There.
A cluster of movement deeper in Coalition territory, just at the edge of visibility where the heat distortion makes details harder to pin down.
Too consistent to ignore.
“They’re funneling something,” I murmur.
“Or someone,” he replies.
I don’t like that answer.
I don’t like how well it fits.
“Next rotation,” I say, keeping my gaze forward. “We watch closer.”
“You’re going to do more than watch,” he says.
It’s not a question.
I don’t answer right away.
Because he’s right.
And we both know it.
—
The next shift settles in with the same oppressive heat, but the tension underneath it feels sharper now, more focused.
I adjust my patrol timing just enough to align with the pattern we tracked earlier, letting my route drift closer to the edge of the blind zone without making it obvious. Every movement is calculated, every pause placed where it won’t draw attention.
Across the fence, Hrask mirrors it.
Not exactly.
Not in a way anyone else would recognize.
But it lines up.
Too clean to be coincidence.
I crouch again near the base of the fence, pretending to check a fault in the lower wiring as I glance toward the corridor intersection we marked.
Movement.
There it is again.
A pair of Coalition figures moving through the edge of the blind zone, their path angled toward the fence before cutting away at the last second.
Not random.
Not patrol.
Transport.
“What do you see?” Hrask asks, his voice low.
“Two,” I reply. “Same route. Same timing.”
