The harsh blare of reveille tore Kai Chen from uneasy sleep at 0530 hours.
For a disorienting moment, he didn't remember where he was—then it all crashed back. The Citadel. The Archives. His father's voice cutting through fifteen years of static: "Synths. Synthetic humans. Indistinguishable from real people."
He'd gotten maybe two and a half hours of actual sleep.
Around him, Bay 3 was already moving with the organized chaos of morning routine. Darius groaned and swung his legs out of the bunk across from him. Marcus Webb was already dressed, lacing his boots with mechanical efficiency.
Rodriguez stumbled toward the shared bathroom, still half-asleep. Dos Santos and Kowalski were arguing quietly about who used whose soap.
Everything looked normal.
Except now Kai knew that "normal" might be a carefully constructed façade. His father's team had looked normal too—until one of them wasn't human. The thought sent ice through his veins despite the stuffy warmth of the barracks.
One of the mission team was compromised.
The words echoed in his mind. Sarah Wolfe survived. She gave him access to everything. But what if that was exactly what a synth infiltrator would do? Earn his trust, control the flow of information, watch what he discovered?
No. Stop. That way lies paralysis.
He sat up, rubbing his face. His reflection in the small mirror mounted on his footlocker showed what he expected: dark circles under his eyes, tension in his jaw despite his efforts to appear relaxed.
He looked like someone who'd spent the night processing the revelation that synthetic humans had been infiltrating the wasteland for over fifteen years.
"Rough night?" Darius asked, pulling on his shirt.
His concern seemed genuine—but then again, wouldn't a perfect infiltrator seem genuine?
Stop it. Not everyone is a synth. Most people are human. Most.
"Couldn't shut my brain off," Kai answered, which was true enough. He stood and grabbed his toiletries. "New place, lot to process."
"First day's always the worst," Marcus said, not unkindly. "Gets easier once you're too exhausted to overthink."
He checked his watch. "We've got twenty-five minutes before formation. Kozlov's running PT personally today, which means it's going to be hell. Eat something if you can—you'll need it."
Through the window, Kai could see the sky beginning to lighten over the Citadel's walls. Another day. Another performance of being a normal recruit with straightforward motivations.
Except Morrison's assessment was in just over three hours.
She was ambitious, politically connected, and had access to his complete file. She'd be looking for anything unusual, any sign that he was more than he appeared to be.
And he needed to be impressive enough to be valuable without revealing that he'd spent last night learning about a conspiracy that got his father killed.
His body felt heavy with exhaustion, but his mind was racing.
He had thirty minutes to prepare himself—physically, mentally, emotionally—for what might be the most important day of his life.
They can't be allowed to expand beyond Colorado.
His father's last words. And now he was supposed to walk into that same facility, surrounded by people he couldn't fully trust, investigating a threat that had already killed everyone who tried to expose it.
Kai splashed cold water on his face in the bathroom, letting the shock of it bring some clarity.
In the mirror, he practiced his expression—alert but not wired, focused but not obsessed. The mask he'd need to wear all day.