I shouldn't be able to see any of this.
My body tells me that much with every breath. One arm doesn't respond at all, the other shakes so badly I have to pin it against my side to keep it still. My chest burns when I inhale, and when I exhale it feels like something inside me shifts wrong, like it never quite settled back where it belonged. I know I'm bleeding. I don't need to look to know that. The heat soaking through my armor, the way the ground feels slick beneath my boots, that's enough.
I'm still conscious. Barely.
That might be the cruelest part.
Matte is still standing.
He shouldn't be.
He hasn't been fighting like a person for a while now, and even through the ringing in my ears I can tell when something changes in the rhythm of a battle. I've spent my life reading that rhythm, anchoring it, keeping others alive inside it. What I'm watching now doesn't have one anymore.
He moves, and the street explodes.
Concrete bursts upward in slabs as Essence detonates beneath his feet, launching him forward into the Lieutenant with no regard for balance or recovery. The impact caves in what's left of a building wall and sends debris raining down around them. The Lieutenant answers immediately, driving Matte back with a strike that would have pulped anyone else, but Matte doesn't slow. He hits again, and again, and again, raw force smashing into disciplined motion.
Too much force.
No pacing. No restraint.
I try to stand. My leg buckles instantly and I slam back down to one knee, biting back a sound as pain flares white-hot through my side. My enhancement won't respond the way it should. It's there, faint, flickering, but every time I try to push it outward it feels like dragging power through shattered glass.
I grit my teeth and force it anyway.
A thin pulse spreads out from me, barely more than a whisper, but I feel Scarlett steady where she stands and Violet's breathing even out just a fraction. That alone nearly knocks me unconscious. My vision tunnels for a second before snapping back, blurred and doubled.
The Lieutenant shifts tactics.
I see it before Matte does.
It stops meeting him head-on. Stops trading. It lets Matte overextend, steps aside at the last possible moment, redirects his momentum into ruined terrain. Matte tears free every time, brute force covering mistakes that would have gotten him killed minutes ago, but the gaps are there now. Small. Growing.
He fires a massive surge of Essence that obliterates what remains of a storefront and keeps charging straight through the smoke, but the Lieutenant isn't where he's aiming anymore. It appears at his side and drives a Void-infused blow into his ribs. I hear something crack even from here.
Matte stumbles.
Just once.
My heart lurches.
He recovers instantly, swinging wild, Essence flaring violently around his arms, but the Lieutenant is already moving again, striking low, then high, forcing Matte to react instead of attack. This isn't a fight anymore. It's controlled erosion.
I know where this ends.
I've seen bodies fail before. Strong ones. Stronger than they ever thought they were. You can push past pain. You can push past fear. You cannot push past physics forever.
Matte gathers power again, more than he should, more than his frame can handle, and releases it in a roaring blast that levels half a block and finally drives the Lieutenant back. The shockwave hits me a moment later and knocks the breath from my lungs. I barely stay upright.
When the dust clears, Matte is still standing.
But he sways.
His Essence sputters, flaring unevenly instead of flowing. His shoulders rise and fall too fast, too shallow. He takes one step forward and nearly falls flat on his face.
The Lieutenant doesn't rush him.
It walks.
That's when panic finally breaks through the pain.
I force everything I have left outward, not a surge, not a burst, just a stabilizing field, thin and weak but wide. My vision darkens immediately. Blood drips from my nose and splashes onto the ground.
Matte doesn't notice.
He charges anyway.
He makes it three steps before his legs give out completely. He drops to one knee, tries to stand again, and collapses face-first into the rubble. His Essence flashes once, violently, then cuts out like a severed wire.
The battlefield goes silent.
The Lieutenant raises its arm.
I scream, but no sound comes out.
Scarlett moves first.
She appears between Matte and the Lieutenant in a blink, magic snapping into place around her like a reflex. A spell detonates against the Lieutenant's forearm, forcing the strike wide as Violet slams in from the side, blades flashing, driving the Dracus back a step.
Only one step.
That's all they get.
The Lieutenant turns on them immediately, Void surging as it retaliates. Violet takes the brunt of it, thrown hard into broken stone, rolling and coming up again without hesitation. Scarlett's magic fires in tight, controlled bursts, disrupting channels, breaking rhythm, never lingering long enough to be countered cleanly.
They're not winning.
They're surviving.
I push again.
Everything inside me screams in protest as I force one last enhancement pulse outward, threading it through my own shattered reinforcement to reach them. The effect is immediate and devastating. Scarlett's casting sharpens. Violet moves faster, cleaner. I feel the cost at the same time as a tearing sensation deep in my chest, like something finally gives up trying to hold together.
I slump forward, catching myself on one hand.
My vision fades in and out.
Through it, I see Scarlett and Violet force the Lieutenant back another step. Then another. Not through power, but through denial, through refusing to give it a clean opening while Matte lies broken behind them.
The Lieutenant hesitates.
Just long enough.
Then it disengages, leaping back into the smoke and rubble, not defeated, not fleeing, but recalculating.
I sag completely, strength finally gone.
The last thing I see before the world dims is Violet kneeling beside Matte, hands shaking as she checks his breathing, and Scarlett standing over them, magic still humming, eyes locked on the drifting dust where the Lieutenant vanished.
Matte is alive.
Barely.
And I know, with a certainty that hurts worse than any wound, that when he wakes up, nothing about this will be simple again.