Over the next few days, the base settled into a strange, fragile rhythm—the kind that only exists after disaster, when everyone is too tired to pretend things are normal but too busy to fall apart.
Silver tagged along.
At first, he told himself he was observing. Field assessment. Command structure analysis. Council habit.
In practice, he hovered.
Celeste made a point of pulling him—and Topsy—into everything. Not formally. Just… naturally. Like of course you’re here, why wouldn’t you be?
She walked them through how things actually worked.
Arcade ran logistics like a half-feral accountant god, juggling supply shortages, jury-rigged tech, and three backup plans for every failure. He didn’t ask for input, but Celeste nudged Silver forward anyway, and to Arcade’s mild surprise, some of Silver’s notes were… annoyingly useful.
Pitch scouted ahead, always moving, always listening. He mapped danger by instinct and rumor more than tech. Silver noticed he never stayed in one place too long, like stillness might catch him.
Celeste herself drew aggro without trying—bright, visible, impossible to ignore. Zombies noticed her. People did too. Silver clocked it as a tactical liability.
Ray and Mezzo were the wall.
Ray hit first and hardest, raw power and fury barely leashed. Mezzo covered gaps, faster than sense, wings flaring when he forgot to hold back. Together, they absorbed damage meant for everyone else.
Lumina healed and defended, quiet but relentless. She didn’t hesitate. Didn’t ask permission. She just was there when things broke.
Skye and Hughes filled the spaces in between—support, control, timing. Skye watched patterns others missed. Hughes bent time, terrain, and morale just enough to keep the whole mess from collapsing.
Silver wrote it all down.
Not because Celeste asked him to.
Because… it mattered.
Topsy bounced between roles, enthusiasm weaponized. One minute she was helping Arcade reroute power, the next she was distracting zombies with fireworks and bad ideas. Celeste let her try things. Let her fail safely. Let her shine.
And somehow—quietly, without anyone announcing it—that helped.
Carys wasn’t spoken about much.
But Silver noticed the signs.
Celeste stayed busy. Always moving. Fixing, cooking, sewing, organizing. Filling the exact-shaped absence Carys had left with motion and responsibility. If she stopped, she might feel it.
So Silver didn’t interrupt.
He watched instead.
Watched a commander who didn’t command like he’d been taught—no barked orders, no distance, no fear-based authority. She listened. Adjusted. Asked questions. Let people be good at what they were good at.
It shouldn’t work.
By every council doctrine, it shouldn’t.
And yet.
The unit moved smoother each day. Fewer arguments. Cleaner rotations. Even Ray stopped snapping as often.
Silver found himself… learning.
Not about tactics.
About people.
And that unsettled him far more than any zombie ever had.
It was on one of those mornings that the rhythm broke.
The base had just begun to wake. Steam rose from tin mugs. Someone had burned porridge again. Arcade was arguing with C.H.I.P. about whether “technically edible” counted as a food category. Lumina was trying to braid Bonbon’s fur while Bonbon lectured her in very serious Welsh.
Silver sat at the edge of the common area with a notebook open, pretending not to take notes.
Celeste was halfway through checking the patrol rota when the radio crackled.
Static hissed.
Then a voice broke through, strained but controlled.
“Gobaith channel, this is Bracer Squad forward response. We’ve got movement in the Trading District. Repeat—movement in the Trading District. Civilians are still inside. Requesting Knight support for clearance and evacuation.”
The room changed at once.
Not panic.
Movement.
Ray summoned Heartbreaker. Mezzo was already on his feet, tail twitching as he shoved one arm through his jacket. Pitch summoned then checked Lady Luck with a soft metallic click. Hughes summoned Everstill. Skye’s cards flickered into place around his paws like nervous little stars.
Lumina looked up from Bonbon’s half-finished braid.
Celeste caught her eye.
“Safe brave,” Celeste said.
Lumina nodded fiercely. “Safe brave.”
Silver blinked as everyone moved around him with practised urgency.
No one asked if he was coming.
Celeste simply tossed him a spare field strap.
“Put that on,” she said. “It stops your coat catching on things.”
Silver looked at it.
Then at her.
“My coat does not catch on things.”
A beat.
Behind him, Topsy bounced past and casually hooked one of his trailing seams on a chair.
Silver froze.
Celeste pointed at the strap.
Silver sighed. “Fine.”
Within minutes, the Knights were armed and moving.
The Trading District sat beside one of Clawdiff’s larger parks, where neat old walkways and iron benches had been swallowed by tents, tarps, market stalls, and scavenged barricades. What had once been open grass had become a makeshift village—washing lines strung between trees, soup fires smoking under patched awnings, crates stacked into walls, children’s chalk marks on the pavement beside warning runes.
People had tried to make a home out of whatever the apocalypse had not eaten.
And now something had found them.
By the time the Knights arrived, Bracer Squad was already there.
And larger than before.
Much larger.
They had armbands now—proper ones, stitched with the wolf-head mark instead of hastily painted on cloth. Volunteers moved between barricades with surprising discipline: Pureblood shopkeepers, off-duty mechanics, young runners, old veterans, a few Mythics in travelling shawls, even several Hybrids who looked like they still expected to be told to leave.
Pliskin stood on top of a crate, waving both arms as he directed trap placement.
“No, no, not there! If you put the spring-net there, it’ll catch Mrs Pritchard’s laundry and then she’ll kill us before the zombies do!”
Arch was dragging a heavy barricade into place with two other Bracers, grumbling under his breath. Sandy stood nearby with a clipboard, looking intensely proud of herself and only slightly dangerous.
Jason saluted when he saw Celeste.
“Knight-Commander! Glad you’re here. We’ve got civilians in the eastern stalls, possible candy dead in the old arcade, and something big moving near the park bandstand.”
Silver’s brows lifted.
Celeste glanced at him. “Bracer Squad grew.”
“So I see,” Silver murmured.
His eyes moved over the volunteers, the barricades, the improvised command posts. Messy. Underfunded. Half of it probably illegal by Council safety codes.
Effective, though.
Annoyingly effective.
Celeste stepped forward, voice steadying as everyone looked to her.
“Right. We clear the district by sections. No one goes alone. Bracers handle evacuation and barricades. Knights take point and deal with anything large, bitey, or emotionally upsetting.”
Topsy raised a hand. “What if it’s all three?”
“Then we definitely deal with it.”
Mezzo cracked his knuckles. “Grand. Hate it already.”
Ray rolled her shoulders, fire licking briefly along her hands. “Where first?”
From somewhere deeper in the Trading District, a crash echoed through the morning.
Then a scream.
Celeste drew Starlight and Starbrite.
“First,” she said, “we get everyone out.”
The alarm went up properly near the park.
Candy zombies poured out between the trees and broken paths, scattering civilians who had thought the area was finally safe. A market stall overturned. Someone screamed for their child. A line of laundry snapped loose and whipped across the path like a white flag surrendering early.
“TOPSY—CIVILIANS LEFT!” Celeste shouted, already moving.
“ON IT—WHEEE!”
Topsy vaulted off a bench, rocket boots flaring as she bounced from lamppost to statue to tree, grabbing people mid-jump and tossing them clear like she was playing some unhinged rescue sport.
“PLEASE KEEP ARMS INSIDE THE TOPSY AT ALL TIMES!” she yelled, flinging a startled baker over a barricade and into Sandy’s waiting arms.
Pitch melted into the shadows at the edge of the path.
Zombies lunged for him—
—and vanished.
He dragged them bodily through a shadow-jump, dumping them out the other side directly into Hughes’ waiting arc.
Hughes planted his crook, eyes sharp.
“Now.”
The crook spun.
Time slurred.
The zombies staggered as if moving through syrup—
—and Ray hit them.
Heartbreaker came down in a brutal arc, bodies exploding into fragments as she bashed through slowed forms with terrifying efficiency. Park benches shattered. Pavement cracked. Candy limbs skidded across the grass and dissolved in glittering sparks.
“CLEAR!” Ray barked.
Celeste stayed close to Silver.
Not hovering.
Not exactly.
But near enough that Silver noticed.
“Okay,” she said quickly, calm despite the chaos. “You don’t rush them. You make them want you. Step in, step back. Like this—”
She moved forward, blades flashing just enough to draw a zombie’s attention. The creature snapped toward her, jaw stretching wide, and Celeste sidestepped smoothly, letting its momentum carry it past.
Silver followed her lead, heart pounding harder than he cared to admit. He loosed an arrow, clean and precise, the mana-bolt striking through the zombie’s shoulder and pinning it long enough for Celeste to cut it down.
“That was good,” Celeste called. “Again—don’t overcommit.”
“Darling, I never overcommit,” Silver said automatically.
A zombie nearly took his sleeve off.
Celeste’s ears twitched. “Maybe commit a little.”
Mezzo blurred past them in a streak of motion, super-speed carrying him through clusters of zombies. He yanked one off balance, kicked another into a stall frame, then spun two more directly into Arcade’s reach.
Arcade grinned, electricity crackling around his hands.
“C.H.I.P.—Flatten Mode.”
C.H.I.P. dropped onto a zombie with a crunch.
Then another.
Then another.
Arcade followed up with arcs of electricity that snapped through the pack, jumping between candy bodies in bright, vicious chains.
“TEAMWORK,” C.H.I.P. declared. “IT IS SATISFYING.”
Then—
Pain.
Silver gasped as teeth sank into his arm.
For one second, he was not Lord Arcturus.
Not polished.
Not bored.
Not untouchable.
Just afraid.
“I—Celeste!”
Lumina was there instantly, skidding to a stop and pressing glowing hands over the wound.
“Breathe,” she said firmly. “You’re fine. You’re fine.”
Silver stared at his arm, terror flooding him so fast it stole the words from his mouth.
“Am I—” His voice cracked. “Am I going to turn?”
Skye landed beside them, card sigils flaring as he summoned a shield guardian—translucent, radiant, holding back the last lunging zombies with a sweep of its shining arm.
Lumina shook her head without hesitation.
“No. You’re fine. It barely broke skin. I’ve got it.”
Her light flared.
The wound sealed.
The fear lingered.
But it didn’t win.
Silver looked at Lumina like he had forgotten children could be frighteningly competent.
She gave him a tiny, serious nod, then darted back toward Celeste.
Moments later, the last zombie fell.
The park went quiet except for the crackle of fading mana and the distant sound of Bracer Squad counting evacuees.
“TAAADAAA!” Topsy shouted, arms thrown wide from the top of a half-broken statue. “LUNCH TIME!”
Silver stood there, chest heaving, surrounded by pixelating zombie remains as EXP values streamed across his arm HUD in glittering lines.
Celeste glanced at it and smiled.
“Wow. You’re levelling up fast.”
Silver blinked. “…I am?”
She nodded, genuinely pleased. “You pick things up quickly.”
He opened his mouth with some perfectly superior reply already forming.
Nothing came out.
