Chapter 236: Eyes Above, Blades Below
I didn’t answer right away.
For a second—maybe two—I just breathed. Let the weight of the words settle into the air, coil tight around my ribs. "Give us the order, captain." A phrase simple enough to forge or fake. But there was no strain in the voice. No practiced manipulation. Just precision. Execution waiting for direction.
That made it worse.
Because now I had to choose what kind of leader I was going to be.
I glanced sideways. Camille hadn’t moved, but I could feel her eyes—waiting. Alexis was still crouched, stone gripped in her hand, not as a weapon now but as something to ground her. Evelyn remained at my side, still as ever, though the slight angle of her stance told me she’d noticed the shift in air pressure too. Sienna’s gaze was pinned to the trees—tracking not threat, but potential. And 3830?
She finally spoke. Quiet. Pointed.
"Titles mean nothing unless followed."
I met her eyes. "Then watch me."
My System flickered to life—soft blue outlines lacing my peripherals, text scrolling in layered windows like my thoughts had teeth. Command Presence – Level 8 activated. I felt it click into place behind my eyes. Like the silence before a verdict. Like my own voice had just been promoted.
"Operative Theta," I said, stepping forward. "Directive One: Establish full perimeter sweep. Use aerial recon to mark all hostile movement—thermal, biometric, pattern-based, everything. Relay live feed to my interface and scrub local nodes of identifying metadata."
"Affirmative," the drone responded immediately. "Initiating pattern trace."