Chapter 21 · The Sister Off-Camera

The detonator hit four seconds and Seren did not wait for three. She grabbed Ian by his good shoulder and shoved him flat against the server rack. Nora was already moving toward the archive door. The screen still showed Lena turning, the gun steady in both hands, aimed center mass at where Seren had been standing nine loops ago. Not at Ian. At her.

"She missed," Seren said. The countdown on the detonator in her palm went to two. "You are still here."

Ian was staring at the frozen frame like it could catch fire. Blood ran down his arm from the shoulder wound and dripped onto the tile. He did not seem to notice. "Lena does not miss."

One second. Seren felt the device go hot in her hand. Then it clicked and went dark. No explosion. No reset. Just a failed trigger and a room full of broken glass and people who had run out of time three different ways. She looked down at the detonator. The digital face was blank. Someone had remotely locked it after the countdown finished.