Lucas
Marcos’s body is found before the sun clears the horizon — stiff, blood-dark, unmistakable. Whatever confidence they had dies with him.
They move immediately.
Not by road.
I see it the moment the convoy fractures — vehicles splitting, engines cutting, men abandoning wheels for boots.
“They’re dumping the route,” Darius mutters.
“And the girl?” Theo asks.
I’m already moving.
“She’s not going with them,” I say. “I won't let them.”
The spillway opens ahead — concrete jaws hidden behind brush and broken fencing. Dry now, cracked and sharp, but I can smell the water underneath. Tidal. Temporary. A path that exists only if you know when to take it.
The enemy knows.
And now so do we.
Gunfire erupts without warning.
Rounds chew bark above my head as I break into a sprint, boots
