Rain continued falling outside the shattered building, tapping softly against broken glass while unstable resonance light pulsed through the ruined hallway.
The boy stood frozen near the collapsed wall, breathing unevenly.
Fragments circled his body like a storm struggling to contain itself.
Juvy could feel it clearly now.
His resonance wasn't simply unstable.
It was defensive.
Every violent reaction came from fear buried beneath layers of anger.
Aren took another careful step forward.
"You don't have to be afraid," they said quietly.
The boy's eyes sharpened immediately.
"I said stay back."
A violent pulse cracked through the floor again.
This time the building itself groaned dangerously.
Kael glanced upward. "At this rate the entire structure's going to collapse."
"Yeah," Maxruell muttered, shadows already gathering around his arms, "and I'd personally prefer not dying in the world's ugliest apartment building."
But the boy barely seemed aware of the destruction around him anymore.
His glowing eyes remained locked on Aren.
"…How are you calm?"
The question came out almost accusingly.
Aren hesitated.
Because the truth wasn't simple.
"I wasn't," Aren admitted softly. "Not at first."
The boy's expression tightened.
"You're lying."
"No."
Aren's voice remained steady despite the pressure shaking the hallway around them.
"I was scared too."
The fragments around the boy flickered violently again.
"No one gets scared like this unless something's wrong with them."
The words carried genuine self-hatred beneath them.
Juvy noticed Lina's expression shift slightly.
She heard it too.
Before anyone could respond, the boy suddenly looked away.
"…I hurt someone."
Silence fell instantly.
Rainwater dripped somewhere deeper inside the ruined floor.
The boy's hands trembled at his sides.
"I didn't mean to," he whispered. "They cornered me and I—"
His voice broke.
Fragments exploded outward uncontrollably for half a second before stabilizing again.
"There was too much noise."
Too much fear.
Too much panic.
Juvy understood immediately.
His resonance had synchronized with surrounding emotions until it overloaded.
And when that happened—
He lost control.
Kael's expression darkened slightly.
"How many people were injured?"
The boy flinched hard at the question.
"…Three."
Relief passed quietly through the group.
Not dead.
But the boy clearly believed that hardly mattered.
"They looked at me like I was a monster afterward," he said, staring at the fractured floor. "So I ran."
A long silence followed.
Then Maxruell sighed heavily.
"Well… yeah."
Everyone looked at him.
Maxruell shrugged once.
"If random glowing fragment powers exploded around me, I'd freak out too."
The boy stared at him blankly.
Maxruell shoved his hands deeper into his pockets.
"That doesn't automatically make you a monster."
Simple words.
Blunt words.
But the violent resonance around the boy weakened slightly for the first time.
Aren noticed immediately.
"You're angry," Aren said carefully.
The boy laughed bitterly.
"Obviously."
"No," Aren replied. "I mean at yourself."
That hit harder.
The hallway grew quieter.
Juvy watched the boy's expression carefully as unstable emotions flickered across his face one after another.
Fear.
Shame.
Loneliness.
Then finally—
Exhaustion.
"…I don't know what I'm supposed to be anymore," he admitted.
The sentence sounded painfully human.
Not monstrous.
Not unnatural.
Just lost.
Lina slowly stepped forward then, her Identity Resonance spreading softly through the hallway like warm light.
"You don't have to figure everything out tonight."
The boy looked uncertain.
"But everyone keeps saying people like us are dangerous."
"Some people," Lina corrected gently.
The distinction mattered.
Juvy could feel the boy noticing that too.
Outside, thunder rolled across the ruined skyline.
For a while nobody spoke.
Then Aren asked quietly,
"…Do you want a name?"
The boy blinked.
"A name?"
Aren nodded once.
"I didn't have one either."
Something fragile shifted in the boy's expression.
A small crack forming through the fear.
He looked away for several seconds, thinking harder than someone choosing a name normally should.
Because this wasn't just a word.
It was identity.
Existence.
Proof that he belonged somewhere.
Finally, almost hesitantly—
"…Cairo."
A faint resonance pulse spread through the hallway the moment the name left his mouth.
The violent fragments surrounding him slowed.
Not completely stable.
But calmer.
More centered.
Kael stared carefully at the readings on his wrist monitor.
"…Interesting."
Maxruell groaned immediately.
"Please don't start turning emotional breakthroughs into science again."
But Kael barely heard him.
Because the resonance network itself had reacted the moment Cairo accepted his identity.
As though the world acknowledged it.
Juvy stepped closer at last.
This time Cairo didn't retreat.
"You should come back with us," she said softly.
Cairo hesitated.
Fear still lingered in his eyes.
But not the same fear as before.
This time—
It looked closer to hope.
And somehow, that was even more terrifying to him.