The sound of heavy, blood-slicked leather gripping steel echoed up the dark elevator shaft.
I was leaning over the shattered doors on the ground floor lobby, my father standing behind me with a flashlight scavenged from a dead Board guard. The beam cut through the dust-choked air, illuminating the drop.
Ten feet down, clinging to the thick, grease-covered maintenance cables, was Dax.
His forearms were corded with strain, the veins standing out in sharp relief against skin smeared with ash and void-burn. His gloves were shredded. But as the flashlight beam hit his face, the Speedrun King looked up and flashed me a grin that was equal parts exhaustion and pure, feral defiance.
"Need a lift, Pres?" I asked, my voice cracking with a relief so profound it made my knees weak.
"I had it hand
