The storm had passed, but the fear hadn't.
Rain still dripped from the edges of tents and tarps, hissing as it hit smoldering fire pits. The blackout was over, power slowly crawling back through the camp, but unease hung heavier than the humidity. The blackout hadn't just killed the lights. It had exposed something darker.
Whispers echoed in the quiet.
"You think it was sabotage?"
"No way it was an accident. The generator's fail-safes don't just all fail. Not like that."
Erika sat beneath the half-collapsed canopy where they used to play cards between shifts. Her fingers traced the edge of her rifle. She wasn't thinking about cards anymore.
"I was at the armory when the lights died," she said, mostly to herself. "The lock disengaged. Someone could've walked right in."
Mason stood a few feet away, glaring into the night as if the darkness owed him answers. He'd barely slept. None of them had.
"They didn't go for weapons," he muttered. "They went for food. Sabotaged the fresh stores. Someone wanted to make us weak."
Vivian approached, her boots splashing in the mud. She looked more tired than usual, but her voice still had that calm command only people like James and her could summon.
"James is making a sweep of the southern perimeter. He thinks whoever did this wanted it to look like an external attack. Make us chase shadows."
Ray chuckled darkly. "Well, they got their wish. Half the camp's jumpy. The other half thinks we're cursed."
They stood in silence for a while, broken only by the distant hammering of someone repairing a power line. Then someone finally asked the question that had been on all their minds.
"You think it was one of us?"
Nobody answered right away.
---
Ella had been sitting in the medical tent, helping restock supplies James had secured in the last mission. When the lights went out, her first instinct had been fear. Not of the dark—but of history repeating.
She remembered what James said after Kayden's betrayal: "Sometimes people break for reasons we can't see."
Now, she feared there were more cracks.
As she repacked syringes and alcohol swabs, her hands trembled. Not because of what had happened, but because of who she suspected.
---
The investigation had no uniforms, no warrants. Just people with memories, instincts, and flashlights. Small groups combed the camp, double-checked access logs, questioned movement schedules.
But it wasn't until they reached the destroyed supply tent that a clue emerged.
A bootprint. Not just any kind—military issue. Worn differently than theirs. Newer.
Ray crouched next to it, inspecting. "Too clean. Whoever did this swapped their shoes before they left. Tried to cover their tracks."
Mason bent over beside him. "Could've been from one of the people James brought back recently."
"Or someone pretending to be from outside."
They looked at each other. That chill again. The kind James always warned them about.
---
James returned near dawn, soaked and silent. He said nothing, just listened.
When Erika gave her report, she watched his face for any cracks. But James, as always, was stone and fire.
"We found a casing. Small explosive, planted behind the power relay. Designed to short it out, not destroy it outright."
Ella stepped forward. "So it was sabotage. Not incompetence. Not a test run."
James nodded. "Someone wanted us in the dark. Literally and figuratively."
Mason asked, "Do you think the UNO's involved?"
James didn't answer right away.
"They might be. But it could also be someone trying to make us look weak to them. Someone local."
Vivian crossed her arms. "This camp is your creation. Your dream. If they can break it, they can prove you're not invincible."
"I'm not. But this place is more than me. That's what they don't understand."
---
As the sun rose, bathing the camp in gold and ash, the group split up again. This time not with fear, but with resolve.
Because something else had grown in the shadows.
Not doubt.
Loyalty.
They remembered how James stood at the gates the night the creatures attacked. How he negotiated peace with the rogue traders. How he risked everything to save Kayden's sister.
They weren't following a man. They were defending a symbol.
And now, that symbol had been threatened.
It wouldn't happen again.
---
That night, around the fire, Mason spoke first.
"You think we'll find them? The one who did it?"
Ray shrugged. "Eventually. Cowards leave footprints. Always."
Ella stirred the pot of stew in silence, then said, "James trusted us. We trusted him. If someone breaks that... maybe they never belonged in the first place."
Vivian nodded slowly. "We watch each other. Not because we doubt, but because we care. That's how we survive."
The light from the fire flickered across their faces. Some scarred. Some weary. But all determined.
The blackout had ended.
But their eyes were wide open now.
And they would never close again.