The world hangs in a balance so thin it could be split by a whisper.

East against West.

West against East.

A bipolar order, carved out of history’s scars, stands at the edge of collapse. Nations measure power in silos, in stockpiles of fire hidden beneath the earth. Men and women sit in dim-lit rooms, pressing their ears to machines that breathe louder than their gods.

And inside one of those machines, inside the grobe, sits Ribs.

The grobe is no ordinary vessel. It is a reconnaissance drone, yes, but also a chamber where a man becomes a shadow. It hums softly around him, its shell alive with transmissions, its belly filled with other operatives — each bound to their stations like organs in a body. Human sinew pressed into metal.

Through the slit of his visor, Ribs stares down at Russia’s defenses. Cities outlined by grids of heat. Launch sites disguised as empty plains. But he does not only see Russia. He feels China, too — a gaze behind the gaze. Their satellites follow him, their sensors track his shadow, their suspicion pressing like a knife tip against his skin. He knows this. He accepts it. Nothing here is unseen.

He speaks into the comms. His voice is taut but steady.

“Our reach is within grasp, Commander.”

The line opens into silence.

Because Commander Reila is not like him. Not anymore.

Her brain is encased in plasma. Her consciousness suspended in a cube — a pulsating lattice of fire and data. She carries every archive, every war, every failed peace treaty, every scream and plea etched into the marrow of history. The cube breathes with her, glows with her.

She is not a commander who remembers.

She is a commander who contains.

Yet even with this burden, even with the entire map of human knowledge burning inside her, she hesitates. Because knowledge does not silence doubt. It sharpens it.

One command from her, and Ribs could strike. One syllable, and steel doors in Siberia would creak open, answering with thunder. One slip, and the Earth would collapse into ash.

The Russian silos are stirring already. Their lids grind against the frost, peeling open like wounds. Beneath them, rockets wait, primed, whispering destruction.

Ribs’ breath shortens. He has seen the math. He has lived inside it. A single launch is enough to blind Europe. A handful, and Paris, London, Berlin — gone in fire. The underground veins, the secret tunnels of infrastructure — all of it ready to become conduits of death. He knows this because he has been a case officer for five years. He has traced these lines before, turned them over like stones in his hands. He knows where the cracks are. He knows where the fire will spill.

But Reila — Reila carries different cracks.

Her mind is machine, yes. But her ghosts remain human. She has known loss, violent and personal. A past scarred by ruin. A family torn from her by the same powers she now contends with. And those scars do not fade in plasma. They flicker, strobe, ripple through her choices like tremors in glass. She wants vengeance. She wants the East to pay. But vengeance is a crooked compass. It does not point toward survival.

Behind them, towering above them, looms the infra-kakaketron.

It is no mere system. It is the mind that minds minds. A fusion of silicon and flesh, absorbing data, calculating probabilities faster than thought. It exhales predictions with the indifference of a god. Ribs can feel its presence like static at the edges of his skull. It speaks in numbers, not words. Cold futures. Hard inevitabilities.

But even the kakaketron falters before the one thing it cannot predict: the fracture inside a human soul.

Ribs leans into the comm again. His voice breaks with urgency.

“If we wait, Europe dies. The shields are ready. Trust me.”

Trust. The most fragile currency. Trust in a machine that remembers, trust in a commander torn by grief, trust in a man whose hands itch for action. In war, trust is thinner than oxygen.

And then — China.

The third shadow.

The giant.

Their silos dwarf all others. Thirty times the size. Thirty times the yield. Their silence has been long, patient, deliberate. But silence does not mean stillness. And now, reports surge in: their silos are opening. Not in warning, but in preparation.

The line crackles. Ribs’ voice comes through, sharp, like glass underfoot.

“They’re moving. The Chinese are opening their silos. We act now, or we don’t act at all.”

Reila closes her eyes. If she still has eyes. If the cube has preserved that part of her. Inside, the ghosts rise. Her family’s faces blur into the fire. Her vengeance claws at her reason.

She sees two futures: one of fire, one of ash.

Neither promises salvation.

Every second lengthens into a knife. The world holds its breath.

And still, Ribs waits. Muscles rigid. Ready to obey. Ready to disobey. Ready to burn with the rest of the world if it comes to that.

Because this is not a war of nations. Not East against West. Not West against East. Not even the great silence of China.

This is the final test of humanity itself.

Whether memory can overcome grief.

Whether reason can silence rage.

Whether trust can outlive betrayal.

The silos groan. The earth inhales. The sky leans closer.