The air in the maintenance hall was heavy, tasting of ionized dust and the metallic rot of decaying infrastructure. Zeta stood at the precipice of the exit, his chest laboring under the strain of his own physiology. He could feel the residual hum of the network dying down in his skull, the fading echo of the Overdrive leaving behind a sensation like needles pressed against his brain. Beside him, Mara was pressed against the cold steel of the wall, her breathing shallow and frantic. She had seen the impossible in that arena, and the reality of their situation was settling over her like a suffocating blanket.
"Zeta, look," Mara breathed, gesturing toward the far end of the service tunnel.
The heavy, blast-proof doors were already beginning to groan. Sparks cascaded from the hinges as em
