The next morning arrived far earlier than anyone had agreed to.

Across the Egg Tree, survivors stirred under blankets. Guards swapped shifts with the hollow-eyed misery of people who had technically slept but had not emotionally benefited from it. Pots clattered in the kitchen. Hughes was already awake, because Hughes seemed like the sort of man who had been born annoyed at dawn and simply maintained the habit ever since.

Everyone was up.

Mostly.

Except for one certain ragdoll cat.

Celeste Astallan lay buried in her bed beneath a collapsed kingdom of blankets, pillows, and plushies. Only one flame-tipped tail stuck out from the pile, twitching faintly in her sleep. Her curly blonde hair had fallen over her face in a tangled curtain, hiding all but her nose and one cheek.

She snored softly.

Peacefully.

Unwisely.

The bedroom door slammed open.

Mezzo charged in like a war crime with spots.

In one hand, he held an enormous brass airhorn.

In the other, absolutely no mercy.

He sucked in a heroic breath.

“WAKY FECKING WAKY, PRINCESS!” he roared in his thick Éiravon accent.

Then he blasted the airhorn.

The noise hit the room like a dying train.

Celeste exploded out of bed.

Not sat up.

Not rolled over.

Exploded.

Every limb shot rigidly downward in perfect terrified-cat formation as she launched backwards off the mattress with a shriek.

“Oh stars—!”

Then, because biology had betrayed dignity long before politics ever could, she meowed.

The sound echoed.

Mezzo froze for half a second.

Celeste hit the floor behind the bed in a catastrophic avalanche of blankets, cushions, and plush rabbits. A lamp wobbled. Three plushies bounced. Something squeaked.

Silence.

Then one trembling hand emerged from the mountain.

Thumbs up.

“M’okay,” came a muffled voice from beneath the pile.

Mezzo vaulted over the corner of the bed, grabbed her arm, and hauled.

“No time, no time, Commander, we’re late and I’m in trouble.”

Celeste popped out of the blankets with her hair over one eye, glasses missing, ears flat, and tail puffed to twice its normal size.

“What? Why?”

“I was supposed to wake you up.”

“You did!”

“Late, Celeste! Late!”

Celeste stumbled after him as he dragged her through the door, still half-wrapped in one blanket like a traumatised burrito.

“Why didn’t you wake me earlier?”

“Well,” Mezzo said, already breaking into a run, “Topsy was supposed to wake me.”

“That sounds dangerous.”

“And Pitch was supposed to wake her.”

“That sounds unreliable.”

“And Arcade was supposed to wake Pitch.”

Celeste blinked, trying to process this while hopping on one foot to pull on a boot.

Mezzo threw both hands up.

“And Arcade didn’t get up, so that’s where we are now!”

They skidded around a corner.

Celeste nearly collided with a stack of breakfast crates, apologised to them out of reflex, then kept running.

“Why was Arcade in charge of waking people?”

“I don’t know! There was a chart!”

“There was a chart?”

“There’s always a chart! The chart has betrayed us!”

They reached Arcade’s door.

Mezzo did not knock.

He lifted one boot.

Celeste’s eyes widened. “Mezzo, wait—”

Too late.

Mezzo kicked the door open with the confidence of a man who had already committed to being shouted at by at least three people before breakfast.

“GET YER QUILLS OUT OF BED, YOU SPIKY LITTLE—”

He stopped.

Celeste slammed into his back.

“Ow—why did you—”

Then she saw.

Arcade was on the floor.

Not asleep in bed.

Not slumped over his workbench.

On the floor.

One arm twisted beneath him, quills flattened awkwardly against the boards, face pale beneath the glow of a garbled projection screen. Broken ceramic lay near his hand. Tea had dried in a dark stain across the floor.

The screen above the desk flickered with static.

Not files.

Not data.

Just fractured amber light and distortion.

Celeste’s stomach dropped.

“Arcade!”

She rushed past Mezzo and dropped beside him, hands hovering uselessly for one terrible second before she touched his shoulder.

“Arcade, wake up. Please wake up.”

Mezzo crouched on his other side, all joking gone from his face.

“Easy, lad. Come on. Up you get.”

Arcade groaned.

His eyes fluttered open.

For a moment, he stared at the ceiling like he had absolutely no idea who had put it there.

Then he squinted at Celeste.

“…Why are you in my room?”

Celeste exhaled so sharply it almost hurt. “Because you’re on the floor!”

Arcade looked down.

Processed this.

Frowned.

“That does seem like a design flaw.”

Mezzo slid an arm behind his back and helped him sit up. “What happened?”

Arcade rubbed his temple, wincing. “I… don’t know.”

Celeste’s ears lowered.

“You don’t remember?”

He stared at the garbled screen.

“No.”

The word came out too quiet.

Then his eyes sharpened slightly, panic catching up with consciousness.

“C.H.I.P.”

A flicker of light sparked near his wrist.

C.H.I.P. appeared with a small pop, optics spinning unevenly.

“USER STATUS: RUDELY AWAKE.”

Arcade grabbed the edge of the desk and hauled himself halfway upright.

“What happened?”

C.H.I.P.’s optics blinked.

“UNKNOWN.”

Arcade went still.

Celeste looked between them. “What do you mean unknown?”

“I MEAN UNKNOWN,” C.H.I.P. said, sounding almost offended by his own answer. “LAST RECORDED ACTIVITY: GUM-NEXUS ARCHIVE UNPACKING. THEN STATIC. THEN USER HORIZONTAL.”

Mezzo’s jaw tightened. “That sounds like gumball trouble.”

Arcade rubbed his head harder. “Everything is gumball trouble. Be more specific.”

Mezzo helped him into the chair. “Maybe you should take it easier till we get to the kraken.”

Arcade stared at him.

Then at Celeste.

Then at the room.

Something in his brain seemed to reconnect all at once.

“The kraken.”

Celeste winced. “Yes.”

“The kraken is today.”

“Yes.”

Arcade’s eyes went huge.

“We were supposed to be up ages ago.”

Mezzo pointed at him. “That’s what I’ve been trying to communicate through the medium of panic.”

Arcade lurched to his feet so fast the chair tipped backwards.

Celeste grabbed his sleeve. “Arcade, wait. You were unconscious on the floor.”

“And now I’m conscious on my feet. Improvement.”

“You might have a concussion.”

“I always have a concussion. It’s called being awake near this team.”

C.H.I.P. bobbed beside him. “USER MEDICAL STATUS: QUESTIONABLE.”

“Everyone’s medical status is questionable!” Arcade snapped, already stumbling toward the door. “We’re late, we’ve got a gummy kraken to kill, and if Topsy gets to breakfast before me there won’t be pancakes left!”

Celeste, still half in her blanket and missing one boot, scrambled after him.

“Arcade!”

Mezzo scooped up her glasses from the floor and shoved them into her hand as he passed.

“Come on, Commander. Jellyfish killing time waits for no traumatised hedgehog.”

“It’s a kraken!”

“Big wet jellyfish with ambition!”

Arcade stagger-ran down the corridor toward the kitchen, C.H.I.P. wobbling after him, Mezzo sprinting behind with the airhorn still in hand.

Celeste followed, heart still pounding.

They tore down the corridor like the apocalypse had scheduled itself early.

Which, to be fair, it had.

Arcade was in front now, moving with the wild, uneven speed of someone powered by panic, nerve damage, and the distant promise of pancakes. C.H.I.P. floated beside him, occasionally bumping into walls because his optics were still recalibrating.

Mezzo followed with the airhorn under one arm, wings half-spread, hair sticking up in every possible direction.

Celeste came last, still missing one boot, blanket trailing behind her like a defeated royal cape.

“We need to make sure everyone’s up!” Arcade shouted.

Mezzo pointed down the hall. “Right! Room checks!”

Celeste panted. “Can we do them calmly?”

“No!” Arcade and Mezzo shouted together.

They hit the first door.

Mezzo threw it open. “UP! Kraken murder o’clock!”

Empty.

Second door.

Arcade kicked it with less style and more shin pain. “If you are asleep, you are wrong!”

Empty.

Third door.

Mezzo reached it first and flung it open with theatrical urgency.

“Topsy, get yer furry wee—”

Topsy was sitting on the loo.

Silence.

A terrible, sacred silence.

Topsy stared at them.

They stared back.

Then Topsy screamed.

“DO YOU MIND?!”

Celeste shrieked and slapped both hands over her eyes. “SORRY!”

Arcade spun around so fast he nearly hit the wall. “MY EYES! MY SCIENCE EYES!”

Mezzo staggered backwards, clutching his face. “I’VE SEEN THINGS NO GRYPHON DOG SHOULD SEE!”

“You saw nothing!” Topsy roared, grabbing a roll of toilet paper and throwing it at them. “NOTHING!”

C.H.I.P. hovered in the doorway for half a second too long.

Topsy pointed at him. “YOU TOO, FLOATING KETTLE!”

“MEMORY FILE CORRUPTED FOR EVERYONE’S SAFETY,” C.H.I.P. chirped, and vanished behind Arcade’s shoulder.

Mezzo slammed the door shut.

The three of them stood in the corridor, breathing hard.

Celeste lowered one hand from her eyes. “Is she awake?”

Arcade nodded grimly. “Traumatically.”

“Then it counts,” Mezzo said, turning sharply—

—and immediately tripped over Bonbon.

The tiny panda had appeared in the corridor wrapped in a blanket, holding a biscuit in one hand and looking completely unsurprised by events.

Mezzo windmilled.

“Feck—!”

He hit the floor with a thud.

Bonbon looked down at him.

Mezzo groaned into the floorboards. “That’s the third time this week.”

Bonbon patted his head with her free hand.

“Byddwch yn ofalus.”
(Be careful.)

Mezzo lifted one thumb weakly. “Thank you, small judge.”

Celeste scooped Bonbon up before anyone else could fall over her. “Are you okay?”

Bonbon nodded and offered Celeste the biscuit.

Celeste accepted it automatically. “Thank you.”

Arcade pointed at the biscuit. “Don’t eat that. We don’t know where she got it.”

Bonbon smiled.

Arcade narrowed his eyes. “That smile answered nothing.”

They continued down the hall.

Celeste peeled away toward Lumina’s room, heart already bracing for chaos. She knocked once, then opened the door.

“Lumina? Skye? Are you—”

She stopped.

Lumina and Skye were already awake.

Not only awake.

Prepared.

They stood in the middle of the room wearing makeshift armour assembled from spare leather pads, saucepan lids, padded jackets, and what looked suspiciously like parts of an old training dummy. Lumina had tied a ribbon around one arm like a commander’s band. Skye had goggles pushed up over his ears and a tiny pouch of mana crystals at his belt.

Between them sat a board.

On the board were two neatly drawn columns.

LUMINA

SKYE

Underneath each name were little boxes.

At the top, in bright crayon, someone had written:

ZOMBIE SCORECARD

Celeste stared.

Lumina beamed. “Morning!”

Skye raised a hand. “We’re ready.”

Celeste slowly stepped into the room.

“Guys.”

Both children straightened.

Celeste pointed gently at the scorecard. “Remember what we talked about?”

Lumina and Skye exchanged a look.

Then, in perfect rehearsed unison, they recited, “Keep to the back. Support roles. Heal anyone who needs it. Let the grown-ups kill the big ones.”

Celeste watched them closely.

They smiled with terrifying innocence.

She narrowed her eyes.

They smiled harder.

After a moment, Celeste gave a solemn nod.

“Good squires. You do me proud.”

She gave them both a thumbs up.

Lumina saluted.

Skye saluted too, accidentally knocking his goggles down over his eyes.

Celeste smiled despite herself, then backed out of the room and shut the door.

The instant she was gone, Lumina and Skye turned to each other.

Lumina whispered, “Still going to kill a big one.”

Skye nodded, deadly serious.

“Definitely.”

Outside, Celeste paused.

Her ears twitched.

She looked back at the door.

For a moment, suspicion crossed her face.

Then Arcade yelled from down the corridor, “COMMANDER, IF YOU’RE DONE INSPECTING CHILD SOLDIERS, BREAKFAST IS BURNING!”

Celeste’s eyes widened. “Oh stars—pancakes!”

She bolted.

Behind the closed door, Lumina picked up a crayon and added one extra box beneath her name.

Skye saw it.

Added two beneath his.

The war had officially begun.