“I know.”
Everyone looks at me.
Fragments flash violently through my mind now.
Training simulations.
Emergency drills.
Wu teaching containment procedures to “advanced subjects.”
Dear God.
They prepared children to maintain reactors.
Clay sees realization hit me.
And panic floods his face.
“No.”
His voice breaks slightly.
“Hannah, absolutely not.”
I grab his hand hard.
And for one second—
everything slows.
The bunker.
The alarms.
The war.
Just him.
The man who taught me what love felt like after a lifetime without it.
“You said we end this together,” I whisper.
Clay shakes his head instantly.
“This isn’t together.”
The pain in his voice nearly destroys me.
Above us…the reactor shields begin collapsing one by one.
Blue-white energy flashes violently through the chamber.
Gabriel looks seconds from panic now.
“We are out of time!”
Wu watches us all with bloodied amusement from the floor.
