Around mid-afternoon, Lucas gathered everyone beneath one of the massive Winslow trees near the settlement gate. The RV sat nearby, parked and ready, its weathered frame casting a long shadow across the ground.
The mood was tense.
Ysa stood at the front of the group, tablet in hand. "We finally got a viable piece of information regarding where Emily and the others might be held."
Ava immediately pushed through the crowd. "What?" she blurted out. Her hands trembled. "Really? Where? Where did they take her? Is she still alive? What are we doing standing here? Let's go get her."
Lucas stepped forward. "Hold on, Ava." His voice remained calm. "Let's not rush into anything. They could be lying. We don't know for sure."
Ava stared at him.
"We have to think this through. If we charge in blind, we might not save any of them."
Ava's eyes widened. "Every second she's out there lowers her chances of being alive!" Her voice cracked. "That is my sister, Lucas!"
A silence settled over the crowd.
Lucas nodded slowly. "I know." His expression tightened. "And I can't even begin to imagine what you're feeling right now." He paused. "But that's exactly why we have to approach this carefully."
"Why?" Ava snapped. "What for?" She gestured wildly toward the gathered sirens. "We've got them on our side." Her hand swept toward Ysa. "They're just a bunch of stupid, disgusting cannibals!"
Ysa immediately spoke. "We can't go in recklessly." The sharpness in her tone cut through the argument. "Because the prisoner mentioned something that disturbs me."
The entire gathering fell silent.
Even Ava.
Yve frowned. "What?" She stepped forward. "What does that mean?"
Without answering immediately, Ysa tapped several symbols across the holographic display.
The tablet emitted a soft tone. A waveform appeared. Then a recording began to play.
The voice of the prisoner echoed from the device. "Please, miss, let me go. I want to live. I confess to my sins. Please just let me live."
Several people exchanged uneasy looks.
Then Ysa's recorded voice answered. "You're not going anywhere. Not until you tell me everything I want to know."
The edge in her tone made Lucas quietly glance away.
The prisoner continued. "Please... please... I'll do anything."
The recording paused briefly.
Then Ysa asked: "I'll ask again. Have you seen this girl?"
A few seconds passed.
"I think so…we've brought in a young girl just a few days ago." the prisoner answered. "Our state alpha killed a couple of old people…I think that's where I saw her."
Ava's entire body stiffened, her fist clenched, trembling.
Ysa continued. "Where did you take her?"
"I don't know." The man's breathing became shaky. "I don't know. We just capture people alive and bring them to a designated location." A sob interrupted him. "Then the other shapeshifting guys take them." The crowd immediately stirred. "We don't know where they bring them."
The recording fell silent for a moment.
Then Ysa's voice came again. "Shapeshifting?" A pause. "What do you mean?"
The prisoner sounded terrified now. Crying. Sniffling. His words nearly tripped over each other. "I-I don't know. I don't know who they are." A wet sob followed. "But I saw one."
Nobody moved.
"I saw one kill one of my guys."
Several people exchanged nervous glances.
The prisoner continued. "And then it copied his face."
Dylan's expression drained.
Lucas folded his arms.
The recording went on. "It was tall." The man's breathing shook. "And... and it's skin..." A frightened whimper escaped him. "It's skin looked like they were moving."
Yve's stomach sank.
"Please," the prisoner begged. "Please, I don't know anything else." Another sob. "Forgive me for my sins, oh God."
Then Ysa's recorded voice spoke again. "That's not possible."
A moment passed.
Then the prisoner answered. "Please, miss. I have a family." His voice was breaking apart. "If we don't bring in new people after a few days..." He swallowed hard. "They'll kill our families." A long pause followed. "We didn't have any other choice."
Yve gasped. The sound was small. But it carried.
Beside her, Ava's knees suddenly gave way, the color draining from her face. For a terrifying moment, it looked like she was going to collapse entirely.
Ethan moved instantly. He caught her by both arms and steadied her before she hit the ground. "Ava."
She barely seemed to hear him. Her eyes remained fixed on the tablet.
Ysa looked toward Yve. "Yve..."
Yve slowly turned.
The two sisters stared at each other. Then, as if reaching the same conclusion at exactly the same moment, they spoke together.
Low. Cold. Terrifyingly certain.
"They're Skindrifters."
A collective gasp rippled through the crowd, humans and sirens alike.
Even Dylan shifted uncomfortably, his stomach twisted. Suddenly he wasn't standing beneath the Winslow tree anymore. He was back in that sewer, back in the darkness…with that thing. Vivid images flashed his mind, the way his own eyes stared at him inches away, the way it copied his movements. His jaw tightened.
Yve stepped forward. "That's not possible."
Lucas looked between the sisters. "Why?" His voice was tense. "Why are they doing this?" He paused. "What's their goal?"
Yve didn't answer immediately, instead she seemed to be thinking.
Fast.
Very fast.
"The book I read stated that Skindrifters are solitary predators."
The crowd listened.
"They don't form allies. They don't cooperate. They don't work like a hive." Her brow furrowed. "They work alone." A pause.
Then—
"Unless." Something changed behind her eyes.
Dylan noticed it immediately.
The same look she got whenever she was connecting pieces nobody else could see. Her pupils widened. Then narrowed. Like gears locking into place.
Ysa frowned. "Unless what, Yve?"
Yve didn't seem to hear her at first. Her gaze had drifted somewhere distant. Somewhere only she could see. Then she spoke. Quietly. "They're trying to take over the planet."
The words hit like a physical blow.
Silence. Complete silence.
Lucas stared.
Saige looked genuinely horrified.
Even the wind seemed to disappear.
A choked sound came from where Ethan was still supporting Ava. She wasn't looking at the sky or the ground anymore; her eyes were fixed on some unseen horror in the distance.
Then Yve gasped. Another realization. Bigger than the first. "Of course." Her eyes widened. "Of course." She turned sharply toward Ysa. "The human population collapsed."
Nobody interrupted her.
"This planet is isolated." Her voice grew faster. "The other intelligent races barely visits Earth anymore." She pointed toward the ground. "It's the perfect environment."
Lucas frowned. "For what?"
Yve looked at him. "For evolution."
That somehow made everything worse. Several people visibly paled.
Ysa stared. "You're not making any sense."
Yve ran a hand through her hair. "No." She shook her head. "No, I am." Her voice was becoming frantic now. "How did I miss this?" She looked toward nobody in particular. "How did I not see it?"
"Yve," Ysa said carefully.
But Yve kept going. "Skindrifters aren't sapient." She pointed toward the tablet. "Or at least they're not supposed to be." Her breathing quickened. "But when I spoke to the one that imitated Dylan..."
Dylan immediately looked up.
"...it asked me questions."
The crowd grew still.
Yve continued. "Not mindless reactions." A pause. "Questions." Another pause.
Then: "It asked me how you know whether you're sapient or merely sentient."
Nobody spoke because nobody knew what to say to that.
Yve looked around at all of them. Her eyes were wide now. Almost frightened. "That's not something a mindless, vengeance-driven Skindrifter asks." She shook her head. "It shouldn't even care." Her voice dropped. "Unless it's evolving."
The implication settled over the crowd.
Heavy.
Awful.
"That makes sense."
The voice cut through the silence. Everyone turned.
Darnell stepped forward slowly, hands clasped behind his back.
"What does?" Lucas asked.
Darnell looked toward Yve. Then toward the distant sky beyond the settlement. "Every lifeform that becomes aware of itself eventually desires the same thing."
Nobody interrupted.
"A place where it belongs." His gaze hardened slightly. "A place where it can exist as itself." He paused. "A home."
Yve nodded immediately. "Uh huh."
Darnell continued. "If what you're saying is true, and these creatures are developing self-awareness, then eventually they would stop being content with hiding."
The implications settled heavily over the crowd.
"They would want territory."
Lucas folded his arms. "And if humans are already nearly extinct..."
Darnell nodded. "Then Earth becomes available real estate."
Nobody liked how reasonable that sounded.
Then another voice joined the discussion. "Hold on."
Several heads turned.
Jenkins was walking toward them from across the settlement. Adjusting his glasses. Looking annoyed. As usual.
Yve blinked. "What are you doing here?"
Jenkins stopped beside the group.
"I thought you were studying the corpses."
Jenkins stared at her. "Well, I had to step outside for fresh air eventually, didn't I?"
Nobody answered.
Jenkins gestured vaguely toward his nose. "Imagine possessing enhanced sensory perception and then locking yourself inside four walls and a roof with three corpses." He frowned. "That's hell."
Ysa actually winced. "...Fair."
Jenkins nodded. "Thank you." Then he turned back toward Yve. "Now." His expression sharpened. "You just told me that Skindrifters are corrupted human souls."
Yve nodded slowly. "Yes."
Jenkins folded his arms. "How exactly does something that is already dead develop self-awareness?"
The question immediately halted the conversation.
Yve opened her mouth. Then stopped. She rubbed her forehead. "I don't know."
The admission came quickly. Honest. Frustrated.
"I don't know because I have never read a book on evolved Skindrifters." She gestured helplessly. "And if such a book exists, I've never seen it." A pause. "Or maybe nobody wrote one."
"Why?" Lucas asked.
Yve's expression darkened. "Because they're not supposed to evolve."
The words hung in the air. Ysa shifted slightly. Jenkins remained silent.
Yve looked down for a moment. Thinking. Remembering. Then she spoke again. "What I do know..." Her gaze slowly lifted. "...is that the Dylan I spoke to—"
Dylan visibly tensed.
"The Skindrifter currently laying on the table in your house."
Jenkins immediately looked interested.
"—had some degree of self-awareness."
"How much?" he asked.
Yve looked disturbed by the memory. "Enough." A pause. "Enough to question itself."
Jenkins adjusted his glasses. Slowly. Thoughtfully. For once, he wasn't immediately arguing. Because that conclusion bothered him too.
Yve looked up. "If it was pretending, then why ask the question at all?"
Nobody answered.
"If it was mindless, then where did the curiosity come from?"
Jenkins adjusted his glasses. "You're basing a planetary invasion on a single philosophical question from a monster?" He scoffed. "That's an insane leap in logic, even for you."
Before Yve could answer, Darnell spoke. "Not really." The old siren's voice was calm. Measured. "When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth."
Several humans stared at him.
Lucas blinked. "How the hell do you know that?"
Darnell grunted. "One of my favorite shows when I was living here."
Lucas looked even more confused. "You watched Sherlock?"
Darnell shrugged. "I had a couple of decades to kill."
Nobody really had a response to that.
Jenkins rubbed his chin. "He's got a point."
That immediately got everyone's attention.
Jenkins turned back toward Yve. "If there's even a small possibility you're right..." His expression grew serious. "What happens next?" The settlement seemed to grow quieter. "What should we expect if this continues?" A pause. "And why are they taking humans?"
Yve looked down briefly. Thinking. Then she answered. "Either for food."
Nobody liked that answer.
"Or..." She looked back up. "For their DNA."
The silence that followed felt heavier than before.
Ysa folded her arms. "So we're not just fighting cannibals."
"No." Yve's answer came immediately.
Ysa exhaled slowly. "This rescue mission just got a whole lot more exciting."
Yve suddenly straightened. Decision flashing across her face. "I need to go back to Reefville."
Ysa's head snapped toward her. "What?"
"Reefville."
"Why?" Ysa took a step forward. "It's dangerous."
Yve turned toward her. "Ysa, we have multiple time-constrained problems right now." Her voice was becoming sharper. More emotional. "The lives of our friends." She held up one finger. "The Skindrifters." Another finger. "Dylan." Her voice cracked slightly. "I still don't know what's happening to Dylan."
The crowd went silent.
Yve looked toward him. "And I intend to figure it out." A pause. "Fast."
Jenkins frowned. "How?" He gestured toward himself. "I don't have proper laboratory equipment."
Yve immediately pointed at him. "I am not going to spend a year scavenging your lab toys."
Jenkins looked offended.
"I'm getting my own."
Now everyone was staring at her.
Ysa stepped closer. "You think I'm letting you go alone?"
Yve's eyes narrowed. "A siren is not afraid of danger."
Ysa stared at her, then her gaze dropped to Yve's hands. The slight tremble, the clenched fists, the tension. Her expression softened. Just slightly. "Then why are your hands shaking?"
The question hit harder than any argument.
Yve immediately clenched her fists tighter. For a moment she didn't answer, then the words finally came out. Small. Raw. "I'm afraid."
The admission surprised everyone. Including Ysa.
Yve looked toward Dylan. "I swear, Ysa..." Her voice cracked. "I think I caused whatever the hell is happening inside his body right now."
Dylan immediately looked up. "That ain't it."
But Yve kept going. Like she couldn't stop. "Darnell's right."
Darnell frowned immediately. "Yve—"
"I should've been more careful." Her eyes were beginning to glisten. "A siren and a human cannot be together."
The words hurt more than she expected. You could hear it.
Even Lucas looked uncomfortable.
Ysa opened her mouth. Then closed it.
Yve turned away from everyone. Quickly. Before anybody could see the tears forming. And started walking.
The crowd watched her go and for a moment nobody moved.
Then Dylan stepped forward. "Yve."
She didn't stop.
"Yve, wait." And he followed after her.
~~~
Darnell cleared his throat and looked around at the gathered crowd. "Divide and conquer."
The murmurs quieted.
"Anyone handy with a tool, head to the medical building. We're turning that place into a scientific fortress."
A few people nodded immediately.
"We're gonna need workbenches, storage, power, security, clean rooms—whatever Jenkins starts whining about tomorrow."
That earned a few chuckles.
Darnell grunted and started walking away. Duncan fell in beside him without a word.
One by one, the others peeled away from the gathering and followed, conversations already beginning about supplies, construction, and where they could salvage equipment.
Within moments, the crowd had started to disperse. The discussion still sat heavy on their chest, but survival required more time than emotions. So they just shoved their worries deep down, focusing on the tasks at hand.
Lucas watched them go before glancing toward the direction Yve and Dylan had disappeared. "Is she gonna be okay?"
"No." Ysa followed his gaze. "It hasn't been twenty-four hours since they got together and they're already breaking up."
Lucas immediately frowned. "They're not breaking up."
Ysa ignored him. "My sexual experience lasted longer than that."
A flat silence followed. Lucas stared. Lysander stared. Even Ava looked up for a moment.
Ysa glanced around and found every eye on her. "What?" she asked.
No one answered.
Ysa rolled her eyes. "Oh, please. Don't act all innocent." With one final scoff, Ysa turned and walked away.
Lucas rubbed his forehead. "...She's impossible."
Nearby, Lysander stepped forward, drawing the attention of the remaining sirens. His expression was calm, but there was purpose behind it now. "Prepare yourselves, sirens."
The conversations around him faded.
Lysander looked toward the distant horizon. "At sunset, we ride."
Several sirens straightened immediately.
"The prisoner have provided us with a crucial clue." His voice hardened slightly. "We will investigate."
The sirens exchanged glances. Then one by one, they nodded.
~~~
Yve didn't have a destination. Her feet just moved, carrying her away from the settlement, away from the judgment, away from the crushing weight of her own words. She walked through the forest with a blind, mechanical rhythm, the crunch of leaves underfoot, the only sound she registered. Each step was an attempt to outpace the panic clawing at her throat, the guilt that had coiled around her heart like a snake.
She didn't hear him following. She didn't need to. She could feel him there, a steady, persistent presence behind her, a silent anchor in the storm of her mind.
The forest began to thin, giving way to the familiar rush of river.
Nierven's icy destruction, once a static, monolithic tomb in the landscape, was now like a small bulge in the water's surface.
The river, dark and powerful, tore chunks from the mound of ice, carrying them away in a frantic, churning flow. It was a violent, uncontrolled thaw. It felt familiar.
Yve stopped at the water's edge, staring into the cold, dark current. She could feel him approach, his steps quiet on the soft earth. She didn't turn around. She just stood there, her shoulders rigid, fighting the tremble that wanted to take over her body.
Then, she slowly turned.
Dylan stood just a few feet away, his tomahawk slung over his shoulder, his expression unreadable but his eyes fixed on her.
The world around them—the melting ice, the flowing water, the whispering trees—faded into a blur.
All she could see was him. Her eyes were watery, the world shimmering through a film of unshed tears.
He closed the distance between them slowly, deliberately.
Yve exhaled hard, a ragged sound that was half-sob, half-surrender. She was still trying not to break, still trying to hold herself together.
Dylan stopped directly in front of her. He didn't say a word. He just slowly raised a calloused hand and gently brushed his thumb across the skin under her eye, wiping away the moisture that hadn't even had a chance to fall.
The gesture was so tender, so at odds with the hardened man she knew, that it almost shattered her completely.
"I think last night was a mistake," she whispered, the words tasting like poison on her tongue.
Dylan didn't flinch.
He just stared directly at her, his gaze so intense it felt like it was pinning her soul in place. He was silent for a long moment, the air between them thick with unspoken things.
"You really think so?" finally, he asked, his voice a low, rough rumble.
The question hit her with the force of a physical blow that it made her question everything.
Yve shook her head, the movement small at first, then more definite. "No..."
A flicker of something: Relief? Certainty? —crossed Dylan's face.
He cupped her face in his hands, his rough palms warm against her cool skin. The usual stoicism seemed to melt away, replaced by a raw, unguarded honesty.
"While I was hauled up in that sewer," he started, his voice softer than she'd ever heard it, "with that skindrifter wearin' my face... I thought I was gonna die." His eyes searched hers, reliving the memory. "All I could think about... was how much I regretted not tellin' you sooner how I feel about ya."
A single tear escaped, tracing a path down her cheek. "You could be dying because of me."
"Then I'd rather die knowin' I finally said what I actually feel," he said, his voice thick with emotion, "than die keepin' all of it inside."
That one sentence seemed to break something inside Yve. The silent tears she'd been fighting now flowing freely.
Dylan gently wiped them away with his thumbs, his touch impossibly gentle. The man who was so often blunt, cold, and emotionless now stood before her as someone who had finally learned how to love, how to be vulnerable, how to speak his truth.
He pulled Yve into a tight hug, wrapping his arms around her as if to shield her from the entire world. He held her close, one hand moving up to caress her hair, a silent promise that he wasn't going anywhere.
Dylan let out a long, slow sigh, he held her for a moment longer, just letting the reality of her presence sink in.
Then he spoke—
His voice was a low rumble, muffled by her hair but clear in the quiet space between them.
"My whole life's been one long fight," he said, his words measured. "One war after the next. Carryin' out missions. Survivin'. That's all I ever knew how to live." He shifted slightly, his arms tightening around her. "I've been shot, stabbed, tortured... walked through more hell than most folks could imagine. And I always walked out."
Yve choked back another sob against his chest, her fingers digging into the fabric of his shirt as she clung to him.
He paused, and when he spoke again, his voice was quieter, more vulnerable than anything she'd heard from him before. "But sittin' in that dark... thinkin' I might never see you again..." He rested his cheek against her shoulders. "That was the first time dyin' actually scared me."
The confession hung in the air, raw and unfiltered.
Yve pulled back just enough to look up at him, her face streaked with tears, her eyes filled with a devastating mix of love and terror. "I'll never forgive myself," she whispered, her voice cracking. "If I find out I caused whatever's happening inside you. I'll never..."
Dylan didn't let her finish. He just looked down at her, his expression softening in a way that still felt new. "Then we'll figure it out," he said, his voice firm but gentle. "Together."
He pulled her back into the embrace, and this time, she went without hesitation, letting the steady beat of his heart against her ear be the only thing that mattered.