Chapter 23 · You Locked the World

"Take your finger off that button, Kael."

Sila's pistol pressed into the space beneath his jaw. Not hard enough to break skin. Hard enough to make the point.

Kael kept his hand over the black control panel. One touch. That was all the system needed.

Behind the glass wall, six red warning bands crawled across the dead command center. The old-world grid had woken up under his skin, and every screen in the room now showed the same line of text.

ADMIN ACCESS: FULL AUTHORITY.

Sila's breath brushed his cheek. Her other hand locked around his wrist, trying to drag it away from the switch.

"You said this was a door," she said. "You said you could open the bunker."

"It is a door."

"Then why does the whole city have a target painted on it?"

Kael glanced at the nearest screen. A map of the Grey Zone pulsed in hard red blocks. Every rebel settlement. Every supply route. Every hidden shelter Sila had spent three years protecting.

The system had found them all.

"Because the network recognized me," he said.

"Recognized you as what?"

"The person who built the lock."

Her grip tightened.