The creature screeches, mandibles flaring. One of its legs claws at the railing—melting it. I smell the acid before it hits. The reek of burning metal and something like scorched rotten eggs fills the air.
Valtron doesn’t slow down.
At the third-floor landing, he shoves me hard behind him. “Duck!”
I barely make it down when he pivots, lobs a mini gravity mine underhand like it’s a toy, and it sticks to the creature’s chest. One pulse later—it implodes.
No boom. No mess. Just a sickeningcrunchand a collapse of limbs as the thing folds in on itself and craters the fire escape platform.
Valtron grabs my hand. “Jump.”
“You’re INSANE!”
“Trust me.”
There’s that word again.
We fall.
Four stories is a lot longer than it looks. Time slows. Wind roars past my ears. My breath gets stuck in my throat. And just before I scream, the gravity mine on his belt pulses, sending out a ripple that deadens the fall like slamming into jello.
We hit the ground rolling. I come up coughing and bruised, but alive.
Not for long, though—not if the whine of oncoming engines means what I think it does.
Alliance security skimmers zip past, blue lights flashing, sirens warbling like they’re allergic to subtlety. One slows—scans us—and turns red.
“Crap,” I breathe.
Valtron snarls something in Vakutan. It sounds like someone gargling nails. Then he grabs my wrist again and yanks us into the nearest alley.
“We need wheels.”
A grav-bike hums to a halt near a noodle cart. Its owner—a guy maybe five feet tall soaking wet—is slurping soup. He blinks up at us. Doesn’t even get a word out.
Valtron punches him. Down he goes.
“Valtron!”
“What?” He straddles the bike, shoving wires around like he’s played this game before. “He’s lucky I didn’t rip his arm off.”
“Maybe you could TRY not being a psycho for FIVE minutes?” I hiss, hopping onto the back. My arms go around his waist before I can think about it.
He smirks. “You used to like that part.”
That. That right there. That flicker of his mouth, the hint of smug memory—him pressed against me, teeth scraping my neck, hands mapping me like I was a system he was trained to infiltrate. Heat surges up my spine, and not from the explosions.
“I must’ve had a head injury,” I mutter.
But I don’t let go.
The grav-bike roars beneath us, slicing through the night like it’s got somewhere better to be. Valtron leans into the turns like a man born in motion, and I cling to him like he’s the only stable thing left in my world—which, right now, might actually be true.
The city blurs past in neon streaks and gutter steam. We dart between old construction rigs, collapsed overpasses, and gutted retail blocks that haven’t seen a customer since the last economy crash. He’s heading west—deep into the decommissioned zones, where the lights don’t shine and the cameras haven’t worked in a decade.
"Where the hell are we going?" I shout over the engine.
"Someplace forgotten."
