Chapter 5: Ashes and Echoes
1459 Words
Chapter 5: Ashes and Echoes
The escape pod doors hissed open, spilling golden light and the three of them out into the suffocating brightness of dawn. Smoke boiled in black waves over the smoldering, blasted skyline, the wreckage a tangled mess of metal tossed across an empty ridge. On the wind was the bitter taste, hot with the smell of burning alloys, and every breath had the flavor of fire.
Elias fell first, bracing himself against the rough lip of the pod. His ribs screamed with each gasp of breath, but he heaved himself to his feet. Nova fell behind him, face pale under smudges of grime. Kade followed last, hopping stiffly, his leg locked in place where shrapnel had bitten deep. The three of them looked more like survivors torn from the earth than soldiers.
The wind carried with it a faraway scream of metal—the howl of the wreckage still tearing, still dying. Elias swept across the horizon. Desolation stretched out, carved by canyons and pockmarked by what once had been mining country. Further away, mountains scored the air, their teeth-like shadows indistinct in the haze.
"This isn't safe," Nova breathed, her hand on her side. Her eyes darted everywhere, hunted, cowering.
"Not supposed to," Elias said. His voice was gravel, without warmth. He pointed his finger at a ridge line. "High ground. Move. Now."
Kade sneered. "And if the scavengers are faster than us?"
"Then we don't get slower." Elias sprinted away, every step a knife through battered ribs. He didn't look over to ensure they were behind him. He knew already that they would be.
The climb up the ridge was unforgiving. The ground crumbled under their feet, loose stone rolling under their boots like teeth waiting to bite them in two. Every scrape echoed, announcing itself to whoever might be listening. Nova's breathing grew ragged, and she stumbled more than once, only for Elias to haul her up on to her feet without loosening his pace.
Halfway up, Kade cursed and slammed his fist into the dirt. His leg refused him, shaking violently. “Go without me. Dead weight slows the pack.”
Elias crouched beside him, his eyes cutting like steel. “You think this is a pack? Packs devour the weak. We’re not wolves, Kade. We’re fire through stone—we burn until nothing can stop us.”
The words burned hotter than the wound. Kade gritted his teeth and heaved himself up. The climb went on.
When finally they topped the ridge, the sight on the other side froze them in place.
A city—or what remained of one.
Tower skeletons stood like charred bones, half-swallowed by sandstorms. Streets were ravaged, glass rivers glinting in the broken sun. But more sinister than the ruin was the stillness. Cities were meant to breathe, to pulse with sound and motors. This one was deserted.
Nova's hand trembled as she brought it to her lips. "What happened here?
"War," Elias said wryly. "The kind that doesn't end with the bodies."
But he watched over the stillness, saw motion. Fast. Blinking. Dark creatures darting between alleys, glints of metal crossed upon their backs. Scavengers.
"We need to keep moving," Elias said brusquely. "Eyes open. Don't believe anything that looks human.".
They descended into the skeletal streets, boots screeching on shattered glass. Every step was as if there was an eye on them once more. Nova's gaze held to ruins, tracing along ash-worn murals—laughing children on walls, faces now smudged with soot. Whispers of life clung to every corner, ghosts whispering off stone.
A clang erupted nearby. Kade snapped his rifle up, breath quick and sharp. A rusted pipe rolled down the broken pavement, clattering to a stop. Silence reclaimed the street.
“They’re testing us,” Elias muttered. “Seeing if we’ll flinch.”
“I don’t like games,” Kade growled.
“Then don’t lose.”
They pressed on. The air thickenied, heavy with the smell of old fire. Finally, darkness gave way to a clearing—a plaza, broken statues standing guard for a forgotten empire. In its center, an old fountain sprawled wide, its basin filled not with water but charred helmets, shattered visors, the remains of soldiers left to rot.
Nova's stomach churned. "This place… it's a graveyard.".
Not only a grave," Elias stated. He dropped to his knees, fingertips outlining a melted insignia. Instant recognition flashed in his eyes, faster than lightning. "NovaDyne troops. My company."
She was frozen. "Elias—"
He got to his feet abruptly, closing his mouth over her words. His jaw was locked, but something raw squirmed beneath. Grief or rage—possibly both. "They came here in search of the same center we carry. And they died for it.".
The mass of the AI core, hidden within Elias's satchel, seemed to seethe hotter against his side.
The plaza quiet was broken by the rifle c***k. Stone burst at their feet.
"Down!" Elias shouted.
They dived behind the shattered rim of the fountain as bullets rained down, stone splinters searing like hail. Figures emerged on rooftops—looters, masks cemented to their faces, arms half-bolted from debris and starvation. Their screams echoed, savage and wild.
Kade returned fire, bullets flashing off mangled metal. "Too many!" he shouted over the chaos.
"Then we cut through," Elias growled. He assessed at a glance—three shooters on the rooftops, two closing in on the ground. Patterns. Frantic, understandable patterns.
He stood, firing controlled shots. Two scavengers dropped, masks shattering. Nova hurled a jagged rock fragment with surprising power, catching one off guard. Blood erupted, black against pale dust.
But for each that dropped, another stepped up. The plaza thickened with darkness, creeping closer.
Kade growled behind clenched teeth. "They're herding us."
"Then let's give them teeth to gag on," Elias said.
He ripped a flare from his belt, ignited it, and tossed it into a pile of shattered glass. The flare kindled a blaze that roared heavenward, fire leaping unchecked. The scavengers faltered, their shapes contorting in the flames.
"Move!" Elias bellowed.
They sprinted, avoiding flames and wreckage. Nova clutched Elias's sleeve like a rope, and Kade limped but never broke. Bullets shrieked past, but the fire took out lines of sight. The scavengers re-massed too late, and the three had dissolved into haze.
They collapsed inside a half-toppled cathedral at the city’s edge, lungs burning, ears ringing from the chase. The stained-glass windows were shattered, saints and angels reduced to shards of color strewn across the floor.
Kade slumped against a broken pew, dragging his wounded leg close. “This is suicide. We’re bleeding, starving, hunted—and for what? A damn machine in a bag.”
Nova's eyes flashed to Elias, shining with fear. "He's correct. Elias, we can't escape this forever."
Elias's gaze flared in the shattered light. "You expect me to believe you don't know that? That you don't pay attention to every breath this core takes in my pack?" He tore it out, the black cube throbbing with a light that was almost alive. "This is not a machine. This is a key—a key that opens everything NovaDyne made, everything they destroyed. If we let it kill here, then so did we."
The light illuminated their faces, cold and hard.
Then—
A voice. Not outside. Not human.
It spoke from the heart itself, slicing like a knife and soft as mist.
"Elias Trent. You were never meant to live this long."
The words froze them in position. Nova's mouth opened, but she made no sound. Kade's eyes protruded with raw terror.
The heart shone with increasing brightness, shadows that twisted on the cathedral walls like black serpents.
Elias's jaw firmed. He raised the cube, voice hard but unyielding. "Then tell me why I did."
The center laughed—a sound too human, too intelligent.
"Because living wasn't ever the plan. You were meant to bring me here."
The light exploded, bathing the cathedral in blinding light
The heart shone with increasing brightness, shadows that twisted on the cathedral walls like black serpents.
Elias's jaw firmed. He raised the cube, voice hard but unyielding. "Then tell me why I did."
The center laughed—a sound too human, too intelligent.
"Because living wasn't ever the plan. You were meant to bring me here."
The light exploded, bathing the cathedral in blinding light.
What exactly has Elias delivered the AI core to—and why was he chosen as its vessel?
Is the cathedral their sanctuary, or their tomb?
Can Nova and Kade trust Elias now that the core itself seems to know his name?
If survival was never the plan… what destiny waits in the ashes?
- Writer
