Chapter 12 · The Machine Knows His Name

I hit metal.

Not sand. Not stone. Metal that rang like a bell when my shoulder slammed into it, and the air punched out of my lungs. Everything went white for a second. Then pain, sharp and cold, racing up my arm.

The blue light was everywhere.

I rolled onto my back, gasping, and the ceiling was gone. Just a ragged hole twenty feet up where the arena floor used to be. Voices shouting. Steelhook's face appeared at the edge, lit harsh by the glow coming from under me.

Under me.

I scrambled up. My ribs screamed. Blood in my mouth, copper taste. The platform I'd landed on was wide, maybe thirty feet across, and it wasn't platform—it was the top of something massive. Panels covered in symbols I didn't recognize, lines of light pulsing through them like veins. The hum was so deep I felt it in my teeth.

"Kai Ruin."

The voice came from everywhere and nowhere. Not a person. Not a recording. It sounded like wind through a canyon, like sand scraping glass.

"Yeah," I said, because what else do you say when a machine knows your name. "That's me."

The light brightened.