Verzius hacks the bay controls with the same calm he uses to fix my comms after I break them. The man may joke like a drunk pirate, but he handles tech like it’s an extension of his own damn skin.
The skimmer hums to life.
“We get in,” I say, voice low. “We extract her. We blow the lab if we have to. If she’s in containment, we override the field with the breaker key.”
“You still carry that?”
“Never stopped.”
Verzius nods. “Then we go dark. No traces. No questions.”
We launch.
Stars whip past the viewport.
I tighten my grip on the control yoke.
This time, I’m not letting anyone take her from me.
CHAPTER 42
NOVA
Iwake to plastic biting into my wrists and darkness so dense it presses against my face like a second skin.
My breathing’s loud in the box.
The air is metallic—stale, recycled. Everything smells like cold circuitry and the oil-soaked tang of machinery. There’s a steady hum vibrating through the walls, low and pulsing, like a beast just under the floor.
I’m in something.
Insidesomething.
I shift, try to sit, but my knees slam into the wall. No space. My head knocks the ceiling, hard. Zip ties bite into my wrists when I move, cinched behind my back. One’s already cut into skin—I can feel the tacky warmth trickling down.
I blink until my vision adjusts to the green-tinted emergency diode blinking in front of me.
One every few seconds.
Like a pulse.
Like a countdown.
“Nova Calix,” comes Stark’s voice, all syrup and arrogance, filtering through a nearby speaker grille. “You’re part of history now. That’s something, isn’t it?”
My stomach turns.
“I told them,” he says, rambling like he’s on stage. “Told them the old laws couldn’t bind the future. But progress doesn’t wait for permission. It consumes the hesitant. And rewards the bold.”
There’s a sick little chuckle.
“I’ll be remembered,” he whispers, like the thought gets him high.
My heart slams into my ribs.
He’s launching me.
Into the wormhole.
