Chapter 63: The Breach

Darek was waiting at Western Access with blood on his sleeve. Not his. Nate knew because Darek wasn’t paying attention to it.

"How bad?"

"Survey team missed check-in. Two came back."

"How many went in?"

"Six."

Nate looked toward the gate. The normal preparation area had been cleared, medics occupying one wall. A man Nate recognized from Survey sat on the floor with a blanket around his shoulders while someone wrapped his forearm. The second survivor was arguing with Tessa.

"Four still inside?"

Darek handed Nate a field vest. "Three confirmed. One unknown."

"What happened?"

"Floor moved."

Nate stopped fastening the vest.

Darek looked at him. "More than last time."

That was enough.

Nate checked Graveshare. Seven Marks. Reserve unchanged. The claimed Skill still sat behind his third Node, untouched, waiting on a decision he hadn’t made yet.

Darek noticed something anyway. "You injured?"

"No."

"Then what?"

Nate tightened the vest. "Claimed a Skill this morning."

Darek went still. "Integrated?"

"No. In reserve."

"And you came here anyway."

"You called."

Darek stared at him. Nate waited.

"You’re going to make me regret having your number."

"Probably."

"Don’t use it unless you have to."

Nate looked toward the gate. "That wasn’t the plan."

Darek opened it.

Western Access felt wrong before Nate saw anything. The first service corridor was intact. Lights worked. The rails embedded in the floor still led where they were supposed to. But the air carried a vibration that came and went beneath his boots.

Tessa walked ahead with a handheld scanner. Nora followed behind Nate. Darek had brought only four people.

That bothered Nate. "Where’s the rest?"

"Surface."

"Why?"

Tessa answered without looking back. "Because every additional person is another body we may have to extract."

They reached the first junction. A red line had been painted across the floor, and Nate remembered it from previous deployments. Beyond it, the corridor should have continued thirty metres before bending left.

It now bent after eleven.

Nate stared. There was no rubble, no collapsed wall. The corridor simply turned earlier.

"That’s new."

"Very," Tessa said. She marked the location.

Darek didn’t slow. They followed the bend.

The wall beyond it had been split open. Not broken. Separated. Two black panels had pulled apart far enough to create a narrow gap, and something had scraped the floor around it.

Nora crouched. "Blood."

Darek looked at her. "Human?"

She touched nothing. "Probably."

A sound came from beyond the gap. Three knocks. Pause. Two more.

Darek moved first. "Survey signal."

Tessa raised her scanner. "Seven metres."

"Alive?"

"It doesn’t tell me that."

Another three knocks.

Nate stepped toward the opening. Darek caught his vest. "Wait."

The vibration returned. This time Nate felt the floor shift before he saw it.

Darek released him.

The corridor moved sideways. Not much. Maybe fifteen centimetres. Enough to make the black-panel gap narrow. A metallic scream came from beyond it.

"Move."

Darek reached the opening. Nate followed. The gap was barely wide enough for him, and Graveshare scraped one side. Nora came through after.

Tessa stayed outside. "Twenty seconds!" she called.

"To what?" Nate asked.

"No idea!"

That wasn’t comforting.

The space beyond had once been a maintenance room. Now one wall leaned inward and two equipment racks lay on the floor. A Survey worker was pinned between one of them and the wall. Another sat beside him holding pressure against his thigh. The third was standing near the far door.

"Where’s Vale?" Darek asked.

The standing man pointed. "Other side."

The far door was bent inward. Something hit it. Once. The metal flexed.

Nate drew Graveshare. The black material formed along his forearm.

The standing surveyor saw it. "That’s not Vale."

"I guessed."

Another impact. The door split near the hinge.

Darek looked at Nora. "Get the pinned one." Then at Nate. "With me."

Nate opened his First Circuit. The restored shoulder resisted for half a second. Then current passed. Cleaner than before.

The far door came off the frame. Something crawled through.

Nate had never seen one. It was roughly human in height only because its front limbs were too long to let the rest of its body rise fully. Six limbs, the rear pair dragging close to the floor. Its torso looked plated rather than skinned, pale sections overlapping from neck to abdomen. The head had no visible eyes. A vertical opening ran from its jaw almost to the top of the skull.

It opened. Thin structures unfolded from inside.

Darek stepped forward. "Don’t let those touch you."

Nate didn’t ask why.

The creature crossed the room with almost no warning. Fast.

Darek met it first. His baton struck one forelimb. The impact should have turned the creature. It didn’t. Its body folded around the strike. Not dodged. Folded. The torso bent at an angle Nate’s spine hurt to look at, and the head continued toward Darek.

Nate moved.

Killing Step. The creature had committed forward. Nate entered its side. Mourning Edge formed. He cut toward the exposed joint beneath the front plate.

The creature changed direction. Too quickly.

Nate saw the limb coming. His first step was already committed.

His body wanted Second Vector. The reserve sat uselessly beyond reach.

Nate used the cruder thing he’d actually learned instead. Current entered midway through his step. His direction changed only slightly. Enough. The creature’s limb missed his ribs.

His knee did not enjoy the correction. But Nate was still standing, and now he was behind it.

Mourning Edge went in. The blade cut between two plates. Dark fluid sprayed across his hand.

The creature twisted. Darek struck its head. This time the wall cracked behind it. The thing dropped.

Nate backed away.

Darek looked at him. "That the new one?"

"It’s still in reserve."

"Then what was that?"

"Something cruder."

"Ugly."

"It worked."

"Your knee disagrees."

The creature moved. Nate saw it before Darek did. "Still alive."

Darek turned. The wound Nate had cut was closing. Not healing normally. The two plates were pulling back toward each other, the dark fluid reversing along the surface.

Nate stared. "That’s fast."

Darek hit it again. Harder. The creature skidded across the floor, its body folding under the impact. Then it started returning to shape.

Nate felt something from Forsaken Claim. Not a prompt. A pressure. Similar to the instant before a rejected Skill appeared.

He looked at the creature. The sensation strengthened.

"Darek."

"What?"

"Something’s wrong with it."

"Specific."

"I don’t know."

The creature rose again.

Nate closed distance before it finished. Killing Step. It reacted to his first angle. He shifted current into the second half of the step, the same crude correction, smaller this time, controlled. His foot landed cleanly.

Mourning Edge entered through the damaged plate and drove deeper. The creature convulsed. Darek’s baton came down on the same point. The head hit the floor. Once. Twice. Then stopped.

The wound tried to close again. Slower.

Nate kept Graveshare inside it. The armament drank nothing. No reserve change. But the black edge physically prevented the plates from meeting.

Darek noticed. "Hold it."

Nate did. Darek put one boot on the creature’s neck. His next strike broke whatever structure sat beneath the skull.

The body went slack. This time it stayed that way.

Nate withdrew Mourning Edge. Reserve had dropped slightly from use. He didn’t check the exact number.

Nora shouted from behind them. "Need hands."

They turned. The pinned Survey worker was conscious. Barely. The rack had crushed one leg below the knee.

Darek grabbed one side. Nate took the other. His shoulder held. That almost distracted him.

"Lift."

They raised the rack. Nora dragged the worker free.

The corridor vibrated again. The Survey man by the door looked toward the gap. "That happened before it changed last time."

Darek swore. "Nora?"

"Need thirty seconds."

"You have fifteen."

"Then help."

Darek did.

Nate moved to the far door. "Vale?"

The standing surveyor looked at him. "She was behind that."

The passage beyond the door was dark.

"How long?"

"Five minutes. Maybe six."

Nate looked at Darek. Darek already knew what he was asking. "No."

"She’s close."

"We have one critical casualty."

Another vibration. Longer this time. The floor shifted beneath Nate. He caught his balance manually, current arriving a half-beat after his weight did, correcting rather than leading.

The wall at the far end slid several centimetres across the doorway.

Darek pointed toward the exit. "Out."

The standing surveyor didn’t move. "Vale."

Darek grabbed the front of his vest. "If she’s alive when this stabilizes, we go back."

"If it stabilizes."

"Then staying here won’t help her."

The man looked toward the dark passage. Nate did too.

Something flashed at the edge of his vision. Not movement. His hidden interface.

Forsaken Claim had opened.

There was no candidate, no Array, no Skill selection. Only a sensation Nate had never felt from it before.

He looked back at the dead creature. Nothing. Then toward the dark corridor. Stronger.

Nate took one step. Text formed.

REJECTED RESONANCE DETECTED

He stopped.

Darek looked over. "Calder."

Nate barely heard him. A second line appeared.

ORIGIN NOT WITNESSED

Then:

CLAIM UNAVAILABLE

Nate stared into the darkness. There was something down there. Not a Skill he could take. Not yet.

The wall moved again, this time hard enough to throw the standing surveyor sideways. Darek caught him.

"Nate!"

Nate closed the interface. He ran.

They squeezed through the black-panel gap just before the walls shifted again. Tessa pulled Nora through. Darek came next. Nate was last.

Graveshare caught against the narrowing gap. For half a second, he stuck. The panels pressed inward. Nate twisted. Wrong angle. He forced current into the turn anyway, hips changing direction after his shoulder had already committed. Pain flashed down his side.

Then he was through.

The panels slammed together behind him. The gap vanished. Not narrowed. Gone. The wall looked continuous.

Tessa stared at it. "Where’s the door?"

Nobody answered.

The injured Survey worker groaned. Nora knelt beside him.

Darek looked at Nate. "You good?"

Nate touched his ribs. "Yeah."

His knee hurt. His third Node remained empty, the claimed Skill still sitting untouched behind it. His Core had dropped more than he’d expected.

But the shoulder held.

Darek looked at the sealed wall. "We’re leaving."

The surviving surveyor stared at him. "Vale’s still in there."

"I know."

"We can’t leave her."

Darek’s jaw tightened. "We’re getting him to medical, then coming back with people who can open that wall."

The man looked like he wanted to argue. Nora said his name. Quietly. That stopped him.

They started moving. Nate followed.

Three corridors later, Forsaken Claim reacted again. Much weaker. He looked back. Nothing visible. The sensation faded as they climbed.

The casualty went straight to surgery. The second survivor stayed outside medical with both hands covered in someone else’s blood. Darek disappeared into Operations.

Nate sat on the floor beside the preparation lockers because every chair was occupied. His knee had swollen.

Nora handed him a cold pack. "Ten minutes."

"It’s fine."

"Then hold it for fun."

Nate put it over the knee.

Across the room, Tessa was replaying helmet footage. The creature appeared on one screen. Its body folding around Darek’s first strike. Its wound closing.

Then Nate heard Tessa say, "Pause."

Someone paused it. She enlarged the frame. Nate couldn’t see what she was looking at.

His terminal vibrated. Seris.

Heard there was a breach.

Nate typed with one hand. Yeah.

Three dots appeared. How bad?

Nate looked toward medical. Then at the footage of the creature. Then at the sealed gate to Western Access.

One missing. One critical.

Seris took longer this time. You?

Nate looked at his shoulder. Raised it once. No pain. Then his knee.

He typed: Still here.

He almost put the terminal away.

Forsaken Claim flickered again. Only once. A ghost of the same message.

REJECTED RESONANCE

Nate looked toward the floor.

Whatever he’d felt wasn’t gone. It was beneath him.