Riven stepped through the entrance of the council hall and felt the tension immediately.
There was no formal hierarchy, but the lines of power were easy to read. Bram stood left of center with his arms crossed, watching them like someone already counting costs. A woman with burn scars on her hands kept glancing at them both before quickly looking away. Nearby, an older man with a cracked datapad resting on his lap hadn't blinked once since they stepped in. The others sat scattered across benches and chairs.
Boots scraped against the floor as a few moved in place the moment the newcomers crossed the threshold.
Cassian, just behind Riven, leaned closer to his ear, murmuring, "They're not hearing a damn word until we bleed or bow, I'm telling you..."
Riven looked past him, toward the wall in front. A map of the water grid had been etched into the surface at some point, but now it was faded, barely visible under layers of grime. Rheya would've stopped to copy it. She always found value in things people had forgotten to erase.
But he didn't want to think about Rheya. Not here.
Then a door opened behind them. Guards entered, followed by Talia. She crossed the room and took her place among the council. People looked at her as she passed, and it was obvious how she still carried the echo of authority. Her silence had a weight to it.
Riven's jaw tensed as he realized that even now, she was playing it like a balance. Still trying to hold both sides of the scale.
"You said this was urgent," Bram said, looking directly at her. His voice was flat and sharp enough to cut. "So tell us. What exactly happened down there?"
The directness of Bram's remark threw the room off balance. No one spoke.
So he went on. "The outsiders were meant to help us interpret node behavior. Instead, we're standing here after a terrain-leveling event. How does that even happen?"
He let the weight of it settle across the room.
"Now we've got a collapsed node we can't reach anymore. We have no idea how many signals are being thrown wide and high as we speak, since there is no way to track what that bloody system is doing down there. On top of that, the girl is half-conscious. And we're calling this a win?"
A murmur moved through the benches.
Someone on the far end, a man with gloves still dusted from fieldwork, added quietly, "We lost six people the last time we got involved with outsiders. Most of them never even made it back to the surface."
Riven's instinct to respond was there, but he suppressed it for now. If he spoke now, they'd tune him out before he finished the second sentence.
Then Talia stepped forward. "I called this meeting because the outcome wasn't what any of us anticipated. As you all know, the decision to go in wasn't made lightly."
She looked toward Bram, then at the rest of the room.
"The plan was to analyze node data and try to see if the device brought in by the outsiders would have any effect on it. We have been in the dark for years, this was an opportunity. So we took it."
She paused a little, weighing the effect of her words on everybody there.
"We didn't know it would trigger a full event chain."
Bram scoffed loudly as he couldn't contain one more remark. "So that's what this was... your little experiment on the node."
Talia didn't blink. "I made a decision. Same as I've done hundreds of times since we built this place for our own."
Then, it was Riven's turn.
"The node wasn't idle," he said firmly. "Whatever protocol had been running, it was already in motion when we arrived over there. It was just paused by people who were once in control of it. The logs showed it clearly. If we hadn't gone in, it would've triggered on its own at some point. A weather shift, a static surge… anything could've set it off."
He glanced around the room. "It took one touch of a hand to resume the whole thing. That's all it needed."
There was more he could say. About Anya. About the tendrils and the interface that seemed to fit her body. About how the control room pulsed in recognition of her. But he didn't think it would be wise to go there. Not now.
"All we did," he finished, "was stop something already underway."
And just like that, the room stopped whispering. For a moment, everybody kept quiet.
Bram turned slightly, as if considering the others before answering. "So you're saying the system almost triggered a terrain shift on its own," Bram said. "Just because you were there."
Riven nodded once.
"And your answer to that," Bram continued, "was to walk yourself straight into the node's tunnels? With a child?"
Cassian's mouth twitched. "Technically, the child walked in first."
Bram's voice dropped. "Or it was just arrogance. Thinking you could walk into a system that hasn't give us anything useful in five years and somehow make it listen."
Someone in the back grunted in agreement. "We don't even know what that mechanical thing they're carrying actually is."
Cassian stepped forward, prepared to disrupt the dynamic taking shape. "You want to paint this like we went messing around with forbidden tech," he said. "But none of you, except for Talia, were lining up to go down there. You had no plan. No knowledge of what's down there and how it can affect your precious little town."
There was no humor in his voice anymore. He'd had enough of them, of the sideways glances and the suspicion in every word they spoke.
Then one of the older councilwomen leaned forward on her cane. "What happened to the girl while you were in the tunnels?"
Riven changed his focus onto her. She spoke from a different place than the others: not driven by suspicion or pride, but by rational fear. Fear of what this might eventually mean for them all. Yet there was an openness in her demeanor the others hadn't shown. A willingness to listen.
He paused for a moment, weighing the most efficient way to go about it. But in the end, he found no more reason to delay. "Anya was the one who stopped the event," Riven said. Then he waited for the aftermath of his words.
A low murmur rolled through the room, deeper this time. Voices overlapped, people turned toward each other, asking questions that dissolved into the noise before any answers could form.
The old councilwoman spoke again, and her voice cut through the murmur with clarity. "Please, tell us more, young man."
"She was able to somehow connect to the system, which responded to her will alone. That's the only way I can describe it. She moved toward the interfaces, and they aligned to her. They adjusted like they'd been built to listen… to her."
A few people moved on the benches, whispering among themselves.
"But as soon as the countdown stopped, the connection cut off, too. The system ended it from its side. That's when she collapsed."
He looked toward the old councilwoman, holding her gaze, already expecting the worst. But before she could say anything, Bram intervened again.
"So what now?" he asked. "You let them stay? Let them keep walking around with that thing strapped to their side like it's nothing?"
Talia didn't answer, but looked straight at him.
"No more," Bram stated, holding her gaze. "If you won't act, I will."
He tilted his head, barely a gesture, and the side door opened. Five men stepped in, armed with repurposed rifles. They were rough builds patched from scavenged tech and old steel, but solid enough to make their point. The boots hit the stone hard.
A woman near the back of the room gasped. Then someone stood halfway, but eased back down right afterwards. The benches stirred as tension moved through the room.
"Great," Cassian muttered. "Nothing says 'reasonable debate' like walking in armed."
All the while, Riven's eyes didn't leave Bram's men. This wasn't looking good.
Talia stood, finally. "This isn't the way, Bram." But her voice didn't carry the same weight it once had.
From his corner, Bram said nothing. Just watched.