My Shard Bearer System - Elias's Legacy
Chapter 158: Mission Set

Chapter 158: Mission Set

Her melody played quietly through the Ikona’s core, just loud enough to keep the signal link open. That tone—flat and steady—was the only proof the rest of the group had that the Ikona hadn’t gone down.

Outside the duct, the hall was silent. No response had come.

Not yet.

Condensation lined the pipes overhead, dripping down in uneven taps. A cold trail ran along the length of a nearby feed pipe—eighteen-inch PVC, smooth, slightly warped near the bend. Further back in the shaft, the drip from a narrower line echoed faintly—probably a three-inch flow line running past the panel junction. The air carried the smell of old coolant and iron.

The Ikona tilted its head and adjusted slightly, one claw tapping against the edge of a sensor mount. A small buzz answered from the panel’s far side—one of the subsystem monitors still active. That made sense. AN0859 15 subgrid, according to Dot’s earlier scan data. No breaches logged. No overrides offered.

The lock just sat there. Closed. Quiet.

The melody hitched once, almost like hesitation, then smoothed out again.

From deeper inside the facility, a low vibration passed through the shaft. Barely audible. But it was there—pressure in the pipes, like something had moved fast on the far side of B Block.

The Ikona froze, listening.

Then it dropped lower in the duct and stayed still.

The Ikona fluttered forward inside the duct, wings brushing lightly against the side of a pipe. The metal was cold, slick with condensation. It pushed on, navigating the tight bends until it came to another panel bolted into the wall — smaller than the first, partially blocked by a coiled sensor cable hanging loose near its edge.

Below it sat a sealed containment unit filled with heavy gel. The red indicator was steady. The housing was marked clearly — flow-related, older build. The Ikona perched beside it and tested the cable. Its claws gripped tight, wings bracing as it pulled.

Nothing moved.

The gel inside the unit barely shifted. The red light didn’t blink. The system hum stayed steady, quiet but locked in place.

The Ikona adjusted its stance.

Without waiting, it activated its Aural Mimicry and Projection. A secondary shard response, developed without Faye’s direct control — trained, tested, and refined across drills. It swept the shaft acoustics, capturing the ambient feed: the drip of water against the lower pipe, the faint electrical noise from a cracked junction, and the low, pulsing buzz of sensors stationed further up the line.

It waited, then tapped the panel with the edge of one claw — once, then again, slower. Precise.

A voice responded from the E-Box speaker, flat and mechanical:

"Water level above bottom too high. Reduce flow to release alarm threshold and lift A Block lockdown."

The message repeated. The red light stayed on.

The Ikona stayed still, feathers pressed flat. It didn’t move again.

The Ikona held still beside the panel, wings tight. Its melody shifted pitch, flattening into a mechanical tone — clean, clipped, exact.

Faye had practiced the pattern dozens of times. The mimicry wasn’t perfect at first, but it had improved. Even when she wasn’t singing, it remembered.

"Raise sensor ten inches."

The words came out even. The shaft answered with a clunk.

Chains rattled above the box, the tension shifting behind the panel. Something moved — metal grinding against metal — and then a heavy click.

The red light blinked once. Then turned green.

The hum of the panel lowered. A soft thud echoed down the duct as the bolts retracted from A Block’s door.

The Ikona flared its wings and gave a sharp chirp, short and high. Not musical — just excited.

It spun once in the narrow space and darted back through the tunnel, feathers glinting as it passed the wide vent pipe near the curve — twenty-inch, coated in condensation. Sensor lights blinked to its left as it passed the E-Dot cluster, the narrow spacing now familiar.

The air warmed as it neared the quarters.

And the door was open.

The Ikona burst through first, wings buzzing. Its melody was louder now — not a signal, just urgency. It crossed the threshold and flared wide—

Then froze.

Four guards stormed through right behind the open frame, weapons up, uniforms soaked in blood.

One of them wasn’t moving right — neck twisted, eyes unfocused. He stumbled, half-carried by the momentum of the group, and pulled the trigger.

The shot fired wild, the angle skewed.

The bullet skimmed the Ikona’s wing, searing a feather edge. It chirped sharp and veered hard, dropping low as it spun toward Faye.

Elias stood near the center of the pod quarters, the floor still gritty from the earlier blast. His shard pulsed steady in his chest. Dot hovered close, her blue glow stretching across the room’s dim light, brushing against the folds of his sleepwear. The system prompt still hovered just above his eye-line, faded at the edges but clear: "Save a life. 30 minutes remaining."

Across from him, the others clustered near their pods—Kikaru standing tense with arms crossed, Faye crouched low beside her Ikona, Tidwell pacing. Paul hadn’t moved. Junjio kept glancing at the door. Wes stood near the wall, arms folded, unreadable.

Flickering prompts hovered in front of each of them: "Defeat (1) shard user."

Kikaru’s had stayed longer—one blink slower in its cycle. Her stats had been displayed before she swiped it away. Elias remembered the numbers without trying to—Strength: 50. Speed: 85. That edge wasn’t theory. It was real, and it made him wonder how close she’d come to snapping.

The air inside the quarters was thick with dust, bits of insulation still drifting near the corners of the ceiling. The door stood open behind the guards, the emergency lock assembly deactivated. It felt wrong—too sudden after all that noise, all that pressure. The room hadn’t caught up yet.

Faye knelt down and caught her Ikona gently, both hands wrapped around its frame. The creature’s feathers were uneven now, one wing trembling in her grip. The hum it gave off had dropped a register—still musical, but thinner.