The starlight in the Dead Sector sky felt foreign. I lay among the metal debris, my breath coming in ragged gasps, trying to synchronize with a heartbeat that now felt... different. It no longer ticked with the biological rhythm I knew. There was a micro-pause in every beat, a faint hiss audible only to my ears, which had been calibrated by Data Synesthesia.
"Elian..." Kael’s voice sounded weak beside me. He coughed, wiping blood from the corner of his lips. "Did we... did we actually do it?"
I forced myself into a sitting position. The underground cavern was now nothing more than a crater venting toxic smoke. Thorne’s mechanical heart had been obliterated, and the global neural network he controlled should have been severed completely. Yet, the pain in my wrist was growing maddening. Th
