Chapter 25 · The Scarlet Below

The impact drove every breath from Eli’s lungs, his spine slamming into alloy so cold it burned through the frayed fabric of his courier jacket. Dust and the acrid stench of burnt circuit boards flooded his throat, and he coughed so hard his ribs ached, the scarlet ember under his skin flaring in time with each ragged gasp.

Somewhere above, the Black Tower screamed—metal twisting, concrete shearing, the death rattle of a structure that had stood as the Vale family’s throne for three generations.

Marlow’s voice crackled in his earpiece, half-buried under static and the roar of collapsing floors: "Death switches are down! Every civilian implant in the city’s clear—Eli? Sera? Do you copy?"

Eli couldn’t answer. His hand scrabbled across the pitted metal floor until it hit something soft, warm, slick with coppery blood. Sera. He rolled onto his side, his left shoulder screaming where a shard of rebar had torn through the muscle on the way down, and reached for her face. Her cheek was ice-cold, her eyes half-lidded, the silver of her Vale-issue neural implant glowing faint, flickering blue at the base of her skull.