Alice sat alone in the corner of a cold hospital room, her shoulders slumped under an invisible weight. The walls were a pristine white, their smooth surfaces interrupted only by the faintest scuff marks near the bed in the room's center. Above her, shattering the stillness of the room, fluorescent bulbs flickered gently— glares of light bouncing off the smooth waxed surfaces of the floor.

She sighed as she looked up and stared towards the hospital bed, its crisp white sheets once neatly tucked, but now scratched and torn, scattered around the floor of the room.

Alice’s gaze lingered on the broken bed, her eyes dull and distant. It was as if she were looking through the bed, through the walls, through the miles of rock above her. As she rested her hands limply in her lap, her fingers twitched faintly as she shook from fear.

Then the Administrator entered.

He stood in the doorway, his brows furrowed and his voice low. “What Happened?” He asked, breaking the silence.

Alice looked up to face him, the emptiness in her replaced by a flicker of anger. “Bastian was killed in front of Mary.” She said, her voice tight.

The Administrator's jaw tightened, his expression darkening as he clenched his hand into a fist and slammed it into the doorframe.

"Dammit…” He said disappointingly. “Who’s responsible?”

Alice shook her head, her frustration simmering. “We don’t know,” she said flatly, “And that's not what we should be worried about right now.”

The man sighed and ran his hand through his hair as he collected himself in the doorway. “Look, Alice, I’m sorry,” He said, his voice softer. “I was busy… Just tell me what happened, Straightforward.”

Alice shot him a glare, her eyes narrowing. She stood up, crossed her arms, and stared daggers into the Administrator's eyes. “You wanna know what happened? Fine.”

…

(FUTURE DRAWING PLACEMENT, scene of The Administrator and Alice standing in front of a one way mirror, watching a bloodshot Bastian staring blankly through it, Bastian's room is a padded isolation room that's all white and has a bed and corner bathroom)

“Jesus Christ…” The Administrator says, his tone a mix of dread and misbelief. “Why the hell would you resurrect him without me?”

Alice didn’t answer at first, her arms crossed tightly over her chest, and her jaw clenched. Her silence was answer enough.

“Do you have any idea how risky that was?” The man continued, his eyes darting between Bastian’s frantic movements and Alice’s stony expression. “You’ve only ever done it on animals. Never a person. Never something this… complex. The side effects, the instability,” He stared into his pale reflection in the one way mirror. “you didn’t even know if it would work–”

“I didn’t have much of a choice!” Alice snapped, her voice cracking like a whip.

“You weren’t there. Mary was losing her mind- Bastian was gone, What was I supposed to do? Just let him stay dead while she desperately begged me to-” She stopped herself, her voice breaking as she looked back at Bastian, him staring blankly into the glass as silence filled the room.

Then Bastian shrieked, shattering the silence like glass as he slammed his fists against the mirror. His eyes were bloodshot, wide and unnerving, with his face expressing nothing short of pure terror. His throat was ragged, and his voice hoarse from hours of continual screaming.

Alice stepped away from the glass, her legs unsteady, as she sank into a chair behind her. The seat creaked under her weight as she sat down, her shoulders heavy with exhaustion. “I ran a brain scan on him,” She began. “...after I calmed Mary down.”

On the other side of the glass, Bastian slowly turned away, his movements jerky and uncoordinated. He paced the small isolation room, his hands clutching his head as if trying to hold it together. Low, guttural groans escaped his throat, each one more pained than the last.

The Administrator turned to Alice, “What did you find?” he asked, his voice steady yet concerned. Alice didn’t answer right away. Instead, she gestured weakly to the bottom left corner of the mirror, where a small, unassuming button was barely visible.

“See for yourself,” she said, her tone hollow. The Administrator quickly reached out and pressed the button.

The glass flickered briefly before a hologram sprang to life, overlaying the image of Bastian’s frantic pacing. A brain scan dominated the glass display, along with other medical imagery- heart rate monitors, blood pressure readings, and a series of neural maps, all pulsing and shifting in real time.

The brain scan itself was chaotic. Certain areas of the brain lit up repeatedly, flashing with intense activity before fading, only to flare up again moments later. It was as if Bastian’s mind was caught in a thought loop, reliving something over and over, unable to escape.

The man stared at the hologram, his brow furrowing as he tried to make sense of the data. “What am I looking at?” he asked calmly.

“His brain is stuck,” Alice said, her voice barely above a whisper. “It’s like he’s trapped in a memory. Whatever he saw after death… whatever he experienced… it’s not letting him go.”

The room went silent once more, the only sound being the faint hum of the hologram and Bastian’s distant, anguished groans. The Administrator’s jaw tightened as he stared at the scans, the weight of Alice’s words settling over him.

“I see.” He said.

The Administrator sighs deeply, rubbing his temples before covering his mouth with his hand. His eyes fixated on the flickering brain scan in front of him. As Alice looked up from her seat and stared at him, her expression softened.

“Can we talk…?” She said hesitantly. She shifted in her seat after speaking, clasping her hands together in her lap.

The man turned slightly, gazing down on Alice as he analyzed her demeanor. “Sure.” he said calmly, “As long as it doesn’t have to do with what I think it does.

“That’s not fair,” Alice said, her lips parting as if she's choosing her words carefully, “I really think I learned something today with my gift, I think he–”

“He's dead, Alice.” The Administrator interrupted sharply. “Whatever you think you learned, it doesn't change that.”

Silence descended upon the room again, with Alice’s expression hardening, her earlier vulnerability replaced by a cold resolve. She didn’t argue, didn’t push back. Instead, she simply nodded and looked away.

Before the tension could grow any thicker, a phone buzzed loudly in the Administrator's pocket, the jarring sound echoing in the quiet room. Then it buzzed again, and again, the vibrations and noise of the phone increasing. As he reached for his phone and stared at the screen, his expression darkened.

“What’s going on?” Alice asks, her eyes narrowing as The man's face tightened with each new notification.

He sighed, running a hand through his hair as he scanned the messages. “The other tribunal members found out what happened,” he said, his voice low and strained. “Lucius says they’re panicking, I can tell he is too. They want answers…right now”

Alice’s jaw clenches as she stands and collects herself, “Of course they do,” She muttered bitterly, “Mary probably said something.”

The Administrator didn’t respond to her theory. Instead, he straightened, his demeanor shifting into something more controlled and authoritative. “Here’s what we’re going to do,” he said, his voice firm. “Come up with a statement for the tribunal. Tell them that Bastian’s fine, that we have a recovery process in place, and that everything’s under control. Keep it vague—they don’t need to know the details.”

As he finished, he clicked the same button at the corner of the mirror, shutting off all medical imagery.

“What about the public?” Alice asked.

“I’ll handle the public statement.” He responded, “I’ll also talk to Mary myself, let her know I’m handling it. She deserves to hear it from me.”

As he turned to leave, Alice quickly grabbed his arm and gripped it tightly, “Wait-” She said, her voice low yet fierce. “Please…Please don’t do what I think you’re gonna do.”

The Administrator paused as he turned to face her, his mask of calm slipping ever so slightly. She saw the exhaustion, the weight of what he was carrying. “I won’t.” He said softly. “Not unless it's our last option.”

Alice released his arm hesitantly, her fingers lingering on him as she reluctantly let go. Then the man gave her a nod, and exited the room, leaving her alone with Bastian

As she turned slowly to face the one way mirror, she felt her heart in her throat. She saw Bastian, hunched in the corner of the isolation chamber, digging his nails into his arm until his skin broke and blood gushed out.

As his fingers trembled, he slowly began smearing blood on the wall into different shapes and symbols. The sight was too much for Alice, her vision starting to blur as her eyes watered and her chest tightened.

She quickly left the room, tears beginning to stream as soon as she reached the hallway. She didn’t look back as she walked, pressing her hand against her mouth to stifle the sobs rising in her throat.

…

..

.

One week later, in the same room.

Bastian sat on the cold wet floor of the isolation chamber, what's left of his clothes damp and stained by blood. He faced the back wall, once a pure bright white, now turned into an unrecognizable mess, covered in many crude, bloody interpretations of the New Dawn insignia.

The Administrator watched him through the one way mirror, his arms crossed tightly over his chest as he analyzed every small behavioral pattern Bastian exhibited. He watched intently as Bastian stared blanking at the wall– his lips moving silently as if he was reciting some unseen script.

Alice then enters, and The Administrator uncrosses his arms.

“We’re losing control.” She said calmly, her gaze avoiding Bastian as she scrolled on the tablet in her hands. “The tribunal has been reintroduced to the concept of mortality, and it’s caused the district to fall behind normal schedule.”

The Administrator remained silent. His gaze never wavered from Bastian's shivering body curled in the corner of the ruined cell.

“I can’t stall them any longer.” Alice says, attempting to get a response out of the man.

“Then we have to make a decision” The Administrator responded firmly.

Alice's fingers tightened around the tablet as she grew more frustrated. She'd been avoiding looking directly at the isolation chamber, focusing instead on her device and The Administrator- just to avoid confronting what Bastian had become. But as her curiosity overwhelmed her, her gaze shifted to the glass left of her.

The sight hit her like a physical blow.

Bastian's fingernails, now ragged and torn, absently scratched at the floor as his lips moved in silent litany. He scratched absently at the padded walls with his ruined fingertips, adding fresh streaks of blood to the horrific mural that now covered every surface. Just from the sight alone, Alice's other senses overwhelmed her- shocked by what her friend had become.

The tablet slipped from her numb fingers, hitting the floor with a sharp crack. The screen shattered into a pile of glass, the glowing display flickering erratically before going dark.

Alice barely noticed. Both hands flew to cover her mouth as she took an involuntary step back, her heels scuffing against the shards of glass. As she begins to lose her footing, the Administrator catches and embraces her, blocking her view of the one way mirror.

“I would have never-” She began to cry, “If I had…known”

The Administrator's hand moved slowly through Alice's hair, his calloused fingers catching slightly on the tangled strands as she buried her face deeper into his chest.

“It’s not your fault,” He said to her, his tone low and easy. “You made the right decision…We can- We will fix him”

Alice didn't respond at first. Her fingers clenched slightly on the Administrator's coat as silent tears continued to streak down her face. The only other sounds were the hum of the ventilation system and the occasional, muffled whimper from Bastian beyond the glass.

After what felt like an eternity, Alice drew in a shaky breath and pulled back just enough to look up at him. Her voice was raw, barely above a whisper, but she managed to speak.

“Have…have we figured out who did this?” She asked, hoping to take some of the guilt weighing upon her off her shoulders.

The man doesn’t answer, he simply looks away somberly. It was answer enough to Alice though, her expression darkening even more than before as she also looks away.

"You’re not gonna like what I’m going to do next” The man said in a low tone.

Alice pushes herself off of him slowly-

“What do you mean?” She asked, concerned.

"We’re going with the final option, I’ve made the decision.”

“N-No!” Alice cried. “They can be trusted- we don’t have to do this”

“We are running out of time, their loyalty to the New Dawn is already showing cracks and only a short time has passed. Whoever is behind this knows what they’re doing and who we are, and they will try again,” He responds. “I’m in charge and I'm making the executive decision. I’m also setting it in place so that it will be our default protocol for if this happens again.”

"What does that mean for us?" she asked, her voice barely steady.

The Administrator sighed and looked down somberly.

"It means you're staying underground," he said, his voice low but firm.

"For a long time. MT-3 is already tracking leads, but until we know exactly who did this, and why…you're a target– They’ll come for you just because of your gift."

"And I can't—" He cut himself off, his jaw clenching.

Alice searched his face, her stomach twisting at the unspoken truth in his eyes. He wasn’t just giving her orders. He was asking- begging, in his own way- for her to stay alive.

She exhaled shakily and nodded.

"And the rest of the Tribunal?" she asked, her voice hollow. "What happens to them?"

"For the time being– we just can't risk keeping any of them in the loop," he admitted.

“If the situation escalates into something the core three can’t handle alone, then maybe we can inform them."

"They’ve spent centuries believing they were untouchable," he continued, Alice facing away from him and towards the one way mirror.

"Now they’re staring at mortality like rabbits at a snare… and rabbits tend to chew off their own legs to escape." He grimaced. "I won’t let any of them risk everything we’ve built"

The two sat in silence before Alice spoke.

"Lucius will know something's wrong if you call him in personally. He’ll never leave his-"

"Lucius will be taken care of." The Administrator says. "I have it under control, get some rest."

As the heavy door hissed shut behind him, Alice sank into the nearest chair. Through the glass, Bastian's broken whimpers formed a soft lullaby.

"Forgive me, my friends," she whispered to the empty room.

…

..

.

The meeting room was a large, high-tech war room buried under layers of reinforced concrete and nullification shielding, designed to keep prying eyes away. The walls were a sleek, gunmetal-gray alloy, coated with living blue data lines that flashed like veins which transmitted real-time intelligence from across the District into the room.

At the center of the space was a large, round table made of blackened steel, its surface polished to a shine that reflected the strobe-like glow of all the monitors overhead. Dozens of screens hung in the air, circling the table, each monitoring the frameworks of real-time visual information - some displayed real-time surveillance feeds, tactical maps, and scrolling streams of encrypted data.

Sitting at the table was the Midnight Tribunal, all anxiously waiting to be told the reason for their sudden mandatory meeting. Sitting in the 7th seat at the table was a man named Rowan Kingsley, a hunched yet tall and slim figure with long messy hair in a bun and an outfit similar to that of a professional chef.

He then breaks the tension by questioning the room.

“I’m sure we all have our speculations as to why this meeting is taking place, would anyone like to share theirs?”

"Let's not do anything of the sort- I would prefer this room to stay silent until we are addressed directly.” The man sitting in the fifth seat said.

He sat up proud, with his eyes shut- as if he was preoccupied in his own brain, distracted by something else. He held his hands clasped in his lap as his face gave off a stone cold expression. He appeared to be a military officer, with medals clipped over his chest showing his accomplishments and hard work.

MT-Ⅸ anxiously bounced in her chair, knowing what was coming, what they were there for.

As the room began to fill and members 4-9 were accounted for, dialogue began to continue as the members grew impatient. MT-Ⅵ bounced between the monitors above them as MT-Ⅳ argued with Director Kingsley over how long it was taking for MT-I to arrive.

Then, a small, ever so quiet buzzing sound was heard from a small broadcasting speaker in the middle of the table. Everyone sat around the table, froze and tensed up, and MT-V opened his eyes.

“I…Apologize for my tardiness. I was unaware you all had arrived as I am a bit behind schedule today. I hav-”

“Is this meeting about Bastian?” MT-Ⅵ, otherwise known as Lucius, interrupted from a monitor above- his avatar sat in the corner of the screen.

After a brief silence.

“...yes”

Murmurs entered the room as suspicions were made true. Some shifted slightly in their seats, one closed her eyes and collected herself.

“Bastian was a victim of a targeted assassination attempt…Likely due to his ties with the tribunal.”

"What about Alice? Why has she not revived him yet? Or if she has like Mary is saying, Where is he?” MT-Ⅷ said.

“We have discovered that…Upon resurrection from MT-II’s gift, you retain all knowledge of what happens after death. This does irreversible damage to a person's psyche, and Bastian has grown to be inconsolable.”

Mary covers her mouth in shock as the room feels the weight of the Administrator's words. That they are not truly as unkillable as they once thought.

Before anyone can chime in, he continued.

"We are currently unaware of who is responsible for this, and it is likely everyone in this room is also a target.”

The room erupted as MT-Ⅳ barked out an awful, sharp laugh.

“Oh, fantastic. So now we just wait for our fucking turn?” He said, his fingers bouncing on the table as sweat began to trickle down from under his bright red hat.

Lucius sat still on the monitor. Unblinking, like a statue..

“Why are we just hearing about this now?” he questioned desperately.

Mary slammed her palms on the table. “Bullshit! You know more than you’re letting on! Where is Bastian!?” She yelled as she threw her clipboard towards the speaker, missing it and hitting MT-I's empty seat.

Then, chaos. Some laughed hysterically. Some tried to scream over each other, a few tried to remain calm. Mary began hyperventilating in her seat, and MT-V clawed at his collar like it was choking him. The Tribunal plunged headfirst into a state of collective panic, then the familiar hum of the speaker turned up in volume until it shrilled at an unnaturally high stridency.

“This is…disappointing.”

A hiss is heard.

Then, smoke out of the vents, colorless, odorless, and slowly filling the room as the doors sealed shut around them.

Mary was the first to notice. “What the hell is—?” She was interrupted by a stubborn cough, which evidently turned into a gag, and her knees buckled.

Lucius didn’t have a single word to say as his avatar stood in silent shock, his monitor glitching as his face pulled and smeared in pixels all at once, and then into nothing.

Then speaker output turned off.

The room grew quieter.

And the Tribunal, individually and collectively, fell into darkness.

…

..

.

The room was dimly lit, illuminated only by a dim orange desk light shining softly against the pristine wood. Heavy curtains blocked any view of the outside world, lending the feeling that this space was floating in a bubble of time. Bastian was laying back on a leather couch that creaked softly as he began to move.

He groaned and lifted a hand to his aching head, touching what felt like a fresh bandage he didn't remember getting.

"Welcome back," said a voice.

Bastian's eyes slid over to the end of the couch where MT-I was perched, one ankle resting on the knee, a lit cigarette already in his fingers, its smoke curling up into vacant spaces above them.

"What... am I doing here?" Bastian said in a raspy voice, now sitting upright but slumping forward. His muscles felt like they were made of glue, the train of thoughts slow on the tracks.

"I can't--I can't remember how I got here."

The Administrator took a slow drag, the glowing ember flaring in the dull light.

"You had a bad day," he said, exhaling a wave of smoke. "After our meeting, I let you rest in my office." His tone had an ease and practiced smoothness. "You were in no state to go home."

Bastian furrowed his brow and lowered his hand, looking away somberly.

"Well, right," he managed, rubbing his eyes. "Thanks, I guess."

MT-I took him in, then withdrew a second cigarette from his coat, offering it silently.

Bastian paused before taking it, brushing fingers with the man. His skin felt cold.

"Let's talk"