The smoke had not yet cleared from the Battle of Baler when the weight of victory began to press upon the shoulders of the revolutionaries. The battlefield, still littered with bodies—both mechanical and human—was now a graveyard of silence and reflection. But there was little time to mourn. Elijah Vega knew that the real war was only just beginning.
The liberated town became the center of revolutionary activity. Barracks were converted from collapsed warehouses, and churches became command posts. Farmers returned from the hills to reclaim burned fields. Engineers from Manila—brought by Luna's orders—began dismantling the remnants of Raines' technology, carefully salvaging what they could use and destroying what they couldn't understand.
In the center of it all, the revolutionary council convened.
Aguinaldo presided at the head of a long table inside the restored municipal hall. Elijah, General Luna, Isa, and various commanders and regional leaders filled the seats. The atmosphere was tense.
"Victory has a price," Aguinaldo began. "We've earned our independence in blood. But now we must protect it with discipline and unity. We can no longer afford internal fractures."
General Luna leaned forward, arms crossed. "Then we must centralize command. No more independent militias or local caudillos doing as they please. The army must be one fist."
A murmur passed through the room. A provincial captain from Pampanga slammed his palm on the table. "We fought with our own men, our own guns! You want us to hand it all over to a Manila-based army? That's no better than the Spaniards!"
Elijah watched carefully. He had seen this kind of tension before—in the future. Victory could unify. But rebuilding? Rebuilding fractured.
"We need a unified front," Elijah said, his voice calm but firm. "But not a dictatorship. We must agree on a shared command structure. Rotating councils, perhaps—regional representation."
Luna scowled. "That's a recipe for indecision."
"And a single commander," Isa interjected, "is a recipe for civil war."
Aguinaldo raised his hand. "Enough. We must compromise. We will form a Revolutionary Assembly—three leaders from Luzon, two from Visayas, and one from Mindanao. Strategic decisions go through this council. Day-to-day tactics fall to generals in the field."
It wasn't perfect. But it would do—for now.
Wounds Beneath the Surface
Despite progress in organization, the deeper wounds were harder to heal.
Old rivalries surfaced: regional jealousies, accusations of cowardice during the battle, whispers that Luna was plotting to seize full control.
One night, Elijah found himself alone on the church's rooftop, watching the workers below repair a damaged irrigation system using parts salvaged from Raines' machines.
Isa joined him, holding two mugs of ginger tea. "You've been quiet."
"I'm worried," he admitted. "This feels like the calm before a storm. Everyone's smiling during the day, but by night, the knives are sharpening."
Isa handed him a mug. "Revolutions are always messy. But that doesn't mean they're doomed. We just have to hold the center."
He took a sip. "And what if the center collapses?"
She smiled faintly. "Then we rebuild it again. Together."
Seeds of Division
A week later, a new crisis erupted.
General Luna arrested three local officers in Nueva Ecija, accusing them of hoarding weapons and refusing to report to central command. Their execution—done without Aguinaldo's approval—sent shockwaves through the leadership.
Elijah confronted Luna the next day in his headquarters.
"You're going too far," he said.
"They were traitors," Luna snapped. "Cowards who endangered our cause."
"Maybe," Elijah replied. "But we're supposed to be building something better. If you start ruling by fear—what separates you from Raines?"
Luna's jaw tightened. "I do what needs to be done. You want politics, go sit with the council. I'm here to win wars."
Isa, ever the diplomat, stepped between them. "We need you both. But not like this. We'll lose everything we've gained if we don't learn to trust."
Luna walked away without another word.
The Echoes of the Future
That night, Elijah returned to the underground chamber where Adrian and a small team of scientists were experimenting with one of Raines' deactivated data cores. The machine still pulsed faintly, like a dying star.
"Any progress?" Elijah asked.
Adrian shook his head. "It's locked. Encrypted with something I've never seen. But I did find something... strange."
He turned a dial. A screen flickered to life. Lines of fragmented data streamed by, then resolved into a single, blurry image:
A woman's face—cold, pale, cybernetic.
"Who is she?" Isa asked, alarmed.
Adrian's voice was barely a whisper. "Not sure. But her name appears everywhere. 'Virek.' And there's a phrase repeated in the metadata."
He read it aloud.
"Phase Two: Awakening."