A sharp, metallic BOOM thundered through the food storage chamber, followed by a high-pitched whining as rusted alarms jolted to life. Crimson lights blinked erratically, like a dying pulse remembering how to beat.
Jyoti froze.
For half a heartbeat, her instincts rebelled against her limbs. Panic clawed up her throat. She glanced left, right—no vent, no loose grating, no shadow wide enough to slip into. The room had swallowed her whole.
"Stupid, stupid, stupid," she muttered, pacing in place, her mind spiraling.
Then—
**Beep. Beep.**
The storage gates hissed and parted with a lazy shrug, like metal yawning. Dim light spilled in. Silhouettes shuffled forward—broad-shouldered, scar-marked, eyes like old metal and mouths drawn into grimaces. Brutes. Ash-Binders.
Jyoti ducked behind a stack of boxes just as their boots echoed into the chamber.
"It's been tripped. Someone's in here."
"Who's there? Hey! Whoever you are, you're done for!"
A dull thud—a canister knocked over. Every neck twisted in its direction. The brutes closed in like hounds.
But they didn't see her.
Of course they didn't.
She wasn't there.
She slid, a breath between seconds, a ripple of shadow slipping between their sights. Her power curled around her like dust in still air. And then—
She moved.
Past crates, through the flickering lights, and out into the chaos of the corridor—her heart ticking like a misfired engine.
She almost laughed.
Then she stopped.
A sound—too soft for this world. Whimpers. A crunch. A boy, no older than eight, curled beside a shattered food cart. Around him, two brutes laughed while another pressed a boot to the kid's chest.
"Stealing? From us? This rat's got teeth, eh?"
Jyoti exhaled slowly, fingers twitching at her side.
"Tsk."
Three of them. Big. Heavy. Thick-shouldered like columns. It wasn't her fight. She'd already danced with death today. She could be halfway to dinner.
Or...
She sighed, rolled her shoulders, and grinned.
"All this for one bruised brat. You thugs need hobbies."
She darted forward like a slingshot—first kick to the shin of the brute on the left, second movement a yank of an old pipe from the wall. A clang, a scream, a crack. The kid scrambled back as she flipped a box into the face of the largest one.
She moved like chaos rehearsed.
Brutes staggered. One drew a stunrod—she slipped under it, smacked his wrist with the pipe, and sent the weapon skidding. Another tried to grab her from behind, but she spun and smashed a dent into his kneecap.
Shouts erupted.
"It's her again! It's her again!"
More were coming. Too many.
Jyoti grabbed the boy's arm. "You walk, or I carry you. Choose fast."
He nodded, wide-eyed.
They ran.
Through metal corridors screaming with alarms. Past faces too numb to care. Into crowds of bodies pretending not to notice. Jyoti's cloak of absence wrapped around them—part instinct, part something older.
Behind them, brutes shouted, crashing into stalls and throwing crates in frustration. One grabbed a bystander and snarled, "Where'd she go?" No answer. Just shrugs and silence. The fear of knowing too much.
She veered left, then down a chute that twisted beneath broken stairwells. The echo of boots followed. She pushed the boy ahead of her, skidding across slick stone, leaping over a tangle of rusted wire.
The boy fell—Jyoti yanked him up. Her breath scraped her lungs.
A brute rounded the corner behind them—close, too close.
She threw a bottle into his path—glass shattered, mist rising. He slipped, crashed. Their speed increased.
They turned sharp around a corner into a narrow corridor, where the crowd grew thick. A mob of howling monkeys pursuing them grew louder.
She vaulted over a vendor's low cart, dragging the boy with her, utensils flying from the stall. A brute tried to follow—tripped on a crate and cursed. Jyoti twisted through side alleys now, the boy barely keeping pace.
Just when her breath began to snap—
A hand yanked her into a side alley.
Silence.
The lights flickered.
The alley held them like a secret.