Page 74 of Third

That was when it turned toward her again, almost as though the stabilizer drewit.

She raised the weapon.

And fired.

Once. Twice. Then again.

The last shot punched through the creature’s neck joint—what passed for it—splintering vertebrae and severing the long column of muscle beneath. Its head jerked sideways with a wet crack, limbs twitching once in spasm before collapsing all at once like a puppet dropped from a great height. The creature buckled—collapsed to its knees, then flat. Afinal hiss escaped its lungs, like the air leaving a rupturedtank.

And then it stopped moving.

For several long seconds, Anya couldn’t breathe. Not from exertion. Not from fear. It was as if her lungs had locked shut, stunned by what they’d just survived. Then the dam broke. Her breath came too fast—ragged, uneven, tearing past her lips in quick, shallow gasps. Her hands shook.

Tor’Vek stood above the creature, panting, his blade still poised.

“Is it dead?” she asked, struggling to hold back hersobs.

He didn’t answer for a beat. Then: “Yes.”

He turned toward her. Blood streaked his temple. His side. But he was alive.

And so wasshe.

And the stabilizer? Still intact.

The silence that followed was worse than the fight itself. It settled over them thick and absolute, broken only by the staggered drag of exhaustion through their lungs and the distant hum of corridor systems that no longer sounded neutral. Anya’s legs nearly gave. Tor’Vek lowered his blade, slowly, as if unsure it was safe to let go. They exchanged a glance—no words, no comfort, just the shared shock of survival.

Because now they had to keep moving.

And there was no strength left to spare.

The creature’s body cooled slowly, its limbs twitching once more before falling still forgood.

Then came thehiss.

Behind it, the thick slab of alloy that had sealed the corridor began to retract. Slow. Mechanical. Not a surrender. Arelease. As if something had watched and waited, and now that the fight was over, it had no more use for confinement.

Anya’s pulse spiked all over again. The timing was too perfect. As if the walls themselves had been watching, calculating. As if this wasn’t coincidence at all—but something orchestrated. Her skin crawled with the sense of being observed, of a presence just beyond perception pulling strings she couldn’tsee.

She turned to Tor’Vek, her voice low. “Was this a test?” The bond flickered faintly between them, strained and crackling—tainted by adrenaline, but alive. Even in this moment, with the reek of blood in her nose and death at their backs, her body registered his nearness. The sweat on his neck. The heat radiating off him. How badly she wanted to reach for him—and how wrong it would be. How necessary.

He didn’t answer. But his jaw tightened. He checked the bracelet countdown and stiffened. Twenty-two solar units. He jerked his head in the direction of the access panel. “We need tomove.”

They moved.Fast.

Tor’Vek led the way forward, every motion swift and deliberate, weapon still in hand. They stepped through the new opening, past the crushed remains of the creature. Past the fluid it had spilled. Past the smell of death.

And back into the crumbling corridormaze.

It felt emptier now. But not safer. The air had a different weight to it—too quiet, too still. Every step echoed back at them sharper than before, and somewhere beneath it all was the faint, irregular pulse of vibrations underfoot, like the structure was waiting to shift again.

They navigating a new route through the maze. Aspider-scout carcass marked one of their turns, silent witnesses to everything that had happened. The walls groaned again, but held. The cracks widened underfoot, but didn’t break.

When they reached the final tunnel leading to the access panel, Anya nearly collapsed.

But she didn’t.

Because the valley still waited.

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