Chapter Twelve: The Culling

The moment Landon slipped out of the room; Skye moved. Tara barely had time to react before his hand caught her wrist. Not harsh. Not forceful. But deliberate. Heat flared beneath his touch, curling deep in her stomach. Something about it wasn't normal. Tara's breath hitched as she glanced up at him. Skye stood too close, too still. His black-glimmering eyes locked onto hers, unreadable.

"You don't have to rely on him."

His voice was low, steady, but something about the way he said it sent a primal shiver down her spine. She tried to step back. He didn't let go. Her pulse pounded. The warmth in her abdomen twisted, spreading through her chest, crawling up her throat. It wasn't fear. It wasn't revulsion. It was something else. Something that felt…new and old at the same time.

Skye tilted his head slightly, his thumb barely brushing the inside of her wrist, where her pulse was racing. Tara's breath came too fast, too sharp. Then—A voice from the hall.

"Tara?"

Landon. 

The warmth in her stomach snapped like a rubber band. She jerked her wrist free just as Landon's footsteps rounded the corner. His green eyes immediately locked onto Skye, then flickered to her. Tara swallowed hard, forcing herself to move, to break the unnerving silence pressing in on them.

"I'm coming," she said quickly.

She turned—too fast—toward Landon, pushing past Skye without looking back. Her chest was tight, burning. The entire way back to her room, she barely heard a word Landon said. But she felt Skye's eyes on her the entire time.

⸻

The DNHA facility loomed in the distance, unnaturally pristine against the decayed ruins of Shade Territory. Its shimmering silver walls reflected the sickly green sky, a beacon of control in a land filled with chaos. Tara hated it. It was too clean, too polished—too familiar for her to deal with right now. She had grown up in buildings like this. Government walls. Orderly floors. Sterile silence. 

But now, stripped of that world, she could see it for what it truly was. A prison disguised as an institution.

Guards lined the perimeter, their weapons unholstered but not raised. They didn't need to be. The creatures entering the facility knew better than to run. Tara, Ballad, and the rest of the crew walked in a single-file line, merging with the stream of Shades and Fluorescents waiting to be processed. 

And that's when she saw it. The scale of the Shade population. Hundreds. Hundreds of supernatural beings, packed together in this one settlement alone. Tara's stomach tightened. She had spent her whole life believing Shades were a minority. A dangerous faction. A problem that needed controlling. But looking at them now—their faces drawn, their bodies too thin, their eyes hollow—This wasn't a faction. This was a mass grave waiting to happen.

Tara's breath quickened. Ballad's fingers brushed against her arm—a silent warning. Stay calm. Tara nodded once, inhaling slowly, forcing her muscles to relax. But nothing could shake the feeling that she was walking straight into a slaughterhouse.

⸻

Inside the facility, the air was frigid. The white lights buzzed, stark against the steel floors. A voice crackled overhead.

"Assessments will be conducted separately. Do not resist. Do not speak unless spoken to. Noncompliance will result in immediate disciplinary action."

Landon stood rigid beside her. His jaw was tight, his hands curled into fists. Tara could feel the tension rolling off him in waves. He knew. He knew how dangerous this was. A guard strode down the hall, calling names off a clipboard. 

"Tara Dianna Stele."

Tara forced herself to breathe. Gods, they were quick with documentation. She stepped forward. The others vanished behind closing doors.

⸻

She was led into a small, windowless room. A single chair. A single table.Two mirrored walls—one of them was watching. Tara sat. Silence. Then—The lights flickered. A projection flashed to life on the wall in front of her. A puzzle.

Tara blinked. A shape-shifting pattern, morphing and twisting too fast to track. A single question pulsed beneath it.

"Find the missing sequence."

Tara frowned. It wasn't a simple pattern test. It was testing how her brain processed shifts, changes, adaptability. She exhaled through her nose. They wanted to see if she thought like a Fluorescent. Or like something else. She took her time. Studied it. Then, calmly, decisively, she touched the third symbol. The screen flashed green. The puzzle morphed. Faster. More erratic.

"Find the missing sequence."

The shapes blurred, becoming less like patterns and more like living, writhing things. A headache curled behind her eyes. Her fingers twitched. Stay in control. She pressed the second symbol. Green. Again. Faster. More erratic. A pulse of warmth rolled down her spine. The light buzzed in her skull. She swallowed hard.

She wasn't going to lose control. Not here. Not now. 

Another sequence. Then another. The test lasted minutes or hours—she couldn't tell. But eventually—The screen went black. A new message pulsed.

"Exit to the next room."

Tara stood slowly, her legs shaky. She wasn't sure what she had just revealed about herself. But she knew they had gotten what they wanted.

⸻

The next room was worse. A different test. This one was psychological. A chair in the center. A single command pulsing across the screen.

"Confess."

Tara's breath caught. Confess to what? She stepped forward, hesitantly. The chair had restraints. This wasn't an assessment. This was an interrogation. The lights buzzed overhead. The mirrored walls watched. She felt cold. Exposed. A soft hiss sounded as the room flooded with gas. Tara's vision blurred. Memories slipped, twisted, fractured. 

Her hands curled into fists. No. No, she wouldn't break. She wouldn't—Her mother's voice. Soft. Familiar. Singing.

"Éiníní, Éiníní, éalaigí a chodladh..."

Tara gasped. No. No, no, no. They were pulling her apart. The room blurred, spinning, shifting—Her mother's eyes were on her now. Tara clutched her head. They were forcing her to remember. Forcing her to relive—She stumbled forward, gasping—Then—A door slammed open. A voice cut through the haze.

"Tara!"

Landon.

Her vision snapped back. She was on the floor. She didn't know how long she had been down. But Landon was there, pulling her up.

"We have to go," he murmured, his voice urgent, terrified.

Tara staggered. She didn't know what was happening. Didn't know how much of herself she had just given away. But she knew one thing. They weren't done with her yet. And she wasn't sure if she'd make it out of here whole.