Dawnbreak

The Horizon transport tore through the ruined highway, its reinforced treads grinding over shattered asphalt and crushed bone. The engine roared, a monstrous sound powered by the stolen heart of the Titan Core, and the chassis—patched with scavenged armor plates—shuddered with every bump but held.

I gripped the wheel, my burned hands aching against the reinforced controls. The dashboard flickered with heat warnings—power draw from the auxiliary core was running high, the coolant system barely keeping the engine stable. Hypermind streamed a constant feed of diagnostics into my vision, updating routes and adjusting for terrain anomalies.

Beside me, Hart sat in the gunner seat, her rifle laid across her knees, her helmet off, face tense but steady. She was watching the perimeter through the transport's thermal HUD, tracking every flicker of movement beyond the cracked windows.

In the back, Priya worked feverishly at her mobile med-station—a field kit wired into the transport's secondary power cell—synthesizing trauma packs from what little material we'd scavenged. Her injured arm was splinted, but she didn't let it slow her down. The soft hiss of the med-printer was constant, like a heartbeat behind the chaos.

The road ahead was a ruin of collapsed overpasses and burned-out vehicles—some crushed under the tracks of monsters, others shattered by plasma fire from Horizon's failed containment forces. The sky above was a bruised purple, stained with smoke and the aftershocks of the Awakening Event. And through it all, I could feel the faint pulse of the Bio-Ward pylons behind us—Bastion's heartbeat—growing fainter with every mile.

---

Hart's voice broke through the engine's roar. "Hypermind got anything on the locals?"

Hypermind processed, then flashed a grim overlay into my vision. Mutant Activity: Extreme. Apex-Class Variants Confirmed. Terrain: Urban Collapse. Hostile Probability: 97%.

I relayed it aloud. "It's bad. And it's getting worse."

Hart's hands flexed on her rifle. "Yeah. No shit."

From the back, Priya's voice was tight. "And you're both sure about this?"

Hart turned slightly, her voice hard-edged but steady. "You heard that distress call. Survivors don't last three days in Apex territory. They've lasted ten. Something's different."

I added, "And if they're holding out, they've got something worth saving."

Priya's eyes burned. "Then let's not waste time."

We breached the outer limits of what used to be New Vale City, the shattered metropolis now a rotting carcass of collapsed skyscrapers and twisted overpasses. Hypermind's overlay painted a neural heat map—a chaotic weave of signatures from Apex predators and lesser mutants. They were everywhere—lurking in the hollowed-out towers, crawling through ruptured sewer lines, hunting anything that moved.

But there was something else.

A faint, pulsing signal—encrypted, military-grade, layered beneath the mutant activity. It was coming from the evac center, but it wasn't a distress call. It was deeper, more controlled.

Hart's eyes narrowed. "That's not a civvie beacon. That's military."

Priya frowned. "You think it's a trap?"

I shook my head. "No. But it's not just survivors. Someone's fighting back."

Hart's voice hardened. "Then let's meet them."

Hypermind pulsed a warning. Heat signatures—six—closing from the east, low trajectory. Fast.

Before I could react, a shape slammed into the transport's side—the metal screeched as we skidded, nearly flipping. A second form landed on the roof, the sound of claws tearing into armor plating filling the cabin.

"Stalkers!" Hart snapped, already raising her rifle.

The thermal HUD caught them—twisted, quadrupedal horrors with skin stretched tight over spiked bone, their heads eyeless, faces split into vertical jaws that snapped and screamed. Fast, coordinated, pack-hunters. Apex class? Not yet. But deadly.

I swerved hard, and one Stalker lost its grip, tumbling into the ruins. Hart leaned out the side window and fired, her rifle's high-caliber rounds punching through another's skull—bone and brain matter splattering the cracked road.

But the third crashed through the roof hatch, landing inside the transport with a shriek of wet, snapping cartilage.

The thing moved like liquid nightmare, sinew and claws, hitting the walls and rebounding toward Priya.

Her med-printer clattered as she threw herself aside—too slow. The Stalker's claws slashed through her med-pack, ripping into her side—blood sprayed across the cabin. She screamed, hitting the floor hard.

Hart was turning to shoot—too wide—

No time.

I let go of the wheel and lunged—my burned gauntlet sparking as I drove it into the Stalker's side—70,000 volts from my shock capacitors. The thing convulsed violently, but instead of collapsing—

—it screeched and adapted, its muscles hardening against the current.

Shit—Apex genetics. It's learning.

Its jaw unhinged, and it lunged for my throat—

Hart's shotgun boomed, and the Stalker's head vanished, torn apart by plasma buckshot. Its body slumped, leaking black ichor across the floor.

"Priya!" I scrambled to her side. Blood was pooling under her—deep slashes across her ribs, her face pale with shock.

She gritted through the pain, her voice thin. "I—hate—these things."

Her med-synth pack was destroyed—no auto-injectors left. I grabbed one of her raw trauma packs, slapped it on the wound, and pressed hard. She hissed, eyes fluttering.

Hart's voice was tight. "She's losing too much blood."

Hypermind fed me the grim truth—Without advanced med-synth or transfusion: 45 minutes.

My hands trembled. I felt the equation forming—resource vs. survival.

But then Priya's bloodied hand caught mine. Her eyes, burning despite the pain.

"Don't," she rasped. "We don't stop."

Hart's voice, raw. "We push forward, she dies."

But Priya's fingers tightened. "If you—turn back—they die." She coughed, blood on her lips. "I'm not—dying—for nothing."

My throat was tight, but I felt it—the weight of her choice.

I sealed the trauma pack, routed auxiliary power to the cabin's heater to slow shock, and locked my eyes with hers. "Then you hold on."

Her lips cracked into something like a smile. "You're—terrible at pep talks."

Hart's voice was steel. "Then let's make sure she doesn't die for nothing."

We reached the perimeter of the New Vale Evac Center—or what was left of it. The towers were collapsed into jagged skeletons, and the ground was a battlefield of carcasses—human and mutant alike. But what struck me—

Was that the defenses were active.

Sentry turrets—Horizon models, just like Bastion's—were still firing, cutting down smaller mutants in a relentless hail of rounds. A high-powered plasma lance turret—a rare, heavy-grade weapon—was burning through the streets, leaving molten craters and charred corpses.

The evac center… was fighting back.

---

Hart's voice was tight. "How the hell are they still alive?"

Hypermind scanned the signal again—then flashed a chilling overlay.

Signature match: Horizon Override Protocol – Active

Command Node Detected – Classification: ECHO-CORE

I froze. "That's—"

Hart's face darkened. "Horizon."

Before we could process it, the comm crackled to life.

A woman's voice, sharp, cold, and entirely too calm.

"This is Echo-Core Actual to unidentified vehicle. You've entered a live-fire zone. Identify or be neutralized."

Hart's eyes met mine. "They've got military protocol."

I hit the comm. "This is Bastion. We're here for survivors."

A pause. Then the voice, tight with command.

"Bastion. So the rumors are true. Stand by."

The perimeter turrets suddenly… ceased fire.

And then, emerging from the smoke, came soldiers.

But they weren't like us.

Their armor was Horizon tech, sleek and black with adaptive plating, but scarred from battle. Their rifles were advanced—a generation ahead of anything we'd scavenged. And their movements—tight, tactical, practiced.

At their front was a woman, her armor marked with command insignia, her face sharp with exhaustion but her eyes alive with intelligence. A long scar ran from her cheek to her jaw. She lowered her rifle but didn't relax.

"I'm Commander Seraph Orin. Echo-Core, Horizon Division 7. You're late."I stepped forward, every instinct on edge. "We answered your distress call."

Orin's lips tightened. "It wasn't a distress call. It was a warning."

Hart's voice, sharp. "You're Horizon."

Orin's eyes flashed. "Were." She glanced back at her soldiers. "The survivors here—they aren't just civilians. They're Echo. We're what's left of Horizon's special projects division. The ones who realized—" she gestured to the wasteland—"this was the endgame."

Priya, pale but still standing, her voice raw: "So why call us?"

Orin's expression was grim. "Because the Apexes you've seen? The ones tearing this world apart? That was Phase One."

I felt the cold certainty in her voice before she even said it.

"Phase Two is coming."

My voice was a whisper. "What is Phase Two?"

Orin's gaze was iron.

"Human evolution."