BLOODCAPE
Chapter 121: The Cracked Mirror

Chapter 121: Chapter 121: The Cracked Mirror

The room at the top of Gemini Tower was all glass and silence.

From here, District 4 stretched in sterile precision — corporate grids glowing with neon arteries, vertical traffic zipping between ad-splashed towers. But up here, the world felt cold. Still. Like time had stalled just long enough for secrets to take root.

Hernan sat opposite her.

She was one half of a legend — identical to her twin brother in every visible way, but today, for the first time, she felt distinct. Not a mirrored echo. Not a synchronized weapon. Just... a woman with shaking hands and something eating her from the inside.

"You didn’t have to come all the way here," she said, voice low, measured, avoiding his eyes.

"I wanted to check in. After the mission." Hernan smiled gently.

Lie.

He was here because of a warning buried in Nico’s intercepted feed:Gemini split signal anomaly — female twin offline 4.3 seconds.

"Are you hurt?" he asked.

She hesitated. "Not... really."

Too long of a pause. Too careful.

He studied her posture — not her usual grace. She was curled slightly, tense, defensive. A faint tremor ran through her left hand. Barely noticeable unless you were trained to see such things.

He was.

She turned toward the city. "Do you ever wonder if we got it backwards?"

He tilted his head. "Backwards how?"

"Who we protect. Why we do it. What gets erased."

The words cracked in the stillness like glass under pressure.

Hernan didn’t answer right away. His face wore mild concern. Behind it, gears turned like blades. This wasn’t Zodiac protocol. And especially not Gemini. They were rehearsed. Synchronized. Always speaking in we.

But she was unraveling.

"You don’t usually talk like this," he said quietly.

A bitter laugh escaped her. "He doesn’t like when I go off-script."

He.

The brother wasn’t present. Hernan had checked — male Gemini was down two floors, reviewing tech debriefs. So this wasn’t a mistake.

This was intentional.

"What are you trying to say?" Hernan asked. "You know you can tell me."

She turned to him fully. Her expression — fragile, stripped of divinity. For a breath, she was just someone who’d carried something poisonous for too long.

"There are things I wish I hadn’t done," she said. "Or... that I wish I’d fought harder against. Things I let him decide for both of us."

Solaris.

The name wasn’t spoken, but Hernan felt it tear through his ribcage like a silent explosion.

He kept still. His hands remained folded. His face: unreadable.

But inside, he was fire.

"I mean..." she exhaled, slow. "I remember your father."

That stilled him.

"My father?" he asked, tone perfectly uncertain.

"He saved my brother once," she said. "Pulled him out of the Callisto breach. Later, when we met again... he remembered me. Not just my brother. He said we reminded him of his kids. Called us beautiful."

The room tilted.

She spoke like someone finally vomiting poison — jagged, painful, uncontrollable.

"After..." Her voice broke. "After what we did, I couldn’t forget his face."

"What did you do?"

Silence.

Then — a whisper:

"He didn’t fight us. Not at first. He knew. And he still tried to protect his wife."

Every muscle in Hernan’s jaw locked.

He didn’t breathe.

He didn’t blink.

His fingernails pressed into his palm so hard he nearly bled.

"Why are you telling me this?" he asked softly.

She looked at him — really looked — and something cracked in her eyes.

"Because if I don’t... I’ll forget it ever mattered."

A silence followed. Heavy. Real.

She stood — slow, deliberate.

"If I told you the truth," she said, "would you even believe me?"

Then she left.

The glass door hissed shut behind her.

Hernan sat in stillness. Stared at the empty chair.

Then he looked at his left palm — where his ring finger had clicked the recorder inside his suit’s wrist seam.

"Gotcha," he whispered.

📖 Chapter 122: Someone Is Watching

The rooftop air bit colder than usual.

Wind whispered through the railings, tugging gently at the hem of Hernan’s hoodie as he leaned into the concrete ledge, eyes fixed on the distant outline of Gemini Tower. It gleamed under the night sky like a surgical instrument — pristine, precise, and dripping with concealed damage.

And tonight, it pulsed like a wound.

He didn’t move when the access door creaked open behind him.

Didn’t flinch when the soft crunch of gravel approached. And when she stopped beside him, just close enough to share the silence, he let it hang — heavy, deliberate.

"You always come here when you’re thinking," Tessa said.

Hernan blinked, slow. "Maybe I just like the view."

She didn’t answer. Just stepped up beside him, leaning her arms on the ledge, mirroring his posture.

Her hair was tied back tonight — the wind teasing strands loose across her cheekbones. Moonlight silvered her expression, made her look softer than usual. Almost like they were both still kids, pretending the world hadn’t already scarred them.

He glanced at her bare hands. No gloves. Trust.

He should’ve felt honored.

Instead, all he could think about was Gemini’s voice. Her cracked confession. Her regret.

Her mistake.

"You missed team dinner," Tessa murmured.

"Had a debrief. Last-minute."

"Was it with Gemini?"

He hesitated. Just enough.

"Yeah. Debriefing the Sentry mission."

"And?"

He let the pause stretch. "She’s... intense."

"You mean they."

"No. I mean, yes. Just—she was alone this time. Different vibe."

Tessa’s gaze narrowed. Not hostile — just... observant. Too observant.

"You’re shaking."

He glanced at his hands. Tense, curled slightly. Not trembling — but not relaxed either.

"Cold," he lied.

She didn’t blink. "You’ve been off lately."

"Off how?"

"You smile when no one’s said anything. You answer questions no one’s asked. You look through people instead of at them."

Her voice softened, but her stare didn’t.

"And sometimes, when you think no one’s watching... your face just goes blank. Like you forget who you’re supposed to be."

He felt it then — the edge of the cliff, the rush of wind beneath the mask.

"Tessa—"

"Don’t," she said, cutting in. "I’m not accusing. I just—"

She hugged her arms tighter.

"I’ve lost people. I know what grief does. What pretending costs."

Then came the kill shot:

"My parents told me about Solaris once. Said he was the only real hero left. Not for ratings. Not for glory. Just... someone who helped."

Hernan’s throat tightened.

"I always wondered what it’d be like to meet someone like that," she whispered.

He couldn’t respond.

So he did what he always did.

He reached out — not for a weapon, not for a truth — but for a mask. One that looked like intimacy.

He brushed a strand of hair behind her ear.

"He was... just a man," he said. "He died like one."

Tessa looked down. Her voice was small, shaken.

"I don’t know why... but you scare me sometimes."

He didn’t react.

He just looked back at Gemini Tower, where one twin was probably still whispering regrets into the silence... and the other, no doubt, was watching.

Someone always was.

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