Page 41 of Rupture

A piercing whine filled the lab, drilling into Finn’s skull and making his teeth ache.

The scorpion convulsed violently, yet it kept coming with jerky, relentless steps.

“Goddammit!” Finn unleashed another barrage. Blue streaks illuminated the lab like a strobe, as it staggered forward.

A sharp hiss stung his hearing.

Rose.

With a guttural cry fueled by terror, she unloaded a fire extinguisher in a dense blast of carbon dioxide.

The chemical fog enveloped the scorpion in a suffocating mist, clinging to its limbs and joints in a frost-coated haze. Its luminescence stuttered and dimmed, legs spasming sluggishly.

“Now!” Rose screamed, her voice raw.

Finn didn’t hesitate. He aimed at the scorpion’s frozen center and squeezed the trigger.

The shot hit like a thunderclap, the pulse energyexploding through its brittle form. Silver light erupted, filling the lab in a blinding flash.

The scorpion convulsed one final time, its body spasming violently. With a sickening, wet crack, it split apart. Fragments of carapace shattered outward, spraying across the lab.

Finn winced as pieces spattered his arms and face.

What the absolute fuck.

The shrill whine faded, leaving only the sound of his ragged breathing and the faint hiss of the extinguisher.

Rose slumped against him, panting, her grip on the extinguisher loose.

Cold sweat slicked the base of his spine as Finn swept the room with his pulse rifle, scanning the dark corners.Too fucking close.

“Rose. You okay?”

“I think so.” Her voice wavered, and the extinguisher slipped from her hands, hitting the floor with a metallic clang.

“—fucking chairborne rangers in the OSC, sending us down here blind. They fuckingknewthis place was FUBAR. Bad voodoo going on here, I’m telling you?—“

Finn flinched as Luca’s voice burst through the comms, a flood of profanity cutting through the quiet like shrapnel.

The lights flared back on, flooding the lab with brilliant white. Finn blinked hard against the sudden glare. One by one, the computers hummed to life, their coolant fans filling the room with a soft, mechanical purr.

For a moment, it felt surreal. If not for the splattered guts of the scorpion splashed across the floor—he might’ve doubted it had happened at all.

He nudged the broken carapace with his boot, the sticky mess smearing across the floor. “What the hell just happened?”

23

Rose touched her face.Sticky and warm.With what?

Scorpion innards?

She swallowed hard, fighting the bile that surged in her throat. Her fingers fumbled in her pocket for a Kleenex. She wiped at her cheeks, but the smear of gore only seemed to spread. What the hell was Thea working on down here?

Finn’s boots scuffed against the tiles as he paced the lab, pulse rifle at the ready. He checked every corner, even though the lights were back on and the computers hummed reassuringly.

“This your sister’s lab?” He asked from the far side of the room.

She nodded, her stomach twisting, the memory of Finn’s perfect kiss as distant as if it had happened years ago.

---