Vincent made it into the forest before his borrowed shape failed.
The armor peeled back in black flakes and sank into the shard buried near his thigh. What remained was a lean man in torn clothes, one arm gone below the elbow, blood soaking the cloth he had jammed against his side.
He dropped behind a fallen tree and pressed his back into wet bark.
"That went beautifully for a disaster," Nosey said inside his head. "By beautifully, I mean you almost donated our shard to a government intake bus."
Vincent shut his eyes until the spinning stopped.
"I expected one scared kid, not a platoon commander with a sword and backup."
"You expected what you wanted to find. That is how people die in forests."
Vincent pulled the cloth tighter. Pain ran through his ribs and down his leg, but the bleeding slowed under pressure. He could still move. That mattered more than comfort.
"The boy had a shard, and you felt it too," he said.
Nosey went quiet for half a breath.
"I felt something clean, new, and protected. His Ikona was awake enough to pull shape, but not trained enough to hide the signal."
"Then we were right to test the route."
"We were right to observe the route. You were wrong to attack it alone."
Vincent opened his eyes. Branches crossed above him, cutting the sky into hard strips. Somewhere beyond the trees, engines moved along the road. Search teams would come fast. Elara would send disciplined people, not frightened guards.
He pushed himself upright with his remaining hand.
"The Doctor from the vision earlier," Vincent said. "When the vision came, you looked like you knew him."
"I did not know him, but I remembered needing him, and those are different wounds."
"That is a painfully helpful distinction."
"You asked while bleeding, so I gave you the answer available."
Vincent laughed once, then stopped when his side pulled.
Leaves cracked in the distance, and he lowered himself behind the fallen tree to listen.
Three sets of boots. Maybe four. Slow pattern, spread wide. Not soldiers from the main convoy. These moved lighter, with signal gear instead of armor weight.
A masked operative spoke through a comm line. "Track is fresh, and signal strength increased near this slope. Sweep outward and mark blood contact."
Vincent looked at the knife on his belt, then at the plasma rifle slung over the nearest operative's shoulder.
"Nosey, give me enough grip to make the first one quiet," he whispered.
"No full fusion, because your body cannot pay for it."
"I asked for grip, not a sermon."
A thin shell of black material crawled over his remaining hand. It did not cover the whole arm. Nosey was rationing power now, which meant things were worse than Vincent wanted to admit.
The first operative passed the fallen tree.
Vincent rose behind him and drove the knife up under the edge of the mask. He caught the man's rifle strap before the body dropped and eased him down into the leaves.
The second operative turned at the sound.
Vincent brought the rifle up one-handed. Nosey's shell locked around the trigger guard and stock, forming the brace his missing hand could not provide.
The shot punched through brush and hit the second operative in the chest. The plasma charge burst hot enough to throw him backward into a tree.
"Subtle work, very close to silent," Nosey said.
"You handle comedy while I handle murder," Vincent said as the third operative rushed him with a short blade.
Vincent fired again, but the barrel dragged low. The shot tore through the man's thigh instead of his center mass. The operative crashed into him anyway, and both of them hit the ground hard.
The blade came down toward Vincent's throat.
He caught the wrist with Nosey's shell. The shell cracked. His fingers screamed. Vincent slammed his forehead into the man's mask, then rolled his hips and drove his knife into the exposed gap under the ribs.
The operative tried to pull back.
Vincent twisted the blade until the strength left him.
For a few seconds, the forest was only breath and blood.
Nosey's voice came thinner. "More will come after the signal drops from their team. Move before they bring the heavy kit."
Vincent stripped what he could from the bodies. Two grenades. One emergency charge. Spare cells. A locator tag he crushed under his boot. Every motion cost him, but leaving gear behind felt worse.
He found a recording chip on the first operative and pocketed it.
"Three dead, so your morale must be thrilled," Nosey said.
"Three fewer people are reporting our direction," Vincent answered.
"That is not the same thing at all."
Vincent set the charge against the base of the fallen tree and wired the grenades into the surrounding brush with clumsy, one-handed work. It would not kill a trained team by itself. It would make the trail ugly enough to slow them.
He staggered away before the timer finished.
The explosion hit behind him in overlapping bursts. Wood split. Dirt slapped the backs of his legs. Birds tore out of the canopy.
Vincent did not look back.
He kept moving until the forest thinned and the first rusted roofs of the Craliuk District appeared below the slope.
Nosey whispered from the shard.
"If Silas laughs, I am biting him."
"Get in line behind me after we survive," Vincent said, and started down toward the slums.