The main broadcast bay didn’t feel like part of the same building.

  Bay 14 had been a contained stadium where you could still pretend the match was the point. Bay 3 was engineered to manufacture a moment—and then sell it back to you as memory.

  The concourse feeding into it narrowed into a corridor of sponsor walls and looping LED ribbons. The same ten-second clips played on repeat: slow-motion summons colliding, glossy hero shots, the AstraForge logo snapping into place like a seal on a document you hadn’t been allowed to read.

  Mason let the current of spectators carry him until the space opened and the noise changed shape. Not louder—layered. A chant swelling from one section, commentator cadence threaded through overhead arrays, a bass note that pressed against his ribs and stayed there. Camera rails traced arcs above the Core Field like a hunting pattern. A drone hovered high near the lattice, lens trained down at center stage, patient as an eye that didn’t blink.

  Naomi moved beside him with her tablet tucked close, AR lenses in—thin and clear, visible only when the arena lights caught their edge. She looked composed in a way that annoyed Mason, because it wasn’t performative. It was simply her default.

  They found seats mid-tier, off-center. Close enough that the field and the broadcast desk were a single composition, far enough that security’s scanning sweeps didn’t linger on their row.

  On the arena’s near side, two commentators sat at a desk with branding so clean it felt like it had been sanitized. Their faces filled the jumbotron above them, professionally animated, professionally excited. A scrolling graphic band wrapped the stadium: archetype win rates, average Beat time, “Most Played Rank-4 Sigils Today.”

  The numbers were framed like truth.

  Then Kellen Royce entered, and the bay reacted as if it had been waiting for him specifically.

  He didn’t hurry. He didn’t scan the stands like someone searching for permission to belong. He lifted his rig arm for the pre-match cameras, turned it just enough that the sponsorship model number caught the light, then offered a quick two-finger salute to the nearest rail cam. The gesture landed like a signature.

  A cluster near the front rail answered with a chant that had rehearsed itself online. Someone held a printed banner—KING K—letters sharp and even, like it had come off a machine. Another sign, marker-thick, begged for a selfie.

  Mason felt his jaw tighten before he decided what to do with his face.

  Naomi’s attention stayed on the arena geometry and the broadcast cues, not on Kellen’s jacket or the copper streaks in his curls.

  “Entrance pacing,” she murmured, low enough that only Mason could hear. “He’s syncing his first motion with the desk’s cue. The timer starts when they say it starts.”

  Mason’s eyes slid to her. “You’re analyzing his walk now?”

  “I’m analyzing the system,” Naomi replied, tablet unmoving against her ribs. “He’s part of it.”

  At the competitor station, a handler closed in near Kellen’s shoulder—tall, clean suit, lanyard tucked away as if credentials were an accessory. The handler held a slim tablet angled away from cameras. Kellen leaned in with his camera smile still on and nodded twice.

  For a blink, the smile loosened. Not gone—replaced by irritation, quick and sharp.

  Then it snapped back into place as a rail cam glided closer.

  Kellen turned and clapped once toward the stands, an invitation the audience understood. The chant rose again, bigger, like the bay had a volume slider and he knew where it was.

  Across the field, his opponent checked in with none of that ceremony.

  Milo Reyes. Mid-twenties, plain jacket with a small patch at the collar—some gym logo. His rig was good, not pristine. His deck case looked used the way Mason’s did: not curated for grit, just worn from travel.

  Milo lifted his rig for the scan, then looked across at Kellen without shrinking. His stare didn’t ask to be included in Kellen’s story.

  The commentators’ voices rolled through the arrays.

  “Welcome back to Bay 3—feature match time.”

  “And who else could it be? Kellen ‘King K’ Royce. Undefeated today, and the crowd’s loving it.”

  “Across from him, Milo Reyes—out-of-state grinder, known for Striker-Support hybrid sequencing. If anyone can survive the first six Beats, it’s a player like Reyes.”

  Naomi’s stylus tapped the edge of her tablet once. “That’s the whole match, reduced to a soundbite.”

  Mason kept his hands in his lap, fingers lacing and unlacing. He hated that he cared. He hated that he cared more because it was Kellen.

  The referee stepped into the lane. Her voice didn’t need amplification; the bay had already trained itself to listen.

  “Competitors, confirm identity and rig seal.”

  Kellen lifted his rig with a flourish. Milo lifted his rig with economy.

  “Best of three. Twelve Beats. Decision metrics active. No outside verbal coaching.”

  The referee’s gaze moved between them. “Any questions.”

  Kellen spread his free hand in a showman’s shrug, as if questions were for people who weren’t him.

  Milo shook his head once.

  “Round one. Begin.”

  ROUND 1

  Kellen opened Blitz Fang at Rank 2.

  Beat 2, the summon snapped into the field—lean, coiled, eyes fixed forward like it had been born mid-hunt. It didn’t pace. It held still, tension gathered in every line.

  Milo answered with Echo Knight at Rank 3. The Support-leaning fighter arrived with mirrored plating and a guarded stance, shield angled with the patience of something built to absorb and return.

  The crowd liked the matchup already: predator and mirror.

  Kellen didn’t bank Charge. He pressed the bay’s favorite button—tempo.

  Beat 2: Blitz Fang repositioned into center access, taking the lane that demanded an answer.

  Beat 3: Kellen issued the attack and Blitz Fang drove into Echo Knight’s guard. The impact read clean in the cameras—sharp, controlled violence. The stadium reacted as if a switch had flipped; pockets of synchronized clapping started near the sponsor section, as if someone had cued them.

  A broadcast overlay flashed: STYLE +.7 — AGGRESSION OPEN.

  The desk leaned into it.

  “Early pressure from Royce—this is the signature.”

  “And look at the lane control. That’s not just speed, that’s confidence.”

  Milo didn’t flinch at his station. Beat 4: Echo Knight braced and caught the next hit better, shield angle tightened. Its ability triggered—damage mirrored back in a thin slice.

  Kellen’s Core Integrity ticked down.

  A hush ran through the stands, quick and confused, as if the audience didn’t like seeing the king touched by consequence.

  Naomi’s gaze tracked the Charge display above the field. “Milo’s line is a patience test. He wants Kellen to keep swinging into a mirror until ego overrides math.”

  Mason muttered, “Kellen doesn’t let ego override math,” and immediately hated how much that sounded like respect.

  Beat 5: Kellen set a trap. The broadcast labeled it for viewers as UNKNOWN (SET), turning it into mystery content. The rail cam lingered on Kellen’s fingers moving across his rig interface like he was playing an instrument.

  Milo held Echo Knight steady and banked Charge through Beat 5, then made his pivot.

  Beat 6: Milo issued the switch command—recall Echo Knight, summon Radiant Cleric.

  Echo Knight dissolved into recall shimmer, and for one Beat the lane in front of Milo’s station sat empty. The switch cost and the one-Beat delay were the price for trying to change the match’s tempo in a controlled way.

  Kellen saw the gap and moved like he’d been waiting for it.

  Beat 6: Blitz Fang surged forward, not to hit a body—there wasn’t one—but to take space. It claimed the angle that would make Radiant Cleric arrive under threat instead of sanctuary.

  Beat 7: Radiant Cleric manifested, light haloing its shoulders. It lifted its hands to begin a heal line that would claw Core Integrity back and stabilize Milo’s resource game.

  Kellen’s trap triggered.

  A ring of pale glyphs erupted under the Cleric’s feet. The creature’s joints locked, not fully frozen but slowed into something expensive and wrong, like the field had decided its timing was no longer permitted.

  “Trap reveal—CROWN SNARE!” the desk announced, delighted. “That’s brutal. Cleric arrives and gets pinned immediately.”

  Radiant Cleric’s cast motion stuttered. The heal didn’t complete.

  Beat 8: Kellen issued the attack. Blitz Fang hit into the stutter window, and the crowd made the kind of noise people make when they’re handed a clean narrative. Milo’s Core Integrity dropped in a chunk.

  Mason watched Milo’s shoulders at his station—small tension, not panic, but the strain of being forced to play Kellen’s pace.

  Beat 9: Milo tried to buy time with a terrain card—Sanctuary Grid. A Support staple. A pocket that could have made the Cleric hard to punish if it had been allowed to breathe.

  The grid flashed into place.

  Kellen looked at the cameras and smiled like Milo had given him a gift.

  Beat 10: Kellen played a Tactic—SIGIL STEP—timed so Blitz Fang re-laned through the grid’s edge without triggering the protection the audience expected. Legal. Narrow. Frame-perfect.

  Mason felt a cold admiration run under his skin. That wasn’t just reaction speed. That was practiced timing against a rulebook most players only pretended to know.

  Beat 11: Kellen angled Blitz Fang toward Radiant Cleric again. Milo tried to stabilize, issued a defensive command, but Radiant Cleric was still recovering from the earlier lock and the grid didn’t help if you never got a moment to use it.

  Beat 12: Kellen shifted Blitz Fang into a finishing stance—head low, shoulders forward, claws flexing against the Core Field shimmer. The arena lighting dimmed by a notch as the broadcast pushed “moment” into the room. The jumbotron found Kellen’s face. He made sure it caught his grin.

  Final Beat. Command issued.

  Blitz Fang launched, and the broadcast overlay exploded with a stylized crown graphic.

  FINISHER: CROWNBREAK LUNGE

  Milo’s Core Integrity hit zero.

  The referee’s tablet chimed. “Round one: Royce.”

  The stands turned it into a celebration even though it was only one round. The chant resumed, louder, and Mason could feel how easily a bay like this could make you believe winning was the same thing as being adored.

  Mason exhaled, slow. “He didn’t need to time it that tight.”

  “No,” Naomi said. Her voice stayed flat, but her fingers tightened around the tablet. “He wanted the clip.”

  If you come across this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen from Royal Road. Please report it.

  Between rounds, the broadcast rolled a replay from three angles. Slow motion. Particle effects. Crown Snare looked like art when you weren’t the one being pinned.

  Naomi didn’t watch the replay.

  Her attention moved to a telemetry strip tucked into her AR overlay—something the jumbotron didn’t emphasize, something most people wouldn’t even notice unless they went looking.

  Mason leaned slightly closer to her, careful to keep his voice low.

  “You’re pulling extra data?” he asked.

  Naomi’s eyes stayed forward, but her focus wasn’t on the desk anymore. “Main stage runs enhanced broadcast telemetry. It’s sanitized for public. Less sanitized for partners.”

  “So… not for us.”

  “Not for us,” Naomi agreed.

  The strip showed familiar categories—correction, latency buffer, moderation. All normal.

  Then, on the replay frame where Crownbreak Lunge landed, the correction value jumped.

  101.9%.

  It was there for less than a second. Then it smoothed back down like it had never happened.

  Naomi’s breath caught—barely audible, but Mason saw it in her throat. Her knuckles whitened around the tablet edge for one beat before she forced her grip loose.

  “You saw that,” Mason whispered.

  Naomi’s stylus hovered. “Yes.”

  “And they’re not saying anything.”

  The commentators kept talking like the world was stable.

  “Textbook from Royce—he makes it look effortless.”

  “It’s not effortless. That’s elite sequencing.”

  Mason watched Kellen at the station. Relaxed. Laughing with the referee during the break. His handler leaned in with the tablet again, showing him something.

  Kellen’s smile tightened.

  Mason’s eyes narrowed. “Handler giving notes?”

  Naomi didn’t look away from the telemetry. “Brand notes. Or risk limits.”

  “Risk limits?” Mason repeated.

  “You don’t put a corporation’s favorite asset under this many cameras without boundaries.” Naomi’s gaze flicked to the rails and the hovering drone. “There are rules on top of the rules.”

  ROUND 2

  Milo adjusted his opener. He abandoned the Support line and brought out a Rank-4 Striker—Razor Vale—fast and brittle, built to race tempo with tempo.

  The crowd liked the idea immediately. They always liked a challenger choosing violence they could understand.

  Kellen responded by opening Blitz Fang again.

  Beat 2: Razor Vale took center access with an aggressive reposition.

  Beat 3: Milo attacked first and landed clean. Kellen’s Core Integrity shaved down in a visible chunk, enough that the stands gasped and then erupted into excited noise—hope, hunger, the thrill of thinking an upset might be possible.

  Mason leaned forward without noticing he’d done it.

  Kellen didn’t react on his face. His rig hand moved with the same economy as before.

  Beat 4: Kellen set a trap.

  Beat 5: Kellen played a low-cost Tactic—MIRROR FEINT—selling an open lane that wasn’t open, baiting Milo into spending his next command on a strike line that would look correct in a normal bay.

  Milo bit.

  Beat 6: Razor Vale dashed into the feinted lane.

  Kellen’s trap triggered—GRAVITY SEAL. It didn’t freeze movement; it made it costly. Razor Vale’s dash turned into a stutter, momentum shaved away.

  Kellen punished immediately. Blitz Fang hit into the stutter window.

  The impact sounded sharper than it should have, a clean crack that made Mason’s chest tighten. The arena’s bass note shifted against his ribs, subtle but present, like the building had leaned in.

  Naomi’s eyes flicked to her telemetry strip again.

  No spike this time.

  A dip.

  98.6% for a blink, then normal.

  Her stylus scratched a note onto her tablet without her looking down.

  Beat 7: Milo tried to pivot back into sustain. The choice was visible even before he made it: Razor Vale was brittle, and Kellen had already found the rhythm. Milo issued a switch command—recall Razor Vale, summon Radiant Cleric again.

  Razor Vale dissolved into recall shimmer. One Beat of emptiness returned, the switch delay like a held breath.

  Beat 8: Kellen used the gap to take space again, Blitz Fang sliding into the lane that made Radiant Cleric’s entry dangerous.

  Beat 9: Radiant Cleric manifested, hands lifting to cast.

  Kellen didn’t finish with Blitz Fang.

  He changed the scene.

  Beat 9: Kellen issued his own switch command—recall Blitz Fang, summon Crimson Duelist.

  Blitz Fang vanished into recall. For one Beat, Kellen’s side of the field emptied too, and the crowd made a restless sound—confusion, anticipation, the broadcast’s favorite fuel.

  Naomi’s gaze sharpened. “He’s spending the switch cost. He wants the finisher to be a different silhouette.”

  Mason’s mouth went dry. “He’s making it prettier.”

  Beat 10: Crimson Duelist manifested—Rank 4, cape-like fabric trailing, blade angled downward like a promise. It didn’t move like Blaze Runner or Trap Weaver. It stood as if it understood cameras.

  The stands surged into a chant that had nothing to do with mechanics. The bay loved icons.

  Commentary was almost laughing with delight. “Here we go—Crimson Duelist on the board. The fan favorite.”

  Beat 11: Milo tried to protect his Cleric long enough to get a heal off. He issued a defensive command and set a trap, hoping to punish a greedy strike.

  Kellen let the trap reveal itself—SANCTUARY REVERSAL, a Support response designed to turn aggression into self-damage if the attacker overcommitted.

  Crimson Duelist didn’t overcommit.

  Beat 12: Kellen issued a micro-reposition—just enough to cancel the follow-through that would have triggered the trap’s worst effect—then attacked through the safe line.

  It was elegant in a way that felt almost cruel. Like watching someone win and also prove they had time to win clean.

  The broadcast dimmed the lighting again, forcing “moment” into the room like a scent. The jumbotron found Kellen’s face. He gave the camera the exact smile it wanted.

  Crimson Duelist’s blade arced in a clean line designed for slow motion.

  Milo’s Core Integrity hit zero.

  The referee’s tablet chimed. “Round two: Royce. Match: Royce, two rounds to zero.”

  The stands erupted as if the match had been close. That was the trick: the performance didn’t need reality, only rhythm.

  Milo crossed the field for the handshake. Professional. Quick. His face held steady, but his eyes looked like someone who had just learned what the gap between “good” and “marketable” actually cost.

  Kellen clapped him on the shoulder once for the cameras, friendly and light, then moved toward the media corral before the referee had even cleared the lane.

  Naomi rose. Mason followed, pulled into the flow of people funneling toward the sponsor wall where the interview would happen.

  The media corridor was light and control. Stanchions held fans back. Staff in headsets guided Kellen into a taped square on the floor like they were positioning an object for sale. His handler stood just out of frame, tablet ready, posture neutral in a way that felt practiced.

  An interviewer stepped in, microphone branded with AstraForge’s logo.

  Kellen put on the smile again. It landed on his face like it belonged there.

  “Kellen Royce, another clean sweep,” the interviewer began. “How does it feel to keep this pace at regionals?”

  Kellen lifted his hands, palms out in mock humility, then let the grin sharpen.

  “It feels normal,” he said. “I train for this. People act like it’s magic. It’s just work.”

  Fans behind the stanchions cheered. Someone shouted, “King!”

  The interviewer laughed on cue. “We saw Crown Snare in round one, and then you made the switch into Crimson Duelist for the round-two finish. Was that planned, or did you improvise based on the Support pivot?”

  Kellen rotated his rig arm slightly so the camera caught the sleek line and the sponsorship decals.

  “Planned and improvised,” he replied. “I know my deck. I know what people do when they get scared. They try to heal. They try to slow the game down.”

  He leaned closer to the mic, voice dropping like he was sharing something intimate.

  “I don’t let them.”

  Mason watched from the edge of the gathered crowd, close enough to hear, far enough that security didn’t redirect him.

  Naomi stood beside him, tablet held low with the screen dimmed. She looked like she was listening, but her eyes kept flicking toward the handler’s tablet and the security positions, reading body language the way she read data.

  The interviewer’s tone shifted, as if receiving direction through an earpiece.

  “This season, there’s a lot of talk about ‘new blood’—players coming up from locals, surprising brackets. Any names you’re watching?”

  Kellen’s smile widened, almost too bright.

  “Oh, I love new blood,” he said. “It makes the game interesting.”

  Just out of frame, the handler’s fingers tapped the tablet—two quick motions. A cue.

  Kellen’s eyes flicked toward it, then returned to the camera.

  “I’m watching anyone who thinks they can outsmart the meta with… vibes,” Kellen continued. “Anyone showing up with older rigs and a dream. It’s cute.”

  Heat climbed behind Mason’s ears. He gripped the strap of his rig case until the material bit his palm.

  Kellen’s delivery stayed smooth. “But I’m also watching the ones who actually have hands,” he added. “The ones who can take a hit and keep playing. I respect that. I want to test it.”

  The interviewer nodded like the line had been pre-approved. “So you’re looking for a challenge.”

  “I’m looking for the next story,” Kellen said. “If the bracket hands me that story, I’ll take it.”

  A fan pushed a card over the stanchion. Security hesitated, then allowed it. Kellen signed without breaking his camera smile, a performance nested inside another performance.

  “Any message for viewers at home?” the interviewer prompted.

  Kellen leaned in, voice crisp.

  “Keep watching,” he said. “The king’s not done.”

  Applause. Cheering. The corridor filled with the kind of energy that didn’t belong to any single person anymore—it belonged to the broadcast.

  The moment the camera light blinked off, the handler stepped in and turned Kellen away from the fans with practiced speed. Kellen’s smile dropped immediately, replaced by a look like he’d been holding his breath too long.

  The handler raised the tablet, showing him something.

  Kellen’s jaw flexed. “I did what you wanted.”

  The handler replied in a calm tone Mason couldn’t hear, mouth barely moving. Corporate calm.

  Kellen nodded once, sharp, then reset his smile as another camera angle slid into position for B-roll. The mask returned so fast it made Mason’s stomach twist.

  Naomi shifted her stance, angling slightly so Mason didn’t drift closer into the media space. It wasn’t possessive. It was protective in the quiet way she did things, like setting a boundary in code.

  “Did you hear the line about older rigs?” Mason asked, voice tight.

  Naomi’s gaze stayed on the corridor flow. “Yes.”

  “And ‘cute.’”

  “Yes.”

  Mason’s fingers curled harder around the strap. “He’s talking about me.”

  “He’s talking about a narrative,” Naomi corrected. Her posture stayed composed, but she edged half a step closer—close enough that Mason could feel her presence as a stabilizing point without her needing to say anything soft. “He’s building a foil.”

  “I’m not his foil.”

  Naomi’s eyes finally met his. “Then don’t let him write your reactions for you.”

  That landed harder than Kellen’s insult, because it was true and because it asked for discipline Mason didn’t always have outside the arena.

  They drifted with the crowd away from the media corral and back into the broader concourse, where the noise was less orchestrated and more human.

  Overhead, the jumbotron looped the finisher again—crown graphic, slow motion, Crimson Duelist’s blade framed by boundary light. The clip had already become a product.

  Mason’s mind kept returning to Naomi’s telemetry strip. The correction spike. The dip. The way the numbers smoothed themselves the moment you tried to stare too hard.

  Naomi’s tablet buzzed—silent vibration. She glanced down, then frowned.

  “What?” Mason asked.

  Naomi turned the screen slightly so he could see.

  She’d captured a frame from her AR overlay at the finisher impact. The correction spike frozen: 101.9%.

  Under it, a line Mason hadn’t noticed before, tucked beneath the buffer metrics:

  FIELD STABILIZATION: PRIORITY ROUTE ENABLED

  Mason stared. “That wasn’t in my bay.”

  “No,” Naomi said. Her stylus hovered like she was afraid to mark the wrong thing. “Main stage only. Or at least, main stage visible.”

  “Priority route,” Mason repeated, tasting the words like something he shouldn’t swallow. “That means… what, it stabilizes some matches first?”

  “It implies the system chooses where to spend safety,” Naomi replied. “If something strains, it routes stabilization where it matters.”

  Mason’s mouth went dry. “Where it matters for who.”

  Naomi’s gaze flicked toward the staff lanes and camera rails. “For the broadcast. For assets. For narrative continuity.”

  Mason adjusted the strap of his rig case, suddenly aware of how small his own rig looked in a bay like this—older casing, scuffed edges, inked sigils that meant something to him and nothing to the machine running overhead.

  They moved past an AstraForge promo booth where a staffer handed out glossy pamphlets: CORE FIELD SAFETY INNOVATIONS. Smiling families on the cover. A slogan promising protection.

  Mason didn’t take one.

  Naomi did. She folded it once and slid it into her jacket pocket like evidence.

  A voice cut through the concourse behind them.

  “Naomi Park?”

  Naomi stopped mid-motion.

  Mason turned.

  Kellen’s handler stood a few paces away, tablet tucked under one arm now. Up close, the handler looked younger than Mason expected—late twenties, clean-cut in a way that read curated rather than natural. The handler’s eyes flicked to Naomi’s credential badge first, then back to her face, as if confirming the name matched the body.

  Naomi’s expression stayed neutral. “Yes.”

  The handler smiled politely, controlled. “We’ve read your work. NP_Theory, right?”

  Mason felt a jolt in his stomach. He looked at Naomi, but she didn’t look back. Her focus stayed on the handler, measuring.

  “That’s an online handle,” Naomi replied.

  “Still,” the handler said. “It’s good analysis. AstraForge appreciates community voices who understand the game.”

  Naomi didn’t move, but her hand tightened around the tablet. “I’m a player. Not a spokesperson.”

  “Of course.” The handler’s smile didn’t change, as if Naomi had made a charming joke. “No pressure. Just—if you’re free later, there’s a small analyst mixer. Not public. A few invited guests. People who care about the technical side.”

  Naomi’s voice stayed even. “Who’s hosting.”

  “AstraForge Competitive Operations,” the handler replied. “Light refreshments. Networking. Nothing formal.”

  Mason watched Naomi’s throat move as she swallowed, controlled.

  “And why invite me,” Naomi asked, “instead of sending an email.”

  The handler’s smile held. “Because you’re here. And because Kellen mentioned he saw you taking notes.”

  Mason’s eyes went sharp. Kellen had noticed her. Of course he had. The king noticed anything that could be content, anything that could be leveraged.

  Naomi didn’t flinch. “Tell Competitive Ops I’ll think about it.”

  “Great,” the handler said, and it sounded like a checkbox being ticked. The handler’s gaze shifted to Mason for the first time—quick scan: older rig, cheap jacket, badge. Recognition not of who he was, but of what he represented near Naomi.

  “Good luck in your next round,” the handler added, still pleasant. Not encouragement. Acknowledgment that Mason existed in the same orbit.

  Then the handler turned and disappeared into the staff lanes.

  Mason and Naomi stood in the concourse for a beat while the crowd flowed around them, lanyards swaying, sponsor bags brushing past hips, a constant churn of noise and movement.

  Naomi let out a slow breath through her nose. “That was fast.”

  Mason’s voice came out rougher than he meant. “Kellen pointed you out.”

  “He pointed out the person with a tablet,” Naomi replied. “That’s not personal.”

  “It feels personal,” Mason said, then hated that it did. Hated that Kellen’s story-making had already found a hook in his chest.

  Naomi’s gaze softened for a fraction, then she locked it down again like she’d caught herself being too readable. “The invitation is a trap.”

  “Are you going?” The question left Mason before he could make it sound like anything other than what it was: fear of losing access to her, fear of her stepping into AstraForge’s orbit and getting swallowed.

  Naomi looked down at her tablet, then at the folded pamphlet in her pocket. “I don’t know,” she said. “Access is access.”

  Mason’s stomach tightened. He pictured her in a room full of corporate smiles and NDAs, her brain hungry for answers and the machine eager to feed her just enough to buy silence.

  “You don’t owe them anything,” Mason said.

  Naomi’s eyes lifted. “I didn’t say I did.”

  A silence opened between them—tense, not hostile. Full of things neither of them had named yet, because naming them made them real.

  On the jumbotron, the finisher looped again. The crowd ate it again, like repetition was a meal.

  Mason watched the corner of Naomi’s captured telemetry frame in his mind: 101.9%, then smooth. Priority route enabled. A system choosing who deserved stability.

  “They’re not just tuning the field,” Mason said quietly. “They’re allocating it.”

  Naomi’s stylus hovered over her tablet as if she could puncture the lie by writing the right sentence. “Yes,” she replied. “And they’re ensuring the people who matter don’t see the seams.”

  Mason tightened his grip on his rig case strap and felt the weight of his next match settle into him. Mid-morning slot. Another bay, another opponent, another set of numbers running faster than the paperwork admitted.

  Kellen’s line replayed in Mason’s head—older rigs and a dream, cute—and Mason hated how easy it was for a sentence to find a bruise.

  Naomi’s voice cut through it, flat and precise.

  “Eat,” she said. “Then we review your likely opponents. You can hate him later.”

  Mason nodded once, because it was something he could do without giving Kellen the satisfaction of seeing it. Then he followed Naomi into the concourse flow, both of them moving through a building that wasn’t merely hosting a tournament.

  It was managing which stories were safe to broadcast.