The sapphire abyss didn’t feel like a fall. It felt like the mouth of a god closing shut. Arkan’s stomach lurched as gravity surrendered to a magnetic suction that dragged his bruised body through the darkness of the refinery’s throat. He wasn’t breathing air; he was inhaling cold, pulverized carbon. Beside him, Maya was a blurred streak of incandescent white, her scream silenced by the overwhelming ultrasonic hum of the shaft.
“BRACE!” Riley’s roar cut through the static in Arkan’s earpiece. A second later, the kinetic dampers slammed into their ribcages.
THUMP.
Arkan hit the metal mesh of a lower ventilation platform with the sound of a falling anvil. He tasted copper. Fresh, hot blood welled up in his mouth, coating his tongue with the tang of the Status he was currently bleeding out
