Through the static, something else came through. Stone scraping against stone, like ancient feet taking slow steps.

"Fuck this," Luca said, grabbing his blaster. "Chris, how do we get through to her?"

Chris's scanning shit with his multitool. "The dimensional overlap is unstable. If I can create a resonance cascade in our local space, it might force a realignment, but—"

"English, please."

"I can maybe break down the wall between dimensions. But it's going to be loud, and it might attract whatever else is down here."

Danny looked up from his scanner, face pale. "A forced dimensional realignment could cause localized gravitational shearing. We're talking about forces that could tear apart reality on a quantum level. It could attract more than just creatures. It could damage the very structure of this place."

More scraping sounds came through Zoe's comm, closer now. Her breathing was getting ragged.

"Do it," Luca ordered. "We need to get her out."

Chris pulled out a plasma charge and started fucking with it using his multitool. "Everyone back up. This is going to get messy."

While he worked, the crystal formations on the walls started vibrating. High-pitched frequency cut through their helmets like broken glass, drove them to their knees with hands clutched to their heads even though the armor should have filtered it out.

"Chris, hurry the fuck up!" Ryan gasped.

"You wanna do it yourself?" Chris asked.

The corridor's lights flickered and died. Their helmet's lights kicked in, harsh white glare making everything look like a nightmare.

Chris attached the modified charge to one of the biggest crystal formations and stumbled back. "Zoe, when this goes off, run toward the sound. Don't stop, don't look back."

"What about the statues?"

"Fuck the statues. Just run."

The charge went off with a blast. A wave of vertigo hit Luca, making the corridor spin as if he were falling through space. Temperature dropped so fast his breath fogged inside his helmet.

The air in front of him rippled, then split open. Through the rift, he could see another version of the same corridor, but dimmer. The edges of the portal flickered and sparked, already beginning to collapse.

And there was Zoe, sprinting toward them with three large stone Varnathi warriors in pursuit. As she ran, chunks of the "other" corridor flaked off into nothingness behind her, the alternate reality dissolving like ash.

The rift was shrinking fast.

"Move, move, move!" Luca shouted, laying down covering fire as Zoe dove through the closing portal.

She crashed into Danny, who caught her and hauled her away from the collapsing rift. The dimensional tear snapped closed with a sound like breaking bones.

Danny helped her sit up, and her visor retracted automatically. Her face was pale and sweat-soaked, eyes wide with fear.

"The first time I looped back, they were just standing there," she said, voice shaky. "The second time, they were facing the corridor I'd just left. They were anticipating me." She looked up at them with haunted eyes. "They knew I was going to try to escape."

"Are you hurt?" Emily asked, running her scanner over Zoe's armor.

"Just terrified. And really fucking glad to see you guys again." Zoe looked back at where the rift had been. "That place..."

They pushed deeper into the complex. Past chambers that made Luca's brain hurt to look at, corridors that shouldn't exist. The signal was getting stronger, but they were all running on fumes.

"We need to rest," Luca said when they reached a wide corridor lined with pristine Varnathi reliefs.

"No way," Zoe said immediately. Her hands were still trembling from the dimensional rift encounter. "We gotta keep moving."

Luca looked around at his crew. Danny was leaning against the wall, power readings in the red since his shield generator got fried. Emily was fumbling with her gear check. Even Chris was moving slower than usual.

"Look at Danny's power readings," Luca said. "Look at your hands. They're shaking. We push on like this, we make mistakes, just like in that other delve. Mistakes get us killed. We rest."

Zoe started to argue, but Joey put a hand on her arm. "He's right. We're running on fumes and adrenaline."

"Fine," she muttered, but her eyes kept darting to the shadows.

Danny slumped against the wall, his heavy armor clanking. "Fuck me, I feel like I got hit by a shuttle."

Ryan pulled out his multitool with the field repair kit and started working on Danny's power armor. The sparks from the weld looked surreal beneath a 500,000-year-old carving of what might have been a Varnathi god.

Chris cleaned his rifle while sitting beneath an intricate relief showing Varnathi figures manipulating streams of energy. Everyday maintenance under epic artwork was jarring as hell.

If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

Ryan had his camera out, documenting the reliefs. Joey wandered over, drawn by the soft click of the shutter.

"Can you believe this?" Ryan whispered, gesturing at the carved walls. "This is the most important discovery in human history. It's beautiful."

Joey studied the flowing script and geometric patterns, expression troubled. "It's a weapon, Ryan. Or a machine. Every carving, every glyph... it's here for a reason. We're sitting inside the most complex piece of technology ever conceived, and we're treating it like a museum." He shivered. "It makes my skin crawl."

"You think they're still watching us?" Ryan asked, lowering his camera.

"I think this whole place is watching us. Has been since we walked in."

Luca caught the end of their conversation from where he sat with Emily. The thought that they were being observed by systems beyond their understanding made his chest tight. Great. Just fucking great.

"Ryan, you getting all this?" he asked, trying to focus on practical concerns.

"Every detail," Ryan confirmed. "Though I'm not sure anyone back home is going to believe it."

"They'll have to," Emily said, testing her repaired gear. "We're walking proof that there's more to the universe than we ever imagined."

Beyond that small circle of light, the ancient corridors stretched away into darkness, filled with wonders and terrors they couldn't begin to comprehend.

Chris's proximity sensor beeped once, then went silent. He glanced at the display, frowning. "Huh. Must be interference from the dimensional tear."

A shadow flitted by at the edge of their light, there and gone so fast it might have been imagination.

"Did you see that?" Emily asked, her hand drifting to her plasma blade.

"See what?" Danny asked, but he was already reaching for his warhammer.

Then the chittering began. Distant at first, but growing louder. Scrape of claws on stone. Through the corridor they'd come from, shapes poured toward them. Vexillari drones, dozens of them, metallic carapaces gleaming.

But these weren't all the same. Small, fast scuttlers scrambled along walls and ceiling. Behind them came larger, heavily-armored spitters with swollen acid sacs. And from the floor came a grinding sound as burrowers erupted from hidden passages, drill-like mandibles spinning.

"Contact!" Luca shouted, drawing his plasma tomahawk. "They must have come in from one of the portals!"

"Don't hit the walls!" Danny yelled as Chris and Ryan raised their rifles.

"Why the hell not?" Ryan shouted back.

"Because these reliefs aren't just stone! They're part of the power and data network! A stray shot could trigger another trap, or something!"

Shit. No suppressing fire. No room to maneuver. They were stuck in close-quarters combat with creatures designed to melt through armor.

"Zoe, take out the spitters on the ceiling!" Luca ordered. "Danny, wall up! Don't let the scuttlers break our line! Emily, watch the floor for burrowers!"

The first wave of scuttlers hit like breaking glass. Luca met them with his tomahawk, carving through chitinous bodies while his blaster picked off stragglers. Plasma edge sliced clean through the lead drone, but two more immediately took its place.

Zoe's dagger flashed as she targeted the spitters. Each throw precise and lethal. But there were so many targets she couldn't get them all.

Glob of acid hissed past Luca's head, splashed against the carved wall. Ancient stone began to smoke where it hit, several glowing glyphs flickered and died.

"Careful with those fucking shots!" Chris yelled, his rifle spitting controlled bursts.

Danny stepped forward, warhammer raised, and activated something Luca had seen him do before but never in a fight this intense. [Taunt]. His voice boomed through the corridor with unnatural force.

"Come on, you chittering pieces of shit! Is that all you've got?"

Immediately, every drone in the swarm turned toward him. Scuttlers abandoned their flanking attempts. Spitters shifted their aim. Even the burrowers changed direction, all converging on Danny like he was the only target that mattered.

"Danny, what the fuck!" Luca shouted, but it was too late.

The entire swarm hit Danny at once. His warhammer crushed the first few, but there were too many. Without his shield generator, he was completely exposed. Acid splashed against his armor from multiple directions, finding gaps, eating through the outer plating.

Danny roared in pain and fury as the acid reached his under-armor, but he kept swinging.

Luca felt something click in his head as his training kicked in. Time seemed to slow as [Weak Point Focus] activated, highlighting vulnerable spots on every drone in his field of view. The gaps between carapace plates. The soft joint where the head met the thorax. The thin membrane covering their acid sacs.

He raised his blaster, [Steady Aim] engaging. His hand stopped shaking. His breathing steadied. The weapon felt like an extension of his arm, every shot perfectly calculated.

The first blast took a spitter's acid sac, causing it to explode in a shower of its own caustic fluid. The second punched through a scuttler's eye cluster, dropping it instantly. The third, fourth, fifth shots found their marks with mechanical precision.

"Emily, get to Danny!" he called, never taking his eyes off the targets. His skills were doing the thinking for him now, each shot guided by inhuman accuracy.

Emily's plasma blade hummed to life as she carved her way through the swarm toward Danny, the energy sword slicing through drone carapaces like they were made of paper. Behind her, Joey moved with his blaster raised, providing covering fire while keeping his medical scanner ready.

"Danny, stay up!" Joey called, checking his scanner's readings on the big man's vitals. "Your armor's breached but you're not critical yet!"

A burrower erupted from the floor right beside her. Luca spun, tomahawk descending in a vicious arc that split the creature's drill-mouth in half.

The battle raged on. Every shot had to be perfect. Every movement had to avoid the priceless artwork that might kill them if damaged. The drones seemed to sense their restrictions, pressed harder.

Emily coordinated with Luca, and their movements were synchronized. When scuttlers tried to flank them, she was already there, blade carving a defensive arc.

Finally, Zoe's dagger took down the last spitter, and Danny's hammer crushed the final burrower.

Silence except for their own ragged breathing and the sizzle of acid eating through the floor.

[+151,071 XP] [+52,875 credits] [Item acquired: Sleep Regulator Patch] [Item acquired: Concussion Grenade] [Item acquired: Stasis Field Grenade]

Before Luca could even lower his weapon, Emily rushed over and grabbed him, pulling his visor up for a kiss. Adrenaline and relief and something fiercer all mixed up in the way she pressed against him.

"Don't ever scare me like that again," she said when they broke apart, her forehead resting against his visor.

"I wasn't the one who charged into a swarm of acid-spitting bugs," Luca replied, but his arms were around her waist, holding her close.

"Everyone alive?" Chris gasped from where he was slumped against the wall.

"That hurt like hell." Danny gasped, checking the acid burns on his armor.

"The Skyflayers outside, these drones inside," Luca said, the implications crystallizing in his mind. "We should have cleared the goddamned portals."

As they caught their breath, something began to happen at the far end of the corridor. A single glyph started to glow with soft, golden light. Then another, and another, forming a pathway of illumination along the wall.

The lights formed a clear path toward the deeper parts of the complex, pulsing gently like a heartbeat made of sunshine.

Next chapter will be updated first on this website. Come back and continue reading tomorrow, everyone!

If you find any errors ( broken links, non-standard content, etc.. ), Please let us know < report chapter > so we can fix it as soon as possible.