Page 27

At the center: Kang. He wears his uniform open at the collar, tattoos even sharper in the harsh LED flood of the drones hovering overhead. He directs with minimalist gestures, never needing to speak above a whisper. His face is unreadable. Sometimes he glances at the sky, at the glimmer of the aurora, as if watching for something only he can see.

They start in the top lab. Two men split left, two sweep right. The woman hangs back, running a geiger counter along the floor and walls. Kang is last, pausing to touch the cold surface of a Sphere embedded in the hallway. He lingers, his hand splayed against the glass, and for a moment the blue light flares brighter, illuminating the bones of his hand.

Maven tugs my sleeve, a question in their eyes: Are we dead?

I shake my head, but the truth is, I don’t know. The crawl space smells of old dust and animal piss, and every muscle in my legs wants to run. But something else keeps me anchored—the way Kang moves, the way he leans into every new room, never flinching from the things that have killed a hundred men before him.

One of the soldiers finds the staircase, the passage Maven and I used. They shout for Kang, who moves to the mouth of the stairwell and peers down. He doesn’t order a charge. He just waits.

A soldier edges down the steps, flashlight strobing the walls. I count the seconds—eight, nine, ten—then a bark of radio static: “Clear.” Kang follows, and so do two others. They descend in silence. The woman remains at the top, her eyes sweeping the perimeter with a calm that makes me nervous.

Maven leans in. “If we move now, we can get to the service ladder and out.”

I want to believe it. But something is off. I glance back at the panel, the code I’d punched in still blinking a slow, insistent yellow. The Spheres along the wall pulse in sequence, the whole corridor humming like a live wire.

It hits me then: Kang isn’t here to sweep. He’s here to trigger something. To see what happens when the Spheres go hot.

I hold Maven’s arm and whisper, “Wait.”

A half-minute later, the patrol emerges from the stairwell, dragging a plastic bin filled with Sphere fragments and twisted bits of lab equipment. Kang brings up the rear, his hands empty but his gaze laser-sharp. He gives a short command. The soldiers move to the perimeter, forming a loose circle around the ruins.

Kang stands in the center, staring up at the drones. He mutters a string of numbers—too low to catch—and the Spheres in the wall react, their light cycling from blue to red and back again. He watches them, expressionless, as if he’s memorizing the color sequence.

A soldier steps out of line. “Sir, it’s just a bunch of trash. Nothing left worth taking.”

Kang doesn’t look at him. “Do the job. Full sweep. Protocol’s been violated in this sector.”

The soldier grumbles, but obeys.

Maven shifts, prepping for the run. But the noise makes a chunk of the crawlspace ceiling crumble—a small slide of dirt and charred insulation. The sound is nothing, really, but Kang hears it.

He’s in motion before the rest of the squad even processes the anomaly. He signals the nearest soldier, then strides toward our hiding place with a predator’s certainty, rifle up but not aimed.

The moment before he breaches, I see his eyes—green and clear and full of the kind of hunger that doesn’t belong to men who just follow orders. There’s recognition there, not of my face, but of the pattern. The way I’m hiding, the way I’m waiting, the way I’m about to run.

Kang’s face hardens. He mouths a word, just for me: “Now.”

I grab Maven and we bolt. We break through the back end of the vent, hit the dirt hard, and sprint for the river cut. Maven yelps as a thorn tears their sleeve, but we keep going, fueled by the pure animal knowledge that the next bullet might have our name on it.

Kang’s soldiers give chase, but not with much enthusiasm—they’re not here for prisoners. They’re here for what we already found.

We reach the old river, plunge into the gully, and use the curve of the bank to cover our escape. After a hundred meters, we double back, making sure we’re not followed. Maven huffs, spit and blood streaking their chin.

We crawl into a drainage pipe and collapse, lungs burning. Maven laughs, a sharp, shocked sound. “You fucking maniac,” they say, shaking their head. “You could have got us killed.”

I stare at the darkness above. “He knew we were there.”

“What?”

“Kang. He wanted to see what we would do.”

Maven grunts. “He’s insane. Or he thinks you’re worth more alive than dead.”

The headache starts then, not a throb but a full-spectrum burn behind my eyes. I pop one of Elara’s black pills, chew it, and taste charcoal and something sweet.

For a long time, we lie there, catching our breath.

Then, from the far end of the pipe, a voice—soft, echoing: “Diana. If you’re listening, I’ll be at the basin at dawn. Don’t be late.”