The library was underground.
Not metaphorically. The actual basement of Gallowmere Academy, three levels below the maintenance shafts, in another block that had been left behind, where Theron had spent the last six hours hiding.
He'd found it by accident—a door marked ARCHIVES / RESTRICTED that shouldn't have been accessible with a flareless ID. But the lock had been old, corroded, and someone a long time ago had left it slightly ajar.
Theron had slipped through because staying in the maintenance tunnels meant security would eventually sweep them. The library meant books. Books meant forgetting, for a while, that his life was ending.
He was reading about the Resonance Wars—or trying to—when he heard footsteps.
"You're not supposed to be here."
The boy—maybe eighteen, dark hair, wearing clothes that marked him as Glow-tier—stood in the narrow aisle like he'd materialised from the books themselves. He held a small leather journal, fingers already moving to hide it.
Theron's heart rate spiked.
Another report. Another—
"Relax," the boy said.
"I'm not going to snitch."
He said it like a fact.
"Lucas," he added, not extending his hand. Just stating it. He moved deeper into the archive, toward the back where the oldest books lived.
Theron didn't follow. He stayed where he was, clutching the history book, waiting for the trap to spring.
But Lucas just sat down on the floor and opened his journal like Theron wasn't there.
"You're the flareless kid," Lucas said after a long moment. Not a question. "Damian Korr reported you like an hour ago. Whole academy's buzzing about it."
Theron's stomach dropped. "I need to leave."
"No, you don't." Lucas glanced up. "The Screening Division hasn't been down here in five years. And they're already looking topside. You stay quiet, stay still, stay down here, you'll be fine until they give up."
"They won't give up."
"Yeah." Lucas closed his journal. "You're right. They won't. But you've got maybe six hours before Screening actually mobilises. That's time."
Theron sat down slowly, still holding the book.
The silence felt like a test.
"What's your name?" Lucas asked.
"Theron."
"Theron what?"
Lucas, as if dumbfounded, went incredibly still.
"Shit," he whispered.
He didn't explain. Just sat there, studying Theron like he was trying to solve a problem that didn't have an answer.
"You know my brother," Theron said. It wasn't a question.
"Kaelen." Lucas opened the book with the incident report—the same one Theron had been reading. "Yeah. He was in my study group before... before Screening took him. I thought of him as my mentor."
Theron's throat felt tight.
"He never talked about you," Lucas continued quietly. "But he left something. Just in case."
He pulled out a worn notebook, pages filled with handwritten notes. He set it on the floor between them but didn't open it.
"He made me promise," Lucas said. "If anyone from his family ever showed up, I was supposed to... help them understand. About resonance. About what happened to him. About why the system hunts people like him."
Theron stared at the notebook.
"I can't," he said.
"Can't what?"
"Learn about this." Theron's hands shook. "If I know too much, I have to lie about it. If I lie, I fail the compatibility screening. If I fail, they'll know something's wrong."
Lucas watched him.
"You think you're getting screened?"
"They're coming for me. Damian made sure of that."
"Yeah." Lucas picked up the notebook and held it out. "But not for six hours. Maybe more."
Theron didn't take it.
"I don't want to know," he said. "I don't want to understand. Understanding makes it real, and if it's real, then I have to—" He stopped. His voice had cracked.
Lucas lowered the notebook.
"Okay," he said. "Then we won't talk about history."
"Why are you helping me?"
"Because Kaelen asked me to. And because..." Lucas looked at the notebook in his hands. "Because he was right about the system. And because I'm tired of being the only one who knows how fucked up it all is."
Theron wanted to leave. He wanted to run back to the maintenance tunnels, back to the darkness where nothing was real, back to the moment before Damian had seen the chain around his neck.
But he didn't move.
"What will they do?" Theron asked quietly. "When they catch me?"
Lucas was quiet for a long time.
"They'll test you," he said finally. "They'll run resonance compatibility scans. They'll ask you questions about your family history. They'll look for signs of unregistered resonance."
"And if they find it?"
"They won't," Lucas said. "Because you don't have it. Not yet."
Theron looked up.
"Not yet?"
Lucas stood up and walked to a specific shelf. He pulled down a book that wasn't as old as the others, but close. The spine read RESONANCE AWAKENING: DOCUMENTED CASES.
"You're flareless," Lucas said, not opening it. "That's not a lie. That's not a cover-up. It's just... incomplete."
"I don't understand."
"I know." Lucas set the book down without opening it. "And you're right—you shouldn't learn more right now. It would only make things worse. But..." He looked at Theron directly. "When screening happens, they won't find anything. You're clean. Genuinely flareless. And that's good. That's what you want."
"Then why are you telling me any of this?"
"Because Kaelen said—" Lucas stopped. He looked away. "He said if you ever showed up, if you ever got caught, you'd need to know that your flarelessness wasn't a curse. It was a chance."
Theron still didn't understand.
"A chance for what?"
Lucas picked up the notebook again—Kaelen's notebook—and held it out.
"Don't read this now," Lucas said. "Hide it. Keep it safe. When you're ready—when you're actually ready, not just desperate—you'll understand why your brother wanted you to have it."
Theron took it slowly.
The leather was worn, familiar somehow. Like Kaelen's hands had touched it so many times that something remained.
"What's inside?" Theron asked.
"Everything he couldn't tell you. Everything he needed you to know." Lucas sat back down. "And the reason why you're going to survive screening."
"How do you know I will?"
"Because you're still here," Lucas said simply. "Damian expected you to run. The academy expected you to panic. But you found this place instead. That's the difference between people who survive and people who don't. I genuinely believe that."
Theron looked at the notebook in his hands.
"What happens after screening?"
Lucas didn't answer immediately.
"I don't know," he said finally. "But your brother... Kaelen believed that screening was a door, not a coffin. He believed there was a reason they bring people in instead of just killing them."
"What reason?"
I told you—you're not ready to learn that yet. You don't have a reason to fight since you haven't seen the cruelty of the system... yet."
...
The sounds of footsteps above and around them stopped. The searching, the voices—all of it had gone quiet.
"They're giving up," Lucas said. "For now. Screening will send a pickup team at dawn. Probably."
Theron clutched Kaelen's notebook.
"What do I do?"
"You go back topside," Lucas said. "You turn yourself in before they have to hunt you. You pass screening. You survive. And... a word of advice. Be especially careful about Dr. S. She's not right in the head."
"And then?"
Lucas smiled—sad, knowing, like he'd already seen where this ended.
"And then," Lucas said, "you find out if your brother was right about what you are."
...
Theron was in deep thoughts about his life prior, trying to remember anything Kaelen told him, anything that could point to Lucas or to the notebook he held in his hand.
"Can I even trust him? I still don't know why would he help me..." exclaimed Theron while on the way out of the abandoned archive.
"Ugh... I guess I have to just give him a chance... after all, i don't anybody else to talk to anyway."
Then Theron slipped out and went away.
...
Three hours later, Theron climbed out of the maintenance tunnels and walked to the academy's security office.
He was still holding Kaelen's notebook, now hidden beneath his shirt, the leather pressing against his ribs like a second heartbeat.
The pendant was gone—Damian had it. The pendant was gone, but this was something Kaelen had left behind for him, and that had to mean something.
He knocked on the security door.