What if some bonds had existed... long before you ever became aware of them?
The serpent had disappeared, yet its presence still seemed to glide beneath their skin.
The stream had returned to its peaceful course, as if nothing impossible had risen from its depths. And yet... nothing was quite the same anymore.
Aria walked more slowly. Her eyes constantly left the trail, drifting toward the roots, the branches, and the fleeting movements hidden among the ferns.
The forest no longer seemed simply beautiful. It felt inhabited by countless presences she had never imagined before. Without realizing it, she was learning to step outside herself, to observe before acting.
Neris led the way, though without the cold confidence she had carried since they first met. Her drones remained packed away inside her case. Just like at Pulse-9, she was now moving forward without an interface between herself and the world.
Jazz trotted along in the middle of the group.
"Journal entry: since encountering the very large serpent, the three humans have developed an unusually cautious behavior."
"Thanks, Jazz," Aria murmured.
"I'm doing what I can to support your personal growth."
Sophie gave a faint smile but remained silent. Ever since meeting the serpent, the world seemed to have gained a new depth. The wind was no longer just wind. Water was no longer just water. And some silences now seemed to contain... something.
They followed the stream for nearly an hour.
At times, the forest opened slightly, allowing damp shafts of light to filter through the enormous branches. Elsewhere, the trees closed in so tightly that the path almost disappeared.
Then Aria noticed something. Neris was counting rhythms, sometimes under her breath. Three steps... pause... two steps... glance to the left... thirty-two seconds... no longer. She always did the same thing.
And suddenly, a memory surfaced.
An inner courtyard with metal climbing structures. A little girl her own age, teaching her how to cross a small fountain without stepping on certain stones.
"Three steps, then you pause, two more steps, and thirty-two seconds... no longer."
Aria slowed down. Her heart began to beat a little faster.
"Wait..."
Neris turned her head.
"What?"
Aria stared at her for a few seconds.
"Do we know each other? I've had this feeling ever since we met."
Neris frowned. She studied Aria's face for a long moment. Something inside her resisted. Then, without warning, an image surfaced.
A courtyard and the sound of a fountain.
Two little girls sitting on the stone edge, their feet almost touching the water. One let dead leaves drift across the surface, insisting they would eventually reach the sea. The other laughed, convinced they would disappear long before that.
The image faded almost immediately.
"Wait..."
Her voice had become quieter.
"That fountain..."
Aria stood perfectly still.
Something crossed her eyes as well.
"The leaves..."
Silence.
Then, almost at the same time—
"That was you?"
Silence fell instantly. Even Jazz stopped talking.
Neris didn't answer right away. Instead, she resumed walking. She let out a quiet breath before finally stopping. The stream flowed behind her.
"When I was little... my mother sometimes took me to some of Biel's educational centers."
Aria frowned slightly.
"Private programs for employees' children?"
"Yes. You were there often."
Aria felt something shift inside her memory. Faces. White rooms. A girl who always watched the others before speaking.
"It was you..."
Neris barely nodded.
"Something inside me recognized you the moment we met."
Sophie quietly looked up at them.
"Why didn't you say anything?"
Neris let out a small, joyless laugh.
"Because I wasn't sure it was good news."
Aria remained silent for a few seconds. Then something slowly came back to her. The educational centers in Biel. The courtyard. The white rooms. The adults who always talked for far too long. Her mother sometimes took her there when she was working on certain projects and meeting with Kaïssa.
What Aria remembered most was a strange feeling… The feeling of being watched everywhere, even in places meant for children. And in the middle of those memories... one name finally came back.
Neris.
Her stomach tightened slightly.
"Wait..."
Neris raised her eyes toward Aria.
"I think my mother used to mention you sometimes."
The silence that followed was very brief, but long enough.
"Maybe," Neris replied.
And immediately another memory returned.
A white room in Biel. She was maybe thirteen. Two girls looking at her, convinced she couldn't hear them.
"Do you think she can see our files?"
"With her mother? Of course."
Then that little laugh, not cruel… worse. The kind of laugh that turns you into someone apart.
That was the day Neris began shortening her name whenever she met someone: simpler, less recognizable. Because after the name almost always came everything else: the looks, the assumptions, the whispers.
"Oh... it's her."
She had understood very early that some children didn't even need to know her to already have an opinion about her. All they needed to know was where she came from...
...and who her mother was.
As a child, Kaïssa sometimes appeared behind her on Biel's giant screens. So Neris learned to slightly change the way she spoke, to avoid certain places, to shorten her name, to wear clothes that were too loose so people would notice her body less, and to observe before entering anywhere.
The children from Skyward seemed made to be seen. They wore their names like shining crowns: son of… daughter of...
Perfect heirs to a world that taught them very early how to shine in front of cameras, how to smile the right way, how to exist without hesitation.
Neris had never known how to do that. She didn't like eyes that lingered too long. Even less those that had already decided who she was before she had spoken. Some thought she had every privilege. Others wanted to get close to her only because of what she represented. And there were those who hated her in advance.
So she learned to hide her name… before she had even learned how to defend herself.
Aria kept looking at her now, as if trying to piece together fragments of an old memory.
The strangest thing, Neris thought, was that she wasn't feeling that familiar tension anymore. Only a quiet weariness, as if she had suddenly grown tired of always having to go around her own existence.
"Were you already like that?" Aria finally asked.
"Like what?"
"Like someone who always checks the exits before sitting down."
This time, Neris truly smiled.
"Yes. Always."
They resumed walking, but something had changed. The distance between them had grown smaller, not physically… in another way.
Sophie was looking at the stream.
"There's... something."
Neris immediately reached toward her case, then hesitated. The memory of the serpent crossed her mind briefly. She let her hand fall.
"What do you feel?"
Sophie closed her eyes for a few seconds.
"Not danger."
"More like... a familiar presence."
Jazz tilted his dome.
"Statistically speaking, that kind of sentence is becoming increasingly alarming."
Sophie crouched beside the water. Between two damp stones, almost completely hidden by moss, something was blinking faintly.
Aria immediately stepped closer. So did Neris.
"What's that doing here?"
Half hidden beneath moss and damp roots, the object looked like an old relay terminal forgotten by the network. A compact model, worn with age, probably installed long before Biel's latest surveillance measures.
Neris carefully picked it up.
"An old model... a very old one."
She wiped the mud from the screen with the sleeve of her jacket.
For a second, nothing happened. Then, after a small adjustment, an unstable light flickered across the device.
Connection interrupted. Attempting relay...
Sophie immediately felt her stomach tighten.
Almost at the same moment, her phone vibrated in her pocket: a real signal, weak… but real.
She quickly pulled it out.
17 secure connection attempts.
All signed with the same name.
NUMA.
Her heart started beating faster. A final message appeared.
Sophie...
Something tightened gently inside her chest. The terminal suddenly crackled. Then a broken voice pushed through the static.
"...Sophie... if you get this... please answer! I'm really worried!"
The signal cut off. A few seconds later… It came back.
"...not safe... they're searching..."
Neris had frozen. Her own phone had vibrated too. A single notification. No name appeared, but she already knew.
Her fingers hesitated before opening the message.
Neris, Soren's name has reached me. Call me back before someone else takes care of her.
Her stomach tightened immediately.
Aria noticed the change in her expression at once.
"What is it?"
Neris locked the screen almost too quickly.
"Nothing."
But no one really believed her.
The relay crackled once more.
"...don't trust anyone coming from Biel..."
Then nothing. The screens went dark almost at the same time, and silence settled around them again.
Sophie was still holding her phone.
Sophie... answer me!
Those two words kept beating softly inside her chest, not like a warning, but like someone who was truly afraid of losing her.
Beside her, Neris was already looking at the forest differently. Kaïssa's message still seemed to burn behind her eyes.
Soren's name has reached me.
Her stomach tightened again. It wasn't the threat that frightened her most. Kaïssa rarely threatened people directly. She never needed to. The worst part was that she had already started connecting the dots: Pulse-9, Soren, herself and perhaps... the Alliance.
If Kaïssa traced the path back to Soren, the whole system would follow behind: the analyses, the surveillance, the invisible cross-checks that always ended up turning a person into a target.
A cold wave of guilt passed through Neris. Soren had spent years becoming invisible. And now, because of her… That invisibility was beginning to crack.
Aria looked at Neris.
"Do they know where we are?" she asked quietly.
Neris hesitated for a second.
"Not yet."
But even she didn't sound completely convinced.
Jazz slowly rotated his little dome.
"Optimistic analysis: we will soon be slightly hunted."
No one answered. Somewhere, far beyond the trees, a drone briefly crossed the sky before disappearing behind the clouds.
The Guardian Angel: The deepest bonds are not always born of blood. Sometimes, they are woven through a glance, an encounter, or a path shared. When two souls move toward the same truth, something already binds them, long before they become aware of it.