Page 6 of Fractured Devotion (Tainted Souls #1)

This morning starts with blood.

Corporal Enoch Rallis, the patient I’m shadowing in the trauma ward, spirals during a cognitive loop calibration.

His eyes go glassy, his body stiffens, and then—snap—he surges forward like a coiled wire.

His fist slams into the observation panel, and the glass fractures with a sharp, cracking sound that echoes down the sterile corridor.

I react without thinking. Years spent in field hospitals kick in.

I’m on him before he throws a second punch.

He’s stronger than he looks, his muscles taut with panic and strength.

The air reeks of bleach and raw fear. I grip him tight, whispering low reassurances and trying to ground him.

He thrashes beneath me, his eyes wild and lost in whatever memory he’s trapped in.

Orderlies storm in, rushing to help. But I stay down with him until the sedative stills his trembling frame, and his breathing evens out.

Later, in the debrief room, I scrawl a note across a fresh report sheet: “Develop non-invasive trauma de-escalation protocols.” Everything here revolves around neural redirection and suppression.

But that’s not always enough. Sometimes, what they need isn’t a machine. It’s a hand. A voice. Something human.

My knuckles are still stained with blood when I get the summons. Dr. Felix Rourke wants to see me.

His office is soundless and intimidatingly neat. A single brass pen sits beside a mug that steams like it’s been waiting for hours. He doesn’t look up right away. He just gestures for me to sit.

“I hear there was trouble in the ward.”

“Corporal Rallis had a spike. Broke containment.”

“Ah. Unfortunate,” he says, finally meeting my gaze. “Though not entirely unexpected.”

We sit across from each other, the air between us dense. There’s something about Rourke that feels too composed. Like everything he does is choreographed for effect.

“You’ve seen Miramont’s methods before, Alec,” he says, folding his hands. “You know how the system works, even when the edges bleed.”

I nod. “Doesn’t mean we shouldn’t make it better.”

He smiles, but it’s all teeth. “Progress demands discomfort. Don’t let compassion muddle your judgment.”

“You think compassion is a weakness?”

“No. I think idealism is a luxury,” he replies smoothly. “One that your former colleague—Dr. Varon—couldn’t afford either. Her files… well, let’s just say the public versions are much easier to digest.”

I stiffen. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

He sips from his mug, unfazed. “Just that brilliance often walks a razor’s edge. Sometimes, we redact truths to protect the minds that would break under their weight.”

His words cling to me like the coppery smell of blood

He knows something. About her. About what they’ve hidden.

And I’m not walking away until I uncover it.

Dr. Rourke clears his throat as if to dismiss me. “We’ll be in touch,” he says with a finality that borders on warning.

I rise, offering a curt nod. “I’m sure we will.”

His gaze lingers too long as I reach for the door. There’s more behind his eyes—layers he’s daring me to peel back. But not today.

As I step into the corridor, the muted hum of clinic life wraps around me again. The door shuts with a click behind me, sealing in whatever shadows Dr. Rourke didn’t care to show. I walk away, the hallway stretching before me like a question waiting to be answered.

By midday, the clinic hums with calm efficiency, but there’s a chill that never quite leaves these walls.

It settles into the corners, seeps beneath the sterile linoleum, and lingers in the way voices echo too long down the corridors, and in the stale scent of recycled air that clings to every lab coat.

Familiar, clinical, and distant. Like her.

Three days have slipped by since I returned to these corridors and saw Celeste for the first time in months. And I’ve been trying to pretend like that didn’t crack something inside me wide open.

She looked the same, yet nothing like I remembered. She’s colder and sharper, like the edges she’d once dulled for my sake had grown fangs. And yet, beneath the immovable calm, I saw the fracture. Just for a second. Right before she shut the door.

I meant to ask her why she did that. I had rehearsed the words in my head and traced the reasons like familiar scars.

But when I saw her earlier, the words dissolved.

I’d been too tongue-tied to speak the questions that mattered.

Maybe I’m afraid of the answers. Or maybe, deep down, I already know it.

Since then, I’ve tried to stay busy by reviewing trauma protocols, reacquainting myself with Miramont’s security policies, and nodding through briefings like a ghost retracing its own past. But I keep ending up near her wing and pretending it’s a coincidence. It’s not.

Thoughts of her creep in like a ghost, catching me unaware as always.

I remember catching her in the hall outside her office this morning too.

She was alone, reading a chart, oblivious to the world.

For once, I didn’t approach. I watched from down the corridor, unseen.

I don’t know what held me back. Maybe it was the way she stood, like any sudden noise would shatter her.

Or maybe I just didn’t want her to look at me like a stranger again.

A few moments later, someone walks toward her in the hallway.

A tall guy with dark hair. He’s quiet in the way predators are.

He slowed near her and said something low, something casual, but it made her look up from the chart she was holding.

They exchanged a few words, barely a minute’s worth, but it was enough for me to notice the way his eyes lingered.

It was the kind of look that studies, not just observes. I didn’t like it.

Later, I coincidentally crossed paths with him in the stairwell.

“You must be the new security guy,” I say, taking a pause to start a conversation with him.

“Kade,” he offered, clipped and unreadable.

“Alec,” I returned, measured in my tone. I wanted a closer look at him—to see how he handled someone engaging without hesitation, even if he technically is the kind of man who doesn’t blink unless it serves a purpose.

I don’t know what his story is, but I know a mask when I see one.

Hours slip by, and the light outside dims into an indigo hush. By the time I glance at the wall clock, it’s already past eight. The clinic’s usual buzz has gone down, shadows stretching across polished floors, the day’s chaos winding into stillness.

I’m in one of the private review rooms, logged into the neural archives. My screen shows archived data from the last trauma loop session I oversaw before I transferred out. I shouldn’t still care, but here I am, scrolling through old metrics as if they’ll tell me something new. They don’t.

There’s a knock at the glass. Mara, Celeste’s assistant, lifts a hand in greeting before slipping away again. No message. Just her way of reminding me I’m still being watched.

I lean back, exhaling slowly. The problem isn’t the clinic. It’s not even the ghosts.

It’s her.

Celeste hasn’t changed, and that’s what worries me. She still works like sleep is a myth, still keeps everyone at arm’s length, and still carries that invisible shield around her like a shell shaped by everything she won’t say.

And I’m not sure if I’m here to try again… or to finally let go.

But I do know one thing.

That fracture in her? The one everyone else tiptoes around? I was there when it started.

And I think I’m the only one who might still know how to reach her.