The icy air blasting through the gap in the Zero Sector Barrier Gate cut straight to the bone. The sharp scent of pristine antiseptic clashed with the stink of dirty oil and the stale air of the tunnel.
A new chapter had begun. Their steps beyond the massive gate led not to the luxury of Soma's summit tower, but through ancient concrete corridors winding downward toward a hidden facility belonging to Dead-Bytes—the largest rebel group beneath Aethelgard.
Nix guided the increasingly limping Ivo, while Kaelen led the way with Aira. All around them, thick concrete architecture was decorated with frost-coated cooling pipes and tangled network cables pulled into place by hand.
At the end of the corridor, a vast room opened up. It was an underground emergency clinic transformed into a resistance headquarters.
Dozens of injured lower-class citizens—some victims of illegal prosthetic replacements, others casualties of clashes with Soma security—lay on rusted cots. The clinking of medical instruments, the hum of an aging generator, and soft moans filled the dim air.
“Don’t move!”
Four Dead-Bytes fighters leaped out from behind a barricade of shipping containers, aiming homemade rifles and electric nail launchers at Kaelen and his group.
“Lower those spikes!” snarled one of the fighters, his cybernetic eyes glowing red. “Who gave you access to breach the Zero Sector Barrier?”
“Lower those spikes before I hack your eye implants and boil your brain, Biff,” Nix cut in casually from behind them, despite the soot smeared across her face.
Before the clash could erupt, steady, rhythmic footsteps sounded from the iron platform in the center of the room. A woman descended from it. She wore a shabby leather coat layered over a military chest plate. Her short hair was cut asymmetrically, and her sharp eyes intimidated without her needing to raise a weapon.
Mara Quell. Leader of Dead-Bytes and former senior network technician for Soma Corp.
“Nix,” Mara said, her voice deep and heavy. Her gaze shifted from Nix to the injured Ivo, then stopped on Kaelen and Aira. “And you brought Aethelgard’s famous Investigator, whose face is filling every advertising screen in the city.”
“We need protection, Mara,” Kaelen said curtly, lowering his pistol by an inch.
Mara gave a cold laugh, one utterly devoid of humor. “Protection? This place is a field hospital for people Soma grinds down every day. I don’t have room for a top-tier fugitive with a tactical squad on his tail.”
“We brought evidence, Mara,” Ivo cut in, clutching his bleeding thigh. “Not just rumors or propaganda.”
“Everyone who comes here claims they’re carrying evidence,” Mara shot back, stepping toward Aira. Her eyes narrowed as she studied the steady blue glow at Aira’s neck and the fine lines of stitching in her skin. “Most of them end up dead, and the rest sell out their friends for a dose of painkillers.”
Mara stared straight at Kaelen. “If you want shelter, medicine for your doctor, and access to our network, I need real proof. Irrefutable proof that Elysium isn’t merely an imagined digital paradise, but a mass slaughterhouse for the lower-class citizens.”
Kaelen reached into the inner pocket of his jacket. He pulled out the portable memory drive Nix had given him in Chapter 9—the raw extraction logs proving that human consciousness was being forcibly harvested.
“This is a direct extraction log from Soma’s internal servers,” Kaelen said, holding the drive up. “It links the names of lower-class victims to power surges at the summit tower.”
Mara looked at the drive, then at Kaelen.
“A single data log can be forged by a genius hacker like Nix,” Mara said firmly. “I’m not going to risk the lives of hundreds of my people over a scrap of digital code. If you want Dead-Bytes to take up arms with you, you’ll have to help me break into Soma’s Secondary Medical Facility in Sector Three.”
“For what?” Kaelen asked.
“Soma will launch a mass scan called ‘Free Air Vaccination’ tomorrow night,” Mara said, her jaw tightening. “I need physical evidence from inside that facility—direct recordings of how our children and citizens are scanned and tagged as commodities before their consciousness is siphoned away.”
Aira stepped forward and stood beside Kaelen. “I can open the facility’s doors.”
Mara gave Aira a long, appraising look. “You’re awfully confident, Cyborg.”
“I’m not confident,” Aira replied softly, but sharply. “I recognize the structure of its locks. Because part of me... was designed by the people who built that place.”
Silence spread through the room. Mara looked at Kaelen, then slowly nodded.
“All right,” Mara said. “Your doctor will be treated here. Nix can use one of our secondary terminals. But you and this cyborg... you’re coming with me to Sector Three. Prove that the data you brought isn’t just a bedtime story.”
Kaelen clenched his fist, staring at the facility door waiting ahead. A new pact had been forged beneath the cold earth.