.
> [ Adaptation Successful ]
> [ New Ability Unlocked: Minor Fracture Seal (Level 1) ]
She didn’t celebrate.
Instead she walked deeper into the lab and spotted something half-buried under debris — a small metal case with her mother’s name etched on the side.
She pried it open.
Inside was a single data drive and a handwritten note.
Bianca read it out loud, voice tight:
*”If you’re reading this, B, then it already found you.
The System isn’t from here.
It’s trying to keep you alive long enough to choose.
Don’t let Evelyn decide for you.
Find the Anchor Point.
That’s where they took me.”*
Bianca stared at the note.
The System finally spoke, almost reluctant.
> [ …She left more than I expected. ]
Bianca closed the case and looked at the others — at Ward, at Maya, at the faint blue glow still fading on her skin.
“We’re not done here,” she said.
“There’s an Anchor Point. Whatever that is. And my mom’s waiting on the other side of it.”
Maya stood up beside her, small but determined.
“Then we find it,” she said.
Bianca squeezed the younger girl’s shoulder.
For the first time in weeks, she didn’t feel completely lost.
Scared?
Yes.
Reckless?
Definitely.
But not lost.
Outside, the snow kept falling.
Inside the mountain, something ancient stirred again.
And Bianca was starting to push back.