Smoke.
It blossomed in a single heartbeat—rolling across the steel floor in thick gray waves. Bobby coughed, his lungs burning, eyes watering as the acrid cloud swallowed Lyra, the Loopers, everything. Shapes flickered inside the haze—arms, silhouettes—but then blurred into nothing.
A sharp, mechanical whir cut through the chaos.
Bobby’s pulse hammered. His mind screamed: Run! But before his muscles could obey, cold, hard metal wrapped around his wrist.
A hand. But not human.
Its grip was too strong and unyielding—its fingers like steel pistons wrapped in synthetic flesh. For just a second, Bobby's eyes caught it through the swirling smoke. He saw a tall figure of dark alloy and carbon-fiber plating, eyes aglow with faint blue rings. An artificial face, expressionless. And on its ches
