The radio crackled to life at noon. The frequency was encrypted—a code only Marcus and I knew.
"Last Light," a familiar, static-laced voice said. "This is Citadel Actual. We need to talk."
Claire.
I looked at Alex. "She felt it too."
"Of course she did," he grunted. "A psychic scream that loud probably knocked her off her throne."
I keyed the mic. "Go ahead, Citadel."
"Not on the air," she snapped, her bravado hiding a tremor of fear. "Neutral ground. The old railway bridge. One hour. Come alone."
"I'm never alone," I replied. "I'll bring my Second. Anyone else steps on that bridge, I turn it into a solar flare."
"Agreed."
The railway bridge spanned a ravine choked with Mist. It was a skeletal structure of rusted iron, groaning in the wind.
Claire was there, flanked by two massive mutants—humans she had pumped full of cores, their arms mutated into bone shields. She looked tired, her makeup smudged, her tactical gear stained.
"You look like hell, Unnie," I said, stopping twenty feet away.
"Save it, Evie," she spat. She crossed her arms, shivering slightly. "The big one. The Lord. What do you know about him?"
"I know he's coming," I said. "I know he thinks we're cattle."
"He hit my western outpost last night," Claire said, her voice dropping. "Didn't send a horde. Just him. Walked through the wall like it was paper. Took fifty people. Didn't kill them. Just... took them. Drained them."
Her Energy Siphon ability was formidable, but against a Stage Five? She was nothing.
"Why are you here, Claire?"
"A truce," she said, the words seemingly painful to utter. "You have the barriers. You have the plants. I have the manpower and the heavy weapons. If he hits either of us, the other won't survive alone."
Alex shifted beside me. "You tried to raid us three days ago."
"And you won!" Claire snapped. "That was business. This is extinction."
I studied her. I remembered her betrayal in the other timeline. I remembered the knife in my back. But this wasn't that timeline. Here, she was desperate.
"No aggression," I said finally. "No crossing territory. If the Lord attacks you, I won't help, but I won't stab you in the back. If he attacks me, you stay neutral."
"That's not a partnership," she scoffed.
"That's reality," I countered. "I don't trust you with my supply lines. But against that? I won't interfere."
She glared at me, her jaw working. Finally, she nodded.
"Fine. Non-aggression. For now."
She turned and walked back into the Mist, her mutant guards stomping behind her.
"Think she'll keep it?" Alex asked.
"Until the Lord is dead," I said. "Then all bets are off."