Page 120 of Star Claimed Omega
The deck plating groaned above her, footsteps, maybe. Or just the weight of the warship’s colossal frame shifting like a beast in sleep.
She pressed on, breath shallow, knees dragging over grime, sweat sliding down the curve of her back despite the chill.
Her cross-body bag thumped against her hip, payload still intact. Each movement felt like a gamble, like fate watching with narrowed eyes.
Through her neural node, Vern’s voice slithered.
‘Lower, pet. Take the left junction past the coolant feeds. Don’t make me trigger a shock again. You don’t want that, do you?’
She didn’t answer. She never did anymore. But still he whispered, a predator licking its chops in her skull.
‘Keep up the pace, otherwise, one twist of my fingers and you’ll be nothing but red paste on the steel.’
She clenched her jaw and blocked him with a wall of mental static, picturing Santi.
His body, warm beside hers. The way he kissed her temples.
How he held her with gentle protectiveness.
The fact that she was betraying him was killing her.
Her heart was breaking.
She hoped he kept away if he got wind of thisfokkin’ cursed incursion.
She eased through a maintenance hatch into a vast, massive pipe crawl shaft.
Scarlet, from here, wear the anti-grav boots in your pack, to get to the breach faster.’
She obeyed, pausing to rummage through her duffel and change her shoes.
Even as she murmured without sound into the darkness, more prayer than plan, ‘Santi, stay away. Please.’
Her soul clenched.
She couldn’t bear to think of how he’d react if he did indeed come and once he found out her whole, terrifying truth.
With a ragged inhale, clicking on the levitation setting on her boots, she launched into the tight spaces, descending downward, past shafts and decks, one heartbeat closer to oblivion.
SANTIAGO
Santi hit the polished ramp ofLa Última Sombrain a blur,spectral force powering his movements.
He didn’t pause; he stormed straight for the nearest elevator in which Miral glimmered into view with a swirl of violet nanites.
‘Report,’ he barked, edgy asfokk,breath shallow, pulse erratic.
Miral’s eyes glinted. ‘She’s breached a lower access shaft via the CVIQ conduit, slipping through a decommissioned security panel.
‘You have her?’
‘Confirmed. Visuals initiating.’
A holo screen bloomed before him, grainy, but unmistakable.
The massive pipe crawl shaft was panned in dim light, yet there she was.
Her slim silhouette wound through the network of giant pipes, pale face set in grim determination, a bag swaying over her side.
