Chapter 1

"Liar." Jax leaned in, the smell of cheap synthetic tobacco and ozone clinging to him. He gripped my hair, yanking my head back to expose my neck. "The black-market glitch you stole. The Blood Protocol key. Give it up, or I start peeling the skin off your fingers one by one."

I looked up at him, squinting through the neon glare of the overhead billboards. Three other thugs stood behind him, laughing, their cyber-arms humming with low-grade power. They were bottom-feeders, but to a Shell with zero compatibility, they were gods.

"I told you," I spat, a glob of blood hitting his polished boot. "It's gone."

Jax’s face twisted. He didn't shout. He just smiled, a slow, cruel thing. "Wrong answer, Kai."

He raised his hand, his knuckles glowing with a dull orange light—a basic thermal protocol. He slammed his fist into my shoulder, the heat searing through my thin shirt. I screamed, the sound echoing off the damp walls.

"Where is it?" he hissed, pressing the heat deeper into my collarbone. "Tell me, and maybe I'll let you crawl home."

Something snapped inside me. Not a bone, but a barrier.

Deep in the base of my skull, where the forbidden chip was fused to my spine, a cold, black spark ignited. It wasn't a flicker. It was a void. Suddenly, the pain didn't vanish—it changed. It became fuel.

*Devour,* a voice whispered in the back of my mind. Not a human voice. A command.

"I said," I whispered, my voice sounding different—deeper, vibrating with a frequency that made the puddles around us ripple. "I. Don't. Have. It."

Jax sneered, preparing another strike. "Still playing hard? Fine. Let's see how much you—"

I didn't think. I just moved.

My hand shot up, grabbing his glowing wrist. The moment we touched, the orange light didn't just stop—it flowed. I felt it. A rush of heat, raw and violent, surging from his arm into mine. It felt like drinking liquid lightning.

Jax’s expression shifted from arrogance to pure confusion. "What the hell... let go!"

I didn't let go. I squeezed.

*CRACK.*

His wrist snapped like a dry twig. But it wasn't just the bone. The thermal protocol in his arm flickered and died, the orange glow sucked dry into my palm. Jax let out a guttural howl, stumbling back, clutching his ruined limb.

"What did you do?" he shrieked, his eyes wide with terror. "You're a Shell! You can't use protocols!"

I stood up slowly. I didn't feel like a Shell anymore. I felt like a predator that had just discovered what taste was. My veins were humming, a dark, iridescent purple pulsing beneath my skin.

"I think," I said, stepping toward him, "that I just did."

"Kill him!" Jax screamed, pointing his good arm at me. "Kill the freak!"

The three thugs behind him didn't hesitate. Two of them lunged forward, their arms transforming into jagged metal blades. The third fired a concussive blast from a wrist-mounted emitter.

I dove to the side, the blast scorching the wall where my head had been a second ago. I rolled, my mind screaming for more. The rush was addictive. I could see the protocols in them—glowing threads of energy weaving through their muscles. They weren't shields. They were batteries. And I was starving.

I slid under the first attacker's reach, grabbing his ankle.

*Siphon.*

Another jolt of energy ripped through me. This one was jagged, electric. I felt my muscles tighten, my reaction speed spiking. I twisted his leg with a sickening pop and launched myself upward, catching the second thug mid-air.

I slammed him face-first into a dumpster, my fingers digging into the port at the base of his neck.

"Please!" he choked out, clawing at my arm. "Stop!"

I didn't stop. I drained him until his eyes went dull and his limbs went limp. I dropped him like a piece of trash.

Jax was backing away now, his face pale. He tried to scramble up, his boots slipping in the grime. I walked toward him, the air around me shimmering with the stolen energy of three different protocols. I felt like I could tear the city down with my bare hands.

"You're a monster," Jax whimpered.

"I'm a Shell," I corrected, leaning down, my face inches from his. I could smell his fear; it smelled like ozone and sour sweat. "And you just taught me how to eat."

I raised my hand to finish it, my fingers curling into a claw. I wanted to see if I could rip the protocol straight out of his chest.

*Click.*

The sound was small, but it cut through the alley like a razor.

I froze. A cold, metallic sensation pressed firmly against the back of my skull. Not a blunt instrument. A gun. A high-caliber, Syndicate-grade railgun.

"Don't move," a voice commanded.

It was a woman's voice. Ice-cold. Precise. It didn't carry a hint of fear or hesitation. It sounded like a death sentence delivered by a professional.

I stayed perfectly still, my heart hammering against my ribs. The heat from the stolen protocols was still coursing through me, but it felt useless against the sheer killing intent radiating from the person behind me.

"One more twitch," she whispered, the muzzle of the gun digging slightly into my skin, "and I'll erase your consciousness before your body even hits the ground."

I slowly raised my hands, my fingers still trembling from the adrenaline. "Who the hell are you?"

"The person who's been tracking that chip for six months," she replied. I could hear the subtle slide of a safety being switched off. "And you're the pathetic little mistake who actually managed to activate it."

I tried to turn my head, just a fraction. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw her. Tall, draped in a high-collar obsidian coat that absorbed the neon light. Her eyes were a piercing, unnatural silver—the mark of a High-Protocol Elite.

She wasn't just a hunter. She was Syndicate royalty.

"You're coming with me," she said, her voice dropping an octave. "And if you fight, I'll make sure you stay alive just long enough to feel me take the chip back out of your brain piece by piece."

She didn't wait for an answer. She grabbed my wrist—her grip was like iron, cold and suffocating—and jerked me backward.

"Wait!" I yelled, stumbling.

"Shut up," she snapped, pressing the gun harder against my temple. "You're not a person anymore, Shell. You're an asset. And I'm here to collect."