OWNED BY THE DEVIL
We climbed into the service layer; tight, dark, metal lungs of the building breathing around us.
Signal-null weaker here.
Observer Two checked band. “Partial comms in thirty seconds.”
“Enough,” Dominic said.
Movement ahead.
Not Vale.
Interceptors.
Four.
Fast.
Close-quarters in crawlspace is ugly, no elegance, just leverage and violence. I drove forward, using elbows and knees and blade pommel, disabling grip points, collapsing joints. Dominic was beside me, unstoppable, controlled brutality in inches of space.
Silence returned.
“Two minutes,” Vale sang distantly. “You’re ahead of my projections. That’s flattering.”