As Abene, Wilken, Miki, and SecUnit follow Hirune’s still-active feed deeper into the dark facility, Abene begins to treat SecUnit as her real ally rather than as Wilken’s suspicious outsider. SecUnit tells Abene that Hirune was likely taken by a retrieval device as part of a larger trap and explains that the attacker probably wants to draw the team farther in and kill them. Abene accepts SecUnit’s help, and SecUnit admits it was secretly gathering evidence of GrayCris violations. Their discussion also sharpens the divide between Abene and Wilken, whose confidence in SecUnit is low and whose priority seems to be limiting losses rather than recovering Hirune.

In a large transition chamber, SecUnit realizes the storm-like interference masking their scans is actually being used strategically. Before it can fully warn the others, a combat bot attacks from above. SecUnit pulls Abene out of danger, leaves Miki to guard her, and returns to help Wilken. Using Wilken’s explosives and its own speed, SecUnit blinds the bot, attaches explosive packs, and destroys it after a brutal close fight. The victory proves that the facility is defended by military-grade machines, not simple raiders, and it makes SecUnit realize the remaining bots will now know a SecUnit is opposing them.

After the fight, a hostile combat bot sends direct queries and threats over the feed, confirming that multiple enemy units are active and coordinated. SecUnit reasons that the bots were probably activated remotely after the shuttle arrived and may be acting under a GrayCris plan, though perhaps without a controller on-site. SecUnit scouts ahead with Wilken and spots Hirune in the engineering pod, guarded by at least two more combat bots and a large swarm of armed drones. Wilken responds by proposing to send SecUnit in as a distraction so she can try to recover Hirune, treating SecUnit as expendable. SecUnit privately assures Abene and Miki that it has a different plan.

Instead of walking blindly into Wilken’s trap, SecUnit hides in an access tube, lures a sentry drone close with fake human comm traffic, and hacks it using stolen drone-control keys. Through that drone, SecUnit seizes control of the whole drone group and orders them to attack the combat bots in the engineering pod. While the bots and drones fight each other, SecUnit rushes in, grabs the semiconscious Hirune, and escapes through a lift that it has already commandeered. The fighting badly damages the bots and costs most of the drones, but SecUnit is also wounded by shrapnel and stray fire. Even so, it succeeds in retrieving Hirune alive.

As SecUnit carries Hirune back, it discovers that Wilken has dropped all pretense. While SecUnit was occupied, Wilken tried to murder Abene at close range, revealing herself as GrayCris’s infiltrator. Miki intervenes to save Abene and loses a hand in the struggle. SecUnit hacks Wilken’s powered armor, freezes her in place, cuts off her communications, and prevents her from signaling Gerth. Abene stops SecUnit from killing Wilken, arguing that Wilken is more valuable as a witness against GrayCris, and SecUnit leaves her alive but immobilized.

While retreating with Abene, Miki, and Hirune, SecUnit analyzes the attacks and reaches a more precise conclusion: the combat bots and drones were not newly sent for this mission but were part of the facility from the beginning, placed there to protect GrayCris’s illegal operation and likely abandoned in sleep mode when the site was deserted. Wilken and Gerth appear to have been hired separately to kill the assessment team, and GrayCris probably never warned them about the bots, meaning GrayCris was willing to sacrifice its own mercenaries as well. Since Gerth is still aboard the shuttle and may already control or threaten the remaining team members, SecUnit concludes the group must act fast and proposes heading back to the geo pod as it forms a new, risky plan.