The Freezer learned quickly.
That was Kael's first thought when the temperature dropped without warning.
Not gradually. Not in the slow, conditioning way he'd begun to anticipate.
It fell—a sudden, violent absence of warmth that punched the air from his lungs and drove him to one knee.
Around him, bodies reacted in staggered chaos.
Someone screamed.
Someone else laughed—high-pitched and hysterical.
The hum of the walls deepened, vibrating through bone and nerve until Kael felt it behind his eyes.
"Deviation test initiated," the voice announced. "Cognitive stressors authorized."
Kael forced himself to breathe.
In. Out.
The embers in his chest surged instinctively, heat clawing upward in response to the cold. He clenched his jaw and compressed it down, remembering the lesson burned into him by pain.
Don't explode. Fold.
The floor beneath them shimmered.
No—shifted.
The recovery hall dissolved into something else.
Kael staggered as the white walls peeled away, replaced by scorched stone and collapsing steel. The smell hit him next—smoke, blood, melted insulation.
A dungeon.
No. A memory of one.
"Hallucination layer engaged," the voice said calmly.
Kael's heart hammered.
This wasn't random.
This was deliberate.
Monsters emerged from the rubble—twisted things with too many limbs and molten cores pulsing beneath cracked armor. They weren't real. He knew that.
His body didn't care.
Fire answered fear before thought could intervene.
Kael raised his hands—
—and stopped.
They want to see what breaks first, he realized. The mind or the instinct.
To his left, F-061 roared and charged, flames erupting wildly from his arms. His fire was brighter than before—hotter, less controlled.
To Kael's right, someone collapsed, sobbing, clawing at their own head.
Kael didn't move.
He watched.
The monsters attacked in patterns.
Not random.
They're repeating, he realized.
The first lunged left. The second followed with a delayed strike from above. The third hesitated—always hesitated—before committing.
Kael's breath slowed.
His fire compressed, coiling inward, burning hotter the tighter he held it.
When he finally moved, it was precise.
A step to the side.
A twist of the wrist.
He released a sliver of heat—not a blast, but a line. It cut cleanly through the first monster's core. The illusion shattered like glass.
Another step. Another release.
Each movement was calculated.
Each technique… familiar.
These aren't new, he realized. They're recombinations.
He wasn't inventing.
He was editing.
The more he understood the pattern, the less effort it took. The fire responded eagerly, reshaping itself without resistance.
Too eagerly.
Kael felt it then—the strain.
Not physical.
Cognitive.
Like a pressure behind his thoughts, urging him to let go. To stop filtering. To let instinct overwrite identity.
This is the fracture point, he realized. This is where F-204 failed.
Across the battlefield, F-093 fought differently.
She didn't overpower the hallucinations.
She ignored them.
Her movements were minimal, efficient, as if she were fighting something only she could see. Her fire burned low and steady, never flaring, never receding.
She's anchoring herself, Kael realized. To something real.
A scream tore through the air.
Kael turned just in time to see a boy—F-152—stagger backward, clutching his head as flames burst uncontrollably from his skin.
"No—no—no—" the boy babbled, eyes unfocused. "I'm not here—I'm not—"
His fire detonated inward.
He dropped.
The illusion shattered.
The hall snapped back into place.
Cold flooded in.
Medical drones descended instantly, surrounding F-152's motionless body. A translucent barrier rose around him.
"Controlled fracture achieved," the voice announced. "Subject F-152—nonviable."
Kael's stomach lurched.
Nonviable.
Not dead.
Not yet.
F-061 stared at the barrier, chest heaving, eyes wide.
"That was fake," he whispered. "That wasn't real."
The gray-haired man appeared at the edge of the hall.
"It was real enough," he said. "Your minds believed it."
His gaze swept the room, lingering on Kael.
"Some of you adapted," he continued. "Some resisted. Some failed."
His eyes flicked to the barrier around F-152.
"This is why the Freezer exists."
Kael clenched his fists.
"No," he said hoarsely. "This is why you need it."
The man regarded him coolly. "Is there a difference?"
Kael didn't answer.
Because he didn't know.
Later, in the dim quiet of the quarters wing, Kael sat on the floor outside his room, back against the wall.
His head ached.
Not pain—lag. Like his thoughts were arriving a half-second late.
The message flickered again at the edge of his vision.
[EVENT PENDING: CONDITIONS NOT MET]
He focused on it this time.
The text sharpened—then vanished.
"Did you see something?" F-093 asked quietly, sitting beside him.
Kael hesitated.
"Yes," he said finally. "I think so."
She studied his face. "You're not panicking."
"I should be?"
She shook her head slowly. "Most people who see things here do."
Kael stared at his hands.
"I think," he said carefully, "that something is watching me. Measuring me. But it's not the Freezer."
F-093's expression tightened. "That's not reassuring."
"I know."
Silence stretched.
"F-152 won't come back," she said eventually.
Kael nodded. "Neither did F-204."
She leaned her head back against the wall. "Do you ever think about what happens when we leave?"
Kael laughed softly. "You think we leave?"
She smiled faintly. "We're Unrankable. That means we don't fit."
Kael's laughter died.
"That also means," she continued, "they don't know what to do with us."
Kael closed his eyes.
Inside his chest, the fire pulsed—not wildly, but patiently.
Learning.
Somewhere deep in the Freezer, a report updated.
SUBJECT F-117:
ADAPTATION METHOD—ANALYTICAL
FRACTURE RESISTANCE—ABNORMAL
OBSERVATION STATUS—ELEVATED
And beneath it, in a file not meant for human eyes:
POST-RANKER COUNTERMEASURE:
CANDIDATE IDENTIFIED
Kael opened his eyes.
For a brief moment, the cold didn't feel like an enemy.
It felt like a constraint.
And constraints, he was learning, could be broken.