Time to hit back.

  Kevin breathed out slowly, allowing his enhanced senses to fully engage. The world crystallized around him. Sounds sharpened, colors intensified, and movements became predictable patterns rather than chaotic blur. He tracked the Cylopear's head motion, calculating its pattern, feeling rather than thinking through the math of trajectory and timing.

  He squeezed the trigger once, twice, three times in rapid succession. The energy pulses left the barrel at the speed of light, but to his enhanced perception, he could almost see their path. Three perfect lines converged on the monster's massive eye.

  The first shot struck the orbital ridge above the eye, the second hit the lower lid, but the third one punched directly through the pupil.

  The Cylopear's roar shifted from rage to pain, a shrieking wail that sent birds exploding from distant trees. Its eye sizzled and popped, leaking a viscous amber fluid that steamed when it hit the ground. The creature reared back, clawing at its face with massive paws tipped with serrated claws, its movements suddenly uncoordinated and frantic.

  "Direct hit to the ocular nerve," AIDA observed. "Accuracy improvement of approximately 287% over your pre-enhancement baseline."

  Kevin was already moving, his body responding with a fluidity that felt like cheating. He circled to the creature's blind side, firing again at the damaged eye. This time all shots found their mark, each burst of energy drilling deeper into the wounded organ.

  The Cylopear thrashed wildly, its coordination completely disrupted by the precision attack. Its beam fired randomly into the sky, a dying star throwing its last light. The monster spun, searching for its attacker, but Kevin stayed in its new blind spot, moving with it, continuing to target the damaged eye with methodical precision.

  "The orbital cavity leads directly to the brain," AIDA informed him. "Each shot is penetrating deeper. Three more should reach the central nervous system."

  Kevin didn't question how she knew this. He simply adjusted his aim, compensating for the creature's erratic movement, and squeezed the trigger again. And again.

  Completely emptied by the final shot was the rifle's charge. The pulse struck deep in the monster's ruined eye socket, and this time the effect was catastrophic. The Cylopear convulsed, its massive legs buckling. It released a sound unlike anything Kevin had heard before. It was half roar, half electronic shriek, as if the creature's biology and the Redz40 within it were tearing apart.

  Then, instead of collapsing, the monster turned and fled. It crashed back through the treeline, moving with the desperate speed of a wounded animal, leaving a trail of smoking amber fluid behind it. Trees snapped and splintered in its wake, the sound of its retreat fading gradually into the distance.

  The sudden silence felt like a physical weight. Kevin stood motionless, the empty rifle still raised, his enhanced senses slowly returning to normal. His body hummed with residual energy, muscles twitching with unused potential. Sweat poured down his face, not from exertion but from the intensity of the experience.

  "Well done," AIDA said quietly. "First combat test of your enhancements: successful."

  Kevin lowered the rifle, his hands steadier than they had any right to be. Around him, the squad emerged cautiously from cover, faces tight with shock and something else. It looked like awe.

  Duncan approached slowly, her own weapon still raised. She looked at Kevin, then at the smoking trail the Cylopear had left, then back at Kevin.

  "What the hell was that?" she asked, voice rough with dust and tension.

  Kevin glanced down at his hands, seeing them as if for the first time. "Apparently," he said, "I've been upgraded."

  The moment of victory evaporated like mist when Kevin heard the wounded soldier's moan. His enhanced senses picked up the wet, labored quality of her breathing. It was the sound of someone going into shock. He dropped the empty rifle and spun toward where he'd left her behind the concrete barrier. The world snapped back into urgent clarity.

  "She's bleeding out," he said, already moving, pushing past Duncan without waiting for permission.

  The wounded soldier lay curled around her missing limb, face ashen beneath smudges of dirt and blood. The cauterized stump where her arm had been was a mess of charred flesh and exposed bone, the initial heat-sealing effect of the beam wearing off as torn arteries found fresh paths to bleed. A spreading pool of dark red crept across the concrete, each heartbeat pumping more life away.

  Kevin dropped to his knees beside her, combat medical training overriding everything else. He'd seen this before. Different war, same wounds. It was the same countdown to death if he didn't move fast.

  "I need a tourniquet," he barked, already pulling at the belt from his tactical pants. When no one moved immediately, he looked up, finding the squad frozen in place, staring at him. "Now!"

  That broke the spell. Two soldiers rushed forward, one with an actual medkit that he tossed to Kevin. The Green Beret training took over, his hands moving with practiced efficiency despite the century-long gap in practice. He pulled a modern tourniquet from the kit, which was similar enough to what he knew, and wrapped it just above the wound, cranking the tension rod until the bleeding slowed to a trickle.

  The soldier's eyes fluttered, unfocused. "Cold," she whispered, a bad sign. Her skin was taking on a waxy quality, shock dragging her toward unconsciousness.

  "I know," Kevin said, his voice dropping to the calm, steady tone he'd used with wounded fighters in jungles and mountains across a dozen forgotten wars. "Stay with me. What's your name?"

  "Lin," she managed, teeth chattering despite the warm air. "S-specialist Lin."

  "Good, Lin. You're doing great." He checked her pulse. It was rapid and thready under his fingers. Her body was shutting down peripheral circulation, redirecting blood to vital organs. Classic shock progression. "I need you to stay awake, okay? Talk to me."

  He elevated the stump, packing the wound with hemostatic gauze from the med-kit. The material was more advanced than he remembered. It seemed to bond with the blood on contact, forming a temporary seal, but the principle was the same. Stop the bleeding, prevent shock, evacuate.

  "Medic!" Kevin called over his shoulder, not looking away from Lin's face. "She needs fluids and something for the pain."

  "On it." A compact woman with close-cropped hair and medic insignia shouldered past the others, carrying what looked like a field surgeon's kit. She knelt opposite Kevin, giving him a quick, appraising glance. "You know what you're doing. Good. Hold her steady."

  Kevin nodded, shifting to cradle the soldier's head and shoulders while the medic worked. The wounded woman's eyes locked onto his pupils dilated with pain and fear.

  "You're the Old World guy," she said, voice barely audible. "The one who... shot the Cylopear."

  "That's me. The Old World guy." Kevin managed a tight smile. "And you're going to have one hell of a story to tell when we get back to base."

  The medic snapped open her kit, revealing an array of equipment Kevin didn't recognize. She pulled out a clear packet of fluid. That much hadn't changed. She efficiently inserted an IV line into Lin's remaining arm. The fluid in the bag wasn't clear, though; it had a faint bluish tint and seemed to shimmer slightly in the sunlight.

  "Polysynthetic plasma with oxygen nanites," the medic explained, noticing Kevin's questioning look.

  "Better than the old stuff. Carries more oxygen, promotes clotting, and contains mild analgesics."

  Next, she produced what looked like a metallic disc about the size of a hockey puck. She positioned it over the tourniquet and pressed a button on its side. The device hummed, then separated into a series of interlocking rings that expanded to encircle the wounded limb.

  "Hemorrhage cap," she said, working quickly. "Seals the wound, maintains pressure, prevents infection, and starts cellular regeneration."

  The rings contracted, forming a tight seal around the stump. The outer surface immediately began to pulse with soft blue light, matching the rhythm of Lin's heartbeat.

  "Will she keep the arm?" Kevin asked quietly, still supporting Lin's upper body.

  The medic shook her head. "Not this one. But we can grow her a new one back at Fort DC. Take about six months, but she'll have full function again."

  Kevin blinked, the casual mention of limb regeneration reminding him just how much the world had changed while he slept. Lin's eyes had closed, her breathing steadier now as the pain medication took effect.

  "She's stabilized," the medic announced, standing. "We need to move her now."

  Duncan appeared at Kevin's side. "Transport's ready. We need to go before that thing comes back with friends."

  Four soldiers quickly assembled a collapsible stretcher, transferring Lin onto it with practiced movements. Kevin helped secure her, making sure the IV line didn't tangle and the hemorrhage cap maintained contact with the wound. The squad moved as one unit toward the waiting aircraft, half of them on alert with weapons ready, scanning the treeline for any sign of the Cylopear's return.

  The transport wasn't quite a helicopter in the way Kevin understood them. Its rotors were arranged in overlapping rings rather than traditional blades, and the body was sleeker, more insectoid than the military choppers he remembered. The side door slid open automatically as they approached, revealing a compact medical bay alongside rows of jump seats.

  "Secure her to the crash webbing," Duncan ordered as they loaded Lin's stretcher. "Moore, you're with me."

  Kevin followed the captain to the cockpit, where a pilot in a lightweight helmet was already running through pre-flight checks. The control panel was mostly glass displays rather than physical switches, but the fundamental purpose was clear enough.

  Duncan strapped herself into the co-pilot's seat, then nodded to the jump seat behind her. "Buckle in. This thing moves fast and hard when it needs to."

  Kevin secured himself, watching as the rest of the squad finished loading and took their positions. The wounded soldier was now connected to monitoring equipment built into the transport's medical bay. Her vitals displayed on a screen above her stretcher. They were stable, for now.

  The pilot engaged the engines, and the overlapping rotors spun, building from a low hum to a high-pitched whine that was quieter than any helicopter Kevin had ever flown in. The craft lifted smoothly, kicking up a cloud of dust and debris that momentarily obscured the view of the bunker and battlefield below.

  As they gained altitude, Duncan turned in her seat, studying Kevin with an intensity that reminded him of senior officers evaluating a new asset. There was something else in her gaze, too. It was a calculation being run, numbers being adjusted.

  "You took down a Cylopear," she said, raising her voice just enough to be heard over the engines. "Those things have killed entire squads. Nobody goes one-on-one with them and walks away."

  Kevin shrugged. "Beginner's luck."

  "Bullshit." The word was flat, but not hostile. "Your AI did something to you in that pod. Something more than just fixing your cancer."

  Through the window behind Duncan, Kevin watched the landscape fall away. He saw the twisted blue-gray trees, the concrete skeleton of the bunker, and the scorched path where the Cylopear had retreated. This broken world was now his home, whether he wanted it or not.

  "We'll talk about it when we get to Fort DC," he said finally.

  Duncan studied him for another moment, then nodded once and turned back to the front. The transport banked sharply, heading east toward what had once been the nation's capital. The engines hummed steadily, a sound Kevin could feel in his chest alongside the strange new energy that AIDA had awakened.

  She has questions, AIDA observed in his mind. And they're only going to multiply when she sees what else you can do.

  "Then we'd better have some answers," Kevin murmured, watching the wasteland unfold beneath them. The scarred earth, the strange forests, the occasional glint of ruined cities in the distance. All of it was alien, and all of it was now his responsibility to understand.

  One hundred and fifty years. Everyone gone, everything changed. But war remained, and where there was war, there was purpose. He glanced at the wounded soldier, her chest rising and falling steadily under the crash webbing.

  For now, that would have to be enough.

  Chapter four

  FORT DC

  The transport banked sharply, giving Kevin a momentary glimpse of the wasteland below, which consisted of endless miles of twisted blue-gray trees and the occasional glint of ancient ruins catching the afternoon sun. The engine's whine had settled into a steady rhythm, vibrating through the metal floor beneath his boots. He adjusted his position on the jump seat, muscles no longer trembling with post-stasis weakness but still unfamiliar, like borrowed limbs that happened to respond to his commands.

  He glanced toward the medical bay, where Lin lay secured to the gurney. Her face had regained some color, the waxen pallor of shock replaced by the flush of synthetic plasma doing its work.

  "She's stable," Duncan said, following his gaze. She'd unbuckled from the co-pilot's seat and moved back to where Kevin sat. Her voice cut through the engine noise with sharp authority. "Thanks to you."

  Kevin shook his head. "Thanks to your medic and that miracle tech." He nodded toward the hemorrhage cap. "In my day, she'd be lucky to get a prosthetic hook."

  "In your day, you couldn't blind a Cylopear with three shots either." Duncan braced herself against the ceiling strap as the transport hit a pocket of turbulence. "Those things usually take at least a full squad with heavy ordnance to bring down. You dropped it solo."

  "I got lucky," Kevin said, the automatic deflection of a soldier who'd learned early that taking credit was dangerous. Pride before the fall, and all that. "Right place, right time."

  Duncan's lips curved in what might have been a smile. "Your modesty is cute, Moore, but useless. The work your AI did on you in that pod makes you an asset. The kind we desperately need."

  Kevin didn't answer. The strange electric potential still hummed beneath his skin, dormant but ready. He could feel AIDA's presence in his mind, monitoring, calculating, waiting. Not human, but not entirely machine either. Something in between, like him.

  "Coming up on Fort DC," the pilot called back. "Five minutes to the wall."

  Duncan nodded toward the side window. "You'll want to see this."

  Kevin shifted to look out at the approaching horizon. At first, he saw only the broken landscape. The strange, mutated forests gave way to barren flatlands that had once been Virginia farmland. Then the land ended abruptly at a massive structure that materialized out of the haze like a mirage.

  "Jesus Christ," he whispered.

  Fort DC rose like a fever dream of medieval engineering fused with industrial desperation. The walls were at least eighty feet high and were a patchwork of reinforced concrete, scavenged metal panels, and what looked like sections of ship hulls welded together into a continuous barrier. The outer surface was scarred with impact marks and carbon scoring, the wounds of a century-long siege.

  But it was what surrounded the base of the wall that made Kevin's breath catch. The ground itself seemed to be moving. It was a churning sea of red-skinned figures swarming against the foundation like insects against a fallen fruit. Thousands of them, maybe tens of thousands, their hairless bodies and boiled-red skin visible even from this height.

  "The Redz," Duncan said simply. "Never stop coming. Day and night."

  As the transport drew closer, Kevin could see the defensive systems in action. Automated turrets lined the top of the wall at ten-meter intervals, each tracking and firing with mechanical exactitude. Every few seconds, one would pivot, track, and discharge a beam of concentrated energy into the mass below.

  Where the beams struck, bodies disintegrated into ash, only to be replaced immediately by more climbing over the fallen.

  "How many?" Kevin asked, unable to look away from the nightmarish tableau.

  "At the wall? About two hundred thousand, give or take. In the region?" Duncan shrugged. "Millions. They breed faster than we can kill them."

  The transport swooped over the wall, and Kevin's view changed abruptly. Inside the fortress was a compressed city, a vertical maze of retrofitted shipping containers, pre-fab structures, and improvised housing stacked like children's blocks into makeshift skyscrapers. Streets, actual paved streets, wound between the structures, crowded with people moving with purpose.

  "There are a hundred thousand people inside," Duncan said, anticipating his question. "Civilian and military. The last veritable city on the Eastern Seaboard."

  The transport descended toward a landing pad atop what looked like a repurposed parking garage. As they dropped, Kevin studied the city with a soldier's eye. The buildings were arranged in concentric rings, each with its own defensive walls and checkpoints. Workshops, storage, and power generation made up the outer rings, appearing industrial. The inner circles grew progressively more fortified, culminating in a central core that could only be a military command center.

  "Urban defense in depth," he noted. "If the outer wall falls, you fall back ring by ring."

  Duncan nodded. "Exactly. Each ring can be sealed and defended independently. We lose the outer city, we still have the core."

  The transport touched down with a gentle bump, rotors winding down. The side door slid open automatically, and a medical team rushed in with a gurney. They transferred Lin efficiently, connecting her to portable monitors and whisking her away without a word.

  "She'll be fine," Duncan said, gesturing for Kevin to exit. "Medical tech is one of the few areas where we've actually improved since your time. Necessity and all that."

  Kevin stepped onto the landing pad, immediately struck by the controlled chaos around him. Soldiers moved in drilled formations, loading and unloading supplies. Maintenance crews worked on other aircraft, tools and parts organized with military rigor. Everyone wore some variation of the UAC uniform, olive drab with the eagle-and-DNA patch, and everyone, without exception, was armed.