Medical cleared them for supervised connection tests on day nineteen.

  Valoris had been feeling Paragon through incomplete pathways for days now, phantom awareness bleeding through healing ports. But actual interface through functional neural pathways would be different. Real. Proof that the surgery had worked, that transformation would enable connection.

  Her grandmother's advice echoed through memory: First connection feels like dying and being reborn simultaneously. Your consciousness expands beyond flesh into a metal body that operates under different rules. Some pilots adapt immediately. Others panic and need multiple attempts. There's no shame in either response. First connection is traumatic regardless of how prepared you think you are.

  "Thirty seconds maximum," Dr. Valen explained as they walked toward the mech bays. They moved slowly, bodies still healing, movements restricted by ports that weren't fully integrated yet. Each step carried awareness of metal embedded in nervous systems. "Just confirming interface functionality. Checking that neural pathways are developing correctly. Basic consciousness synchronization to verify the ports are integrating properly."

  Thirty seconds. Half a minute of connection with entities they'd summoned three weeks ago.

  They entered the reservoir chamber together. Chimera Squad, modified now, changed permanently, ready to test whether transformation would enable what they'd been building toward.

  Their mechs stood where they'd been since summoning. Motionless, patient, five entities shaped from dimensional substrate and bound to pilots through choices made.

  Valoris approached Paragon slowly, each step carrying the weight of family legacy and personal terror. The mech stood exactly where it had been since summoning: cobalt and silver perfection that concealed hairline cracks throughout its structure. Her mech. Her burden. Her responsibility.

  Her partner, if connection worked.

  "Approach," Valen instructed. "Place your hand on the access panel. The mech will recognize your dimensional signature and initiate basic interface protocol. The connection will feel intense. Don't resist it. Let your consciousness synchronize. Thirty seconds, then we disconnect you manually."

  Valoris stepped forward, reached toward Paragon's plating where the access panel waited. Metal warm beneath her palm. Not cold tech, but something alive, aware, something that had been shaped by her consciousness from dimensional substrate.

  She'd seen her grandmother do this countless times. Had watched connection happen with practiced ease, consciousness extending into a mech body like putting on familiar clothing. Had assumed it would feel natural, comfortable, right.

  She'd been wrong.

  The moment her hand touched the panel, reality shattered.

  CONNECTION.

  Immediate and overwhelming. Consciousness exploding outward from biological boundaries, awareness extending into metal body that existed parallel to flesh, perception expanding to include senses she'd never possessed.

  She could feel Paragon. Not metaphorically. Literally feel it like an extension of her own body. Could sense structural integrity, power distribution, weapon systems, everything that comprised the mech's physical reality. Could feel the hairline cracks throughout armor plating, flaws embedded in perfection.

  But more than physical awareness: consciousness. Vast and ancient and patient. The mech she'd pulled from dimensional space, given form through summoning, bound to her through neural interface ports that were still healing but functional enough for this basic connection.

  Adequate, the presence said, exactly as it had during summoning. Not judgment. Acknowledgment. We are adequate together.

  Valoris tried to respond, couldn't remember how mouths worked when consciousness existed in a body that was forty-two feet tall.

  "Ten seconds," Valen called from somewhere distant, somewhere that existed in the reality Valoris had temporarily left behind.

  She felt Paragon's awareness considering her more thoroughly now that actual connection existed. Assessment ongoing. Measuring compatibility, testing synchronization, determining whether this partnership would function or fracture under operational stress.

  The mech was curious about her. Interested in this small human consciousness that had reached into dimensional space and shaped a weapon from substrate. Interested in what they could become together.

  "Twenty seconds."

  Valoris felt herself spreading too far, consciousness stretching beyond safe limits, awareness extended into the metal body while the biological body remained anchored to ground below. Being in two places simultaneously. Being two sizes simultaneously. Being both human and not-human.

  It was beautiful. It was terrifying. It was exactly what her grandmother had described.

  "Thirty seconds. Disconnecting."

  Reality snapped back. Consciousness compressed back into flesh. Valoris stumbled, would have fallen if medical staff hadn't caught her, gasping like she'd been drowning, like she'd forgotten how to breathe in her biological body after existing briefly in mechanical form.

  Her entire body shook with residual dimensional resonance. The ports throbbed with feedback she didn't understand. Awareness struggled to compress back into biological boundaries after experiencing existence beyond flesh.

  "How do you feel?" Valen asked.

  "Big," Valoris managed, voice rough. "I felt big. Like I was Paragon. Like I WAS the mech. Not piloting it. Being it. Existing as it. I had its body. Its awareness. Its–" She couldn't find words. "My grandmother said it was like dying and being reborn. She was right. I stopped being me. Became something else. Then got forced back into me and it's wrong, I'm too small now, I'm–"

  "That's consciousness synchronization," Valen said calmly. "That's what piloting feels like. You'll learn to manage the transition better with practice. Learn to maintain your sense of self while extending your consciousness into mech form. But the first connection is always overwhelming. You did well. All your neural pathways are functioning correctly."

  Valoris wasn't sure "well" described what had just happened. She felt fractured, consciousness still trying to exist in two places simultaneously.

  Around her, the rest of Chimera Squad underwent similar first connections:

  Zee touched Reaver and immediately went rigid, every muscle locked, expression suggesting she'd touched live current. Her body vibrated with barely contained violence, as though Reaver's combat instincts were bleeding through the incomplete interface. Thirty seconds later they pulled her off and she collapsed, breathing hard, looking simultaneously exhilarated and terrified.

  "It's aggressive," she gasped once she could speak. "I felt its combat instincts. Felt what it wants to do. Felt how much it wants to fight. It's hungry for combat. Eager. Ready. And when I was connected I felt that hunger like it was mine. Like I wanted to fight too. Like violence was right and good and I should embrace it." She looked at her hands like they might have changed. "Is that normal? To feel the mech's nature like that?"

  "Yes," Valen confirmed. "Mechs have consciousness, personality, tendencies. Combat-class mechs tend toward aggression. You'll learn to balance your consciousness with its nature. But yes, you'll always feel its instincts during connection."

  Saren's connection to Meridian appeared calmer. She stood motionless during her thirty seconds, perfect composure maintained, no outward sign of distress. But afterward Valoris saw her hands shaking badly, saw how pale she'd gone, saw the way she swayed despite determination to remain standing. "Overwhelming," Saren said quietly. "Too much sensory input. Too much awareness. Meridian processes information at a speed my biological brain can't match. I felt like I was drowning in data, in sensory streams I couldn't parse fast enough. I need to learn how to manage the information flow."

  Quinn connected to Specter and for a moment their body went translucent, actually visibly translucent, edges flickering like they were phasing between present and elsewhere. Medical staff moved toward them in alarm but stopped when Quinn's expression remained calm, almost peaceful, despite their body doing something that should have been impossible.

  Thirty seconds later they solidified again, but something in their eyes had changed. Something had settled. "I'm more real in there," Quinn said quietly. "More present. Specter makes me exist properly. When I'm connected, I'm certain. I can feel dimensional awareness flowing through systems. I can feel myself existing as something solid and present and undeniable. I need to connect again. I need to go back. Need to–"

  "You need to heal," Valen interrupted firmly. "First connection is complete. Now we continue integration. One more week, then actual training begins."

  Quinn looked toward Specter with an expression carrying something like grief. Being separated from the mech clearly hurt them in ways physical separation shouldn't cause.

  The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

  Milo touched Jinx and immediately started laughing, a high and slightly hysterical sound that suggested something between joy and terror. The laughter built, got louder, took on an edge of mania that made medical staff exchange concerned looks. They disconnected him early when the laughter wouldn't stop, when his body started shaking with the force of it.

  "It's brilliant," he gasped once he could speak through the laughter. "Buddy is brilliant and chaotic and it likes me. It wants to build things. Wants to break things. Wants to see what happens when we combine engineering genius with combat mech capability. It showed possibilities. Things we could create together. Modifications, improvements, experimental applications. And they're insane ideas, but they're also genius and I want to try them all and–" He kept laughing, couldn't stop. "We're going to do amazing terrible wonderful things together."

  "You're going to follow safety protocols," Valen said firmly. "But yes. You'll need to learn to balance its creativity with practical limitations."

  First connection complete. Thirty seconds of consciousness synchronization with beings pulled from dimensional space. Thirty seconds of experiencing what piloting actually meant, what they'd been building toward, what transformation enabled.

  Proof that the surgery had worked and their neural interface ports were integrating successfully. That in one more week, they'd be cleared for actual piloting training.

  That they were becoming what they'd chosen to become.

  Valoris stood beside Paragon, biological body still trembling with residual resonance, consciousness still adjusting to being compressed back into flesh after existing briefly as something vast.

  The final week of recovery passed in strange suspended anticipation mixed with increasing restlessness.

  Their ports were mostly healed externally, still raw internally, still requiring careful maintenance. But functional. Capable of sustaining connection long enough for basic piloting practice. Medical cleared them for initial training protocols.

  Valoris spent the time touching her ports. Not compulsively like Quinn or obsessively like Milo, just acknowledging. They were part of her now. Twelve points of metal-biological fusion, twelve permanent marks of transformation from baseline human to pilot.

  She could feel Paragon through them sometimes. Not active connection, just awareness bleeding through neural pathways that had grown around the port interfaces, consciousness extending into dimensional space where her mech waited patiently.

  We are adequate together, the presence repeated occasionally, and Valoris found herself believing it more each time.

  They were adequate. Maybe that was enough.

  Summer break began during their final healing week. Most second-year students departed for holiday: two months home before third year began, before actual pilot training commenced in earnest and everything got exponentially harder.

  Families sent messages to Chimera Squad too. Valoris's parents offered transport home, suggested rest and recovery in a familiar environment. Her grandmother sent a single message: Come home if you need to. Stay if you're stronger there. Trust yourself to know which.

  Zee's family wanted her back. They needed her presence, missed her, were proud she'd summoned successfully. They sent messages about family dinners, about siblings excited to see her. Come home, they said. We’ll figure out the cost.

  Saren had no one.

  Quinn's messages were minimal, clinical. Their family acknowledged successful summoning, noted recovery progress, did not request a return home, the absence of pressure to visit somehow more telling than explicit invitation.

  Milo's family sent enthusiastic messages about wanting to see him, wanting to celebrate transformation even though they were anxious about permanent modification to his nervous system.

  But Chimera Squad chose to stay.

  Not from obligation or because they had nowhere else to go, but by mutual unspoken decision that they wanted to be here, together. They wanted to share that experience as a squad rather than processing it separately in distant locations, wanted the support of people who understood exactly what they'd been through, what they'd become, what they were facing.

  Found family solidified through shared transformation.

  They spent the break at academy, mostly healed, ports integrated enough for basic comfort, preparing mentally for the challenges ahead.

  The academy felt different during summer break. Quieter, emptier, almost peaceful without the constant pressure of classes and rankings and competition. Instructors were present but less demanding. Training facilities open but not required. Time moved slower, gentler, allowing actual rest for the first time in two years.

  Chimera Squad used that time carefully.

  They trained lightly: physical conditioning to maintain strength, combat practice to keep skills sharp, meditation to continue developing dimensional awareness. But nothing intense. Nothing that risked injury or exhaustion. Just enough to feel productive without compromising healing.

  They studied, reading advanced piloting documentation, reviewing tactical manuals, preparing for third year curriculum that would assume they knew the basics and push them immediately into complex applications.

  They talked. Real conversations, not the exhausted exchanges that usually filled their limited free time. Conversations about what came next, about fears and hopes and expectations, about who they'd been before summoning and who they were becoming after surgery.

  Late one night, they gathered on the barracks roof, technically prohibited, but nobody enforced regulations against second-years who'd successfully summoned and survived surgical modification. They sat together under stars too distant to care about human concerns, talking quietly about transformation and consequence.

  "Four weeks since summoning," Zee said quietly. "Four weeks since everything changed. Feels longer. Feels like summoning happened months ago, years ago, like I can barely remember who I was before dimensional contact."

  "We're different now," Saren agreed. "Measurably different. Physically modified. Neurally integrated. Consciousness extended beyond baseline human limits. The people we were before summoning don't exist anymore. We're something other now."

  "Something other," Milo repeated. "That's accurate but also terrifying. We're not entirely human anymore. We have metal in our nervous systems. We can synchronize consciousness with our mechs. We've touched awareness beyond human comprehension. What does that make us?"

  "Pilots," Valoris said. "It makes us pilots. That's what we chose to become."

  "Did we know what we were choosing?" Quinn asked. "Did we understand the full cost before we paid it?"

  Silence for several seconds.

  "No," Valoris admitted. "I don't think we did. I knew theoretically. Saw ports on family members my entire life. Read the documentation. Understood intellectually. But I didn't know what it would feel like. Didn't understand how permanent modification would change my sense of self. Didn't fully comprehend what it meant to have technology fused with biology until it was done and irreversible."

  "Would you undo it?" Zee asked. "If you could? If there was surgery to remove the ports, to reverse the modification, to make you baseline human again, would you do it?"

  Valoris considered the question carefully, touching the port at the base of her skull. "No," she said finally. "Not because I don't sometimes wish I'd understood better before choosing. But because this is what I am now. Modified human. Proto-pilot. A person bound to Paragon through neural interface and shared consciousness. Going back wouldn't make me who I was before. It would just make me a broken version of who I am now."

  "Same," Zee said. "I hate what surgery felt like. Hated the helplessness during recovery. Hate knowing I'm permanently modified. But I don't want to undo it. I want to move forward. I want to learn what I can do with this modification. I want to see if transformation was worth the cost."

  "It will be," Quinn said with quiet certainty. "Connection proved it. Thirty seconds of synchronization with Specter proved that everything was necessary. Worth it. Right. I'm more real now than I've ever been. That's worth permanent modification."

  "I'm still terrified," Milo admitted. "Still processing. Still adjusting to having metal in my nervous system. But I'm also excited. Curious. Buddy showed me possibilities during our brief connection. Things we could create together. And I want to explore those possibilities. Want to see what engineering genius can accomplish when properly synchronized. So no. I wouldn't undo it. Even though it's terrifying. Even though I sometimes wake up and touch the ports and feel panic that they're permanent. I wouldn't undo it."

  Saren was quiet for longer, staring at stars that existed light-years away, consciousness perhaps reaching toward distances that made their transformation seem insignificant by comparison. "My parents died in a corruption zone," she said finally. "Dimensional contamination that spread faster than evacuation protocols."

  She touched the cervical ports in her neck carefully.

  "My modification is different. It's purposeful. Controlled. Accepted. I chose this. Understood the cost. Paid it willingly. And that matters. My parents were consumed by dimensional contamination they didn't choose, didn't understand, couldn't control. My transformation is exactly the opposite: deliberate integration with dimensional technology under medical supervision. I'm using what killed them. Turning it into something meaningful. So no, I wouldn't undo it. Because this modification honors their memory by proving that dimensional contact doesn't have to be death. It can be transformation. Purpose. Choice."

  The weight of that settled over them like a blanket, heavy but comforting, acknowledgment that transformation carried cost but also meaning.

  "Four days until third year starts," Valoris said quietly. "Four days until we begin actual pilot training. Until we learn whether everything we've done was an adequate foundation for what comes next."

  "We'll be adequate," Zee said. "We survived everything so far. We'll survive training too."

  "Together," Saren added.

  "Together," they all confirmed.

  Valoris touched the port at the base of her skull, warm metal integrated with bone, permanent marking of transformation. In four days they'd begin learning to pilot. Learning to synchronize consciousness with mechs pulled from dimensional space. Learning to operate weapons formed from dimensional substrate through neural interfaces drilled into their nervous systems.

  They were ready. As ready as anyone could be.

  Adequate.

  When third year began, Chimera Squad walked toward the pilot training facilities with neural interface ports fully healed, mechs summoned and waiting, and determination forged through shared transformation.

  Medical cleared them without hesitation. Ports integrated successfully, neural pathways developed properly, consciousness synchronization demonstrated through brief connection test. They were ready to learn whether transformation would enable capability or just mark them as different.

  They passed other squads in the corridors: students whose ports gleamed silver against various skin tones, modifications identical in form but unique in meaning. Some met their eyes with recognition that came from shared experience. Others looked away, still processing their own transformations, not ready to acknowledge what they'd all become.

  Valoris felt Paragon waiting in the distance, its consciousness reaching toward her through neural pathways that connected them now. Patient and adequate, ready to begin actual partnership.

  She touched the port at the base of her skull one more time.

  We are adequate together, she thought toward the presence.

  Yes, it seemed to respond. We are adequate. Now we learn to be more.

  Four weeks of recovery complete. Their ports were healed. Bodies adapted.

  Time to learn to pilot.

  Time to discover whether everything they'd sacrificed would enable them to become what they'd been building toward.

  Time to see if adequate was enough.

  Who's your favorite squad member?