Chapter 20 · Termination Protocol

The sand moved before I did.

It came up through the floor in a ring, black grains hissing like static, and I knew what Steelhook had done the second the first grain touched my boot. Live sand. The kind that eats whatever you tell it to.

And right now, it wanted me.

"Kai!" Nova's voice, somewhere behind the glass partition. I couldn't see her. The sand was already waist-high, circling tighter, and the screening hall lights made it look like oil.

"Don't move," Steelhook said over the speaker system. His voice was calm. Clinical. "The cage is keyed to motion. You run, it crushes."

I didn't run. I stood there and watched the sand spiral up my ribs, cold even through my shirt, and tried to think.

Tried not to think about the last time I'd touched live sand.

The problem with live sand is it's not really sand anymore. Someone—probably some pre-collapse lab tech who thought they were real smart—figured out how to make silicon remember. Make it want things. And once it wants something, it doesn't stop until it gets it or someone with a stronger command shuts it down.

Steelhook had the command codes.