Chapter 8: The Forgotten Awaken

The cold air inside the chamber carried the faint scent of burnt circuits and decayed flesh. The hiss of hydraulics echoed as the pods lining the walls unlocked one by one, the fog of cryogenic suspension spilling out like ghostly whispers.

Kade's fingers tightened around his plasma blade. Every instinct screamed that something was wrong.

Nova stood rigid beside him, her pulse pistol raised, scanning the figures stepping out of the pods. Her enhanced eye flickered as it analyzed them.

And then she froze.

"Kade… these aren't just Syndicate war-machines."

Kade focused on the first emerging figure. Its movement was too smooth, unnervingly precise, as if its body was remembering how to function. It stood fully upright, stretching limbs covered in a grotesque blend of flesh and metal. The veins under its synthetic skin pulsed with neon-blue energy, mechanical plating shifting over organic muscle.

But it wasn't its inhumanity that made Kade's chest tighten.

It was the eyes.

They weren't red, like the Syndicate's usual cybernetic soldiers. They weren't hollow, mindless machines.

They were human. And worse—they were familiar.

Another figure stepped forward. Then another. Their faces—twisted by cybernetic augmentation—held traces of something Kade couldn't ignore.

Recognition.

His grip faltered. He could still see past the mechanical implants, past the enhancements. These weren't just Syndicate experiments.

These were people.

These were his people.

A wave of nausea twisted through his stomach. Kade had fought beside them. He had buried them.

This isn't possible.

A deep, distorted metallic voice cut through the silence.

"Kade Ronin."

Kade turned sharply, heart hammering. A figure stepped from the shadows beyond the pods. Unlike the others, his cybernetic enhancements were sleek, refined—designed for precision rather than brutality.

The armor he wore bore the Syndicate insignia, but it was the eyes that made Kade feel like the air had been sucked from his lungs.

Amber. The same shade as before.

A ghost from his past.

"No." Kade's voice cracked. "You're dead."

The figure tilted his head slightly, a smirk forming on his lips.

"I was."

The leader of Kade's old squad. His best friend. His brother-in-arms.

Reyes.