Chapter 6: The First Clash

Smoke stung Tony's eyes. The ozone stench of *deleted reality* clung to the air where the molten trooper had stood. Sirens screamed aboveground.

"Move!" Confidence slammed the scorched false panel shut. "They'll flood these tunnels!"

She dragged Tony deeper into the Ratway's iron-boned darkness. His hands trembled – not from fear, but from the cold vacuum lingering in his bones. *He'd erased a man.* Not killed. *Unmade.*

*`> REALITY EXCISION CONFIRMED`*

*`> LOCAL SPACETIME INTEGRITY: 98.7%`*

*`> CAUTION: CASCADING ENTROPIC FEEDBACK DETECTED`*

"What *was* that?" Confidence hissed, shoving aside a corroded pipe.

"I… folded him out of existence." The words tasted like ash. "Like deleting corrupted data."

Confidence froze. "Don't say that. Don't *think* that. You're human, Tony. Whatever they did to us—"

"Did *they*?" Tony touched the damp tunnel wall. The concrete shimmered under his fingers, showing phantom layers – ancient riverbed sediment, colonial-era foundations, glitching Vanta-blue circuitry. "That symbol before the attack… it wasn't E.E.A."

*`> SYMBOL ANALYSIS: 87% MATCH TO PULSE SIGNATURE`*

Gunfire echoed distantly – sharp, percussive cracks followed by the sizzle of energy weapons. Screams filtered down the vents.

"They're clearing the sector." Confidence pulled up a grainy feed on her wrist tablet. E.E.A. troopers advanced through the market above, dragging civilians from stalls. A boy, maybe sixteen, glowed faintly amber on thermal. A trooper raised a shock-baton—

*CRACK.*

The trooper's helmet imploded. He dropped like a puppet with cut strings. The boy stumbled back, unharmed but horrified.

*`> KINETIC IMPACT SIGNATURE: PSIONIC`*

*`> ORIGIN: 2.7KM NORTHEAST`*

Tony's breath caught. "Gwarimpa."

*Home.*

The feed cut to static. When it cleared, the same Vanta-blue symbol pulsed over the dead trooper's body – a grim signature.

"Emmy," Tony breathed.

Confidence grabbed his arm. "If she just blew a trooper's head off psychically from two klicks away? She just painted a target brighter than yours."

---

**Abuja – The Richards' Home**

Doris clutched Emmanuella on the basement floor. The girl trembled violently, blood dripping from her nose.

"I… I didn't mean to," Emmy sobbed. "I just saw that boy… felt his fear… and the bad man…" She gagged. "I *pushed* too hard."

Doris wiped her daughter's face, hands shaking. "Shhh. You stopped him. That's all." But her eyes were on the ceiling – the heavy thuds of E.E.A. boots searching the house. They'd torn the cellar door off its hinges. Only a collapsed storage shelf blocked the stairs.

*`> PSYCHIC BACKLASH: NEUROLOGICAL BLEEDING`*

*`> THREAT LEVEL RE-ESTIMATED: TIER A`*

Tony's diagnostic flared in his vision, overlaying Emmy's pale face. He *felt* her pain – a jagged shard of ice in his own temples.

*`> PROXIMITY ALERT: E.E.A. SCANNER LOCK DETECTED`*

"Down here!" a trooper shouted above.

Tony materialized between his mother and sister, reality bending with a sickening lurch. Doris gasped. Confidence covered the stairwell with a scavenged pistol.

"Tony! How—?"

"No time." He placed his hands on Emmy's temples. Her skin burned. The psychic backlash was a storm he could *see* – jagged gold light fracturing behind her eyes. *`> PSIONIC STABILIZATION PROTOCOL: ENGAGED`*

He didn't know the science. Only the instinct. He *compressed* the storm. Folded the bleeding edges of her power inward. Emmy gasped, the tremors easing. The blood flow stopped.

*`> STABILIZATION: 76%`*

*`> WARNING: POWER SIGNATURE AMPLIFIED`*

Troopers heaved the debris aside. A scanner beam lanced down the stairs, painting Emmy gold.

"Tier-A Psion! Maximum restraint!"

Tony stepped in front of them. "Run, Mom. Back alley."

Doris hesitated only a second, hauling Emmy up. Confidence fired wild shots up the stairs, forcing the troopers back.

Tony faced the scanner. His own reflection in a trooper's visor lagged – *two seconds* now. He let the serpent uncoil. Vanta-blue energy crackled around him, warping the light.

*`> THREAT REASSESSMENT: UNMEASURED VARIANT "GHOST"`*

The trooper's helmet speaker crackled. *`> PRIORITY OMEGA: ENGAGE!`*

Tony didn't erase them. He *unfolded* space.

The cramped basement stairs stretched impossibly. The troopers at the top suddenly found themselves kilometers away down an endless, warped corridor. Their shouts echoed into silence.

He grabbed Confidence. "Go!"

They burst into the alley. Doris half-dragged a dazed Emmy toward a waiting rickshaw driver – Mr. Okafor, eyes wide with terror but hands steady. "Hurry!"

An E.E.A. drone dropped from the sky, stun-beams sizzling the ground. Tony raised his hand.

*`> LOCALIZED GRAVITY INCREASE: 500%`*

The drone slammed into the asphalt like a meteor, shattering into molten plastic and sparks.

They piled into the rickshaw. Mr. Okafor pedaled furiously into chaotic streets. Tony watched their home shrink behind them. Troopers swarmed it. A black van marked with the E.E.A. caduceus – a serpent wrapped around a lightning bolt – pulled up.

*`> PRIMARY SANCTUARY: COMPROMISED`*

Emmy leaned against him, her whisper faint. "Something's calling, Tony. In the static. It's… lonely."