Catalina made her way towards Grayson, and Pete had to actively resist the urge to move between them.

"You detained my Lily."

Catalina’s voice was low, controlled, trembling at the edges as she held back on lunging at Grayson.

After all, this was still the son of her best friend.

"Without informing her family. Without legal counsel. Without a single word to the people who brought her into this world. You locked her in a basement—a basement, like some common criminal—in a facility you deemed safe—"

She swept one gloved hand at the devastation surrounding them.

"—but clearly not safe enough."

Grayson looked at her motionless. His eyes rested on Catalina without flinching, without challenging. His expression betrayed nothing—no defensiveness, no guilt, no anger.

He simply let Catalina rant all she wanted.

Pete knew that Grayson probably knew that any response from him would be weaponized against himself, and so Grayson offered none.

But Catalina took his silence as confirmation.

"Nineteen people have already been confirmed dead. My daughter is missing for goddamn no reason at all. And you, the person who hid her here, are sitting there with that face—that insufferable face—as though you haven’t done anything wrong in this world?! That you have nothing to explain yourself for?!"

Her voice finally cracked as she shouted. 𝕗𝐫𝐞𝕖𝕨𝐞𝗯𝚗𝕠𝘃𝐞𝚕.𝐜𝗼𝚖

"Catalina—" Geron moved, catching his wife’s arm with a steadying grip.

"Don’t." She didn’t look at her husband and tried to tug her arm out of his grip.

Her glare remained fixed on Grayson, wet-eyed and lethal.

Geron’s hand tightened on her arm as he turned to Xavier, his expression hardening.

"General Hunter. I trust the investigation will be thorough and expedient. Whatever internal arrangements were made regarding my daughter—"

He glanced at Grayson. The look contained multitudes: apology, accusation, and a desperate plea for understanding, all compressed into a single beat of eye contact.

"—I expect a full accounting."

Xavier didn’t say or promise anything. He just watched in amusement.

Pete looked at Geron, his word choice, and the careful way he positioned himself adjacent to Xavier without explicitly pledging allegiance.

Ambiguous, that was the only word he could describe it.

Geron was threading a needle between condemning Grayson and siding with Xavier. He reprimanded Grayson in tone but committed to absolutely nothing in substance.

It was masterful work.

But it became completely clear to anyone paying close enough attention.

Like Catalina.

Pete watched as her eyes flickered toward her husband. There was a split-second assessment that landed somewhere between suspicion and bewilderment.

Geron was saying the right words, performing the right indignation. But something in his anger was hollow enough for someone sharing a bed with him to notice.

Catalina had not survived decades among the Imperial nobility by failing to notice something like that. She had been married to Geron for a long time, enough to realize the bullshit he was spouting.

But, surprisingly, she said nothing about it.

There was a long silence before; footsteps were heard approaching.

Lieutenant Rocky Hawn walked in, bowed a little to acknowledge the powerful people in the scene, and proceeded to walk towards Xavier. He stopped at a distance from Xavier and snapped a salute.

"Sir. Updated situational assessment from the forensic analysis team."

Xavier returned the salute with a nod. "Report."

Lt. Hawn connected his light brain to the holographic display for everyone to see.

His expression was blank as he started his report.

"Forensic reconstruction of the blast pattern confirms three coordinated detonation points. It is timed to within 0.3-second intervals, based on structural settling analysis."

He paused, scrolled.

"Regarding the identity of the individual or individuals who breached the basement and took the detainee—current working hypothesis from the field analysts is that the perpetrator may have been a civilian with prior knowledge of Former Colonel Gringer’s detention. Specifically, a—"

He cleared his throat.

"—a devoted follower or a fan of Former Colonel Gringer’s public persona who became aware of her confinement and acted independently to effect a rescue."

Dead silence.

Xavier turned his head slowly and fixed his lieutenant with a stare that could have frozen anyone who received it.

"Lieutenant Hawn."

"Sir."

"Did you just suggest, in the middle of a military crime scene with nineteen confirmed dead individuals, that a fan bombed a secured research facility and extracted a military-trained colonel from a reinforced basement?"

Lt. Hawn, to his credit, did not flinch.

"Sir, I’m reporting the field team’s preliminary hypothesis, not endorsing it. They noted that Colonel Gringer’s public profile includes a substantial civilian following with military background as a model and actress—"

"Enough." Xavier’s voice was quiet, which was always worse than loud. "Tell the field team to produce a hypothesis that wouldn’t embarrass a first-year cadet at the Academy, or I’ll reassign every one of them to latrine inspection on the border stations. Dismissed."

"Sir." Lt. Hawn saluted, pivoted, and retreated quite fast.

Colonel Vane, who was guarding the entrance of the tent, watched and maintained his position throughout the entire exchange. He allowed herself one quirk of the eyebrow, but it vanished before anyone else could catch it. Pete saw it anyway.

Xavier returned his attention to Grayson. "As you can see, the investigation is still in its early stages. Perhaps your cooperation might accelerate things."

Grayson said nothing.

Pete could see the calculations running behind those silver eyes.

Xavier seemed content to let the silence do its work. He stood with his hands still clasped behind his back, waiting patiently.

Until Dr. Shortle, the head of the mecha department of the Mecha Research Institute, appeared.

The man looked like he had aged a decade in the past few hours. His white lab coat was streaked with soot, his thin face drawn and haggard, eyes red-rimmed from the combination of smoke exposure and grief.

Dr. Shortle had worked at this facility for over fifteen years. Many of the dead had been his colleagues. His friends.

He carried a data chip between two fingers, handling it carefully as he understood exactly what kind of content it had.

Before offering the chip to Xavier, Dr. Shortle’s gaze drifted toward Pete.

Their eyes met, and in that brief contact, Pete read the meaning behind it.

I’m sorry.

Pete kept his expression neutral, but something cold settled in his stomach.

Dr. Shortle turned to Xavier and held out the chip.

"General Hunter. The recovered files from the basement level’s independent surveillance system. The main network was destroyed in the blast, but the basement operated on a segregated backup loop. Most of the footage is corrupted, but the live structural scan data survived intact."