The descent into Lab V was quieter without its architect.

Arik stood alone in the glass elevator as it shuddered down into the buried levels of Alexandria. The conditional access badge Liam had issued him glowed a faint white against the dark, steady and unwillingly permissive in his hand. Beyond the transparent walls, the shaft sank through reinforced stone, old conduits, and the mechanical bones of a city that had long ago learned to hide its most important organs underground.

When the doors opened, the lower chamber greeted him with blue-white light and the thunderous, disciplined pulse of the Vanguard.

The turbine hung over the abyss like blasphemy made useful. Raw red ether flashed through the intake in violent surges, then was crushed, refined, and driven forward through the machine’s heart until blue turned to white and power became civilized enough for the city above to pretend it had earned it.

Standing near the primary control console, entirely unfazed by the captive god roaring a few yards away, was Alexander Smith.

The security guard did not startle when Arik stepped out of the lift. He only turned, one hand resting near the heavy stun baton at his belt, posture easy in the way only truly dangerous men ever managed. He looked at Arik the way he might look at a structural crack in a load-bearing wall: not frightened, but fully aware that if it widened, the entire room would become everyone’s problem.

"Your Highness," Alexander said respectfully.

Arik’s mouth curved faintly.

"Alexander."

His boots clicked once against the ether-glass bridge as he crossed into the chamber. The turbine’s reflected light moved in gold across his eyes, then vanished again.

"Master Canmore is not here," Alexander said. "Yet you are."

"The machine remains, sir. So I remain."

Arik stopped a few paces away. "A loyal gatekeeper."

Alexander did not answer.

Arik let the silence breathe, then said, "If Felix Canmore walked out of that lift right now and demanded access to this chamber, what would you do?"

Alexander’s expression did not move. "Depends on what you are actually asking, Your Highness."

Arik chuckled.

The sound was low, brief, and wrong enough in the blue-white roar of the chamber to make the turbine seem almost polite by comparison.

"I only want to make sure the people around Liam are good for him."

He turned then, his gaze shifting past Alexander to the sealed gates on the other side of the bridge.

The old structure sat behind its lead casing with the particular ugliness of something hidden rather than buried. Even under modern reinforcement, it looked older than the chamber around it, older than the bridge, older than the kingdom’s preferred version of its own history. The seam pulsed faintly, not brightly enough to count as active, but with the intermittent wrongness of a thing that remembered being important.

Alexander watched him in profile for a moment.

Then he said, "That answer would worry me more if you sounded less calm."

"Calm is useful."

"So is honesty."

Arik’s mouth curved faintly. "You assume I’m being dishonest."

"I assume men like you don’t ask about Felix because you’re making conversation."

That earned Alexander a measured glance.

"Men like me?"

"The kind who walk into a hidden chamber, look at a forbidden gate, and start assessing whether the people near it can be trusted." Alexander’s hand stayed near the baton, loose but ready. "You’re not here for the machine."

"No."

"The gate, then."

"Yes."

Alexander’s eyes flicked once toward the far side of the chamber. "Master Liam said you would be."

"That sounds like him."

"He also said you’d phrase your questions like they were about something else."

Arik laughed again, softer this time. "Did he?"

"Yes."

"And what did he suggest you do about that?"

Alexander’s face remained carved from patience. "Ignore the wording. Watch the intent."

"Useful advice."

"He usually is."

That, more than anything, pleased Arik.

Not because Liam was right. He was almost certainly right more often than was convenient.

Because he had been right enough to leave this man here. 𝐟𝕣𝗲𝕖𝕨𝗲𝐛𝗻𝗼𝐯𝗲𝚕.𝗰𝚘𝐦

Arik let the silence stretch again, not as pressure this time, but as assessment. The turbine thundered below them. Blue-white light moved across the bridge, the console, Alexander’s broad shoulders, and the old sealed gate beyond.

Then Arik said, "If Felix came for Liam, what would you do?"

Alexander answered without hesitation. "Delay him."

"You couldn’t stop him alone."

"No."

"But you’d stand there anyway."

"Yes."

Arik studied him.

That answer, at least, had no decorative edges.

"And if Liam told you to move aside?"

Alexander’s jaw shifted once. "He wouldn’t."

"You’re confident."

"I know the difference between Liam being reckless with himself and reckless with what he protects." A beat. "He’d tell me to buy him time."

Arik’s gaze drifted back to the gate.

"Yes," he said quietly. "He would."

The seam gave one low pulse.

Barely visible. Barely there.

Arik stepped toward it.

Alexander moved at once, direct enough to become a barrier before the second pace landed.

"Not without him."

Arik stopped.

The two men stood in the turbine’s light, one ancient power wearing princely skin, the other a security guard who had apparently decided that rank was a logistical problem rather than a sacred force.

Arik looked at him, and for one brief moment the gold in his eyes stopped being courtly.

"Are you loyal to Liam," he asked, "or to the room he works in?"

Alexander didn’t blink. "To the person who built the room worth guarding."

That answer settled something.

Arik’s mouth moved in the shape of a smile, though the expression held more approval than warmth.

"Then you may stay."

Alexander looked unimpressed. "Very generous."

"It was."

"No," Alexander said. "It was you deciding not to be offended that I said no."

Arik actually smiled then.

"You are alarmingly comfortable with me."

"No," Alexander replied. "I’m actually terrified of you."

The turbine kept roaring below them, white and blue light breaking across the bridge in hard, mechanical intervals. For a moment, Arik said nothing at all.

Alexander, having apparently decided that survival was overrated if honesty was available, continued in the same flat tone.

"The only reason I’m standing here talking to someone like you - a man with a soul carrying burnt ether channels and still walking around instead of withering in permanent pain - is because you care about Liam."

That took the smile out of Arik’s face.

Alexander held his gaze. "And because I don’t think you’d touch the people he cares about."