"Oh," he said.

Rex immediately turned on him. "No. I hate when you say that."

"I didn’t say anything technical yet."

"You said ’oh.’ That is worse."

Liam leaned over the console and dragged the schematic aside with two fingers. A second layer unfolded above the panel, showing the turbine, the chasm, and a clean web of civilian distribution lines spreading outward beneath the city.

None of them touched the noble grid.

Not one.

The civilian districts existed on a separate, neglected infrastructure skeleton, the sort of old municipal network nobles pretended did not exist because admitting it did would imply people lived beyond manor walls.

"The far seal is not drawing from the Vanguard," Liam said.

Rex looked sharply at the schematic. "The civilian feed is isolated?"

"Entirely. Dedicated conduits. Independent breakers. No noble grid intersection. No estate relays. No administrative shared lines. I built it that way because if there was even one overlap, Felix or George would have found it, taxed it, redirected it, or turned heating the slums into a subscription service."

Mezos’s gaze followed the glowing civilian lines. "So the door cannot be receiving power from the turbine."

"It should not even know the turbine exists," Liam said. "The Vanguard feeds the civilian grid only. That door belongs to whatever old Canmore system Felix buried under Lab V, and that system is not physically connected to my output."

Arik’s eyes narrowed. "Then what is it reacting to?"

Liam let out a low laugh. "Nothing. It is some relic from Felix’s experiments. I found a schematic at one point, but it was written in a language I do not understand. Stolen, of course." He dragged a hand through his loosened hair and added, with the exhausted irritation of a man who had long ago accepted that his family collected crimes the way other people collected porcelain, "It was signed by someone named Goliath."

Silence.

Noah’s expression went beautifully blank. Mezos’s face did not move at all, which made him look far more dangerous than if he had reacted. Rex, who did not know enough to understand the shape of the disaster, looked from one Agaronian to another with mounting suspicion.

Arik only stared at Liam.

Liam shrugged, missing none of it and choosing, with great personal commitment, to ignore all of it. "It pulses from time to time with residual energy, but nothing more." He exhaled and pointed at the yellow rectangle on the floor. "Now can you please use the ether? I promised Aunt Mirelle I would be back before lunch."

Noah slowly turned his head toward Arik. 𝓯𝓻𝓮𝙚𝙬𝓮𝙗𝒏𝙤𝒗𝙚𝙡.𝒄𝒐𝓶

Mezos did not.

Arik’s gaze remained on Liam for one more moment, gold eyes unreadable.

Then he said, "Proceed."

Mezos stepped into the yellow-marked zone first.

He did it with the calm of a man volunteering for a diplomatic inconvenience rather than a possible death trap built above a raw red ether vein. His long red hair shifted faintly in the turbine’s rising interference field, blue-white light cutting sharp lines along his cheekbones.

Mezos took his position on the yellow mark and nodded once to Liam.

Liam accessed the panel and waited.

The Vanguard responded before Mezos did.

The turbine’s outer rings shifted with a deep, mechanical growl, drawing red ether through the intake and compressing it until blue-white interference spilled across the bridge like mist over glass. The field rose around Mezos in clean, luminous strands, wrapping around his wrists, his throat, and the line of his shoulders.

Mezos groaned.

Everyone tensed.

Then he stretched his arms slightly away from his sides, tipped his head back, and closed his eyes with the expression of a man stepping into sunlight after weeks underground.

"Gods," he breathed. "I’ve missed this."

Liam’s fingers froze above the console.

Rex stared at him. "Is he in pain?"

"No," Noah said, with immediate and deeply unhelpful confidence. "That is not pain."

Mezos inhaled again, slow and deliberate, and the ether around him sank into his skin without forming a spell, circle, or external flare. The brooch on his coat flashed red once, sharp and angry.

The Vanguard roared.

The brooch dimmed.

Mezos smiled.

It was not his polite court smile. It was not the elegant, dangerous curve he used when someone at a negotiation table had made the mistake of assuming manners meant mercy.

This was a smile so few saw it, a hungry one that made him look younger.

Liam’s eyes narrowed. "Are you absorbing?"

"Yes."

"I said minimal."

"This is minimal."

"You look indecently happy."

"I have been wearing a suppression device since entering Wrohan." Mezos said, voice low and almost lazy. "You will forgive my lack of academic solemnity."

"No," Liam said. "But I will document it."

Noah stepped closer to the edge of the yellow field, watching the way the ether moved around Mezos rather than through the brooch’s restrictions. "It feels clean?"

Mezos opened his eyes. They were brighter now, the blue sharpened by a fresh charge. "Not clean. Filtered through violence, then disciplined by genius."

Liam looked briefly offended. "That is not a technical answer."

"It is accurate."

Rex glanced at Liam. "He is not showing channel strain."

"I can see that."

"You look irritated by it."

"I am irritated by the theatrical enjoyment of a controlled test."

Mezos lowered one hand, but the field continued to feed him in thin, steady streams. "The brooch is trying to identify intake as active use. The turbine keeps burying the signal under its conversion rhythm."

Liam’s attention snapped back to the readings. "So the interference is masking channel response."

"Yes."

"Any rebound?"

"None."

"Pressure?"

"A little. Manageable."

"Liar?"

Mezos’s smile returned. "Not this time."

Liam stared at him for another second, then made a sharp note on the console. "Fine. Step out slowly."

Mezos did, and the moment he crossed the boundary, the owl brooch brightened with a faint red pulse.

His expression tightened, but Arik saw it and so did Liam.

"Rebound," Liam said, red eyes narrowing.

Mezos adjusted his cuff. "Minor."

"Minor is what people say before collapsing somewhere inconvenient."

"I am not Noah."

Noah frowned. "Why am I always the unit of reckless measurement?"

"Because you are reliable," Arik said, his golden eyes still watching the gate.

"That sounded affectionate and insulting."

"It was efficient."

Liam pointed at Noah. "Your turn. Absorption only. If you try to impress anyone, I will cut the field."

Noah stepped onto the yellow mark, already grinning. "I am naturally impressive."

"Yes," Liam said. "A tragic maintenance burden."