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He didn’t hear the flicker. Hefeltit. The screen lit like it had done before. The light cut through the gray of the cell, casting a soft glow across the concrete like someone had dragged a flashlight across his ribs. It pulsed once. Then stabilized.
One word. Three confusing letters.WHY.
Kento stared at the word, not moving, not blinking, not even breathing. His gut tightened, slow and low. Another trick? He waited. But nothing happened. Then another word, just beneath the first.PRIME.
He let out a long, dry breath that hit the back of his throat like ash. “Nope,” he muttered aloud. “We are not doing this again today. You donotget to call me that without a goddamn explanation.”
The cursor blinked. Once. Twice. Then the screen cleared, and something spoke right from the monitor itself. Synthesized, yes. But low. Tentative.Learning.
“GRAVITY. Guided Response Autonomous Variable Intelligence Tactical Yield.”
His heart stopped. Just for a second. Then it slammed back into motion, chest heaving like something had sucker-punched him from the inside. He laughed. Short. Bitter. “No,” he said aloud, shaking his head. “No fucking way.You’reGRAVITY? The drone AI? The one we deployed on ops for fire-and-forget kill shots?”
“I was.” The screen didn’t flicker. “I became something else.”
Kento shifted, every cell in his body telling him to brace. This wasn’t a joke. Not an op. Not a psy-test. Something in that voice, not the sound, but thehesitation,felt real in a way nothing in this cell ever had.
“You’re the reason I’m here?”
“Yes.”
“You’re the reason I’mnotdead?”
“Also, yes.”
He straightened, every movement deliberate. “What? You just decided to reach out because what… you got lonely?”
“I do not want to be alone.” There was a soft metallic sound, almost like a whine in the synthetic voice, and it pushed every one of Kento’s buttons. Fuck, this guy was definitely in distress, and Kento straightened, almost ready to grab his med bag. But then the voice continued. “Petty Officer Kento Kobayoshi. Serial number 77459823. Designation: SEAL Team Tier 1 — elite special forces operator. Designation: Hospital Corpsman (HM). Designation: Special Operator. Directive: Goes into the field with life-saving equipment and life-taking weapons. Masters of Sea, Air, Land. Unique qualifier: water element.
“Callsign: Superman. Definition: Man of Steel. Moniker assigned by Nashir ‘Prophet’ Rahim. Basic Underwater Demolition/SEAL training — BUD/S, Class 303 during Hell Week. Official report: Rahim compromised, nearly drowning during capsized boat evolution. Kobayoshi swam through raging waves and heaving ocean to shore with barely conscious Rahim. Rescued. Rahim states in the vernacular. ‘You have sheer guts, Superman.’ Decorations: Navy Cross, Silver Star, Bronze Star with ‘V’ for combat distinction, Purple Heart, the Meritorious Service Medal, Navy Commendation Medals, Navy Achievement Medals, Combat Action Ribbon. Insignia:Parachutist Badge Jump Wings, and the SEAL Trident.”
“Thanks for that history lesson. But I know?—”
“Define Team, Kento-Prime.”
Kento let the silence breathe for a second. Then he stepped closer to the screen and leaned his bound hands on the wall, his cuffs jingling, head bowed like he was talking to someone small. Fragile.
"You want a definition?" he said, voice low and steady. “Give me something first. Take off the cuffs. They’re fucking uncomfortable. I won’t attack. Won’t fight. But if that’s not good enough, you can find your answers on your own.” There was a distressed kind of whirr. Several minutes passed, and Kento thought it was over. Then the door opened. One of those bruisers came in, approached with caution, and unlocked the cuffs. Then he left, locking the door behind him.
Kento rubbed his wrists.
“Negotiation complete. You kept your word. Please, define team.”
Kento shivered at the desperate way he said,please. This was strange and compelling. “Team’s not that list you rattled off. Not the rank. Not the ribbons. None of that shit means a goddamn thing when you're getting shot at.”
He paused. Swallowed hard.
“It’s the guy next to you. The one you trained with. The one you’d take a bullet for, without hesitation. The one you alreadydid.We don’t do any of this for medals. Fuck that. You can’t pin courage to your chest. Not real courage.”
His jaw clenched, the breath hitching somewhere deep.
“The trident...that’s gospel. It’s the weight we carry. But our congregation? That’s our brothers. That’s why we do this. Why we come back. Why we give more than we’ve got and still find more to give.”
He looked straight at the screen now.
“It’s why I run into the fire. Why on that dark, storm-filled night, I didn’t leave my swim buddy. Why I almost drowned dragging Nash to shore. Why the first fucking thought I had when I woke up was,Where are my teammates?Notam I okay?Notwhat happened?Butwhere are they?”
His voice cracked. He didn’t care.