The darkness was absolute. The air in the old transport shaft was thick with the dust of decades, the metallic tang of oxidized iron, and the faint, acrid smell of ozone from Kwandezi's transmutation. The alarms of the Citadel proper were now a muffled, distant scream, filtered through meters of reinforced concrete.
Aisha coughed, the dust catching in her throat as she pushed herself to her feet. The foam from the corridor clung to her Aegis mesh, cold and slick. "My comms are dead," she stated, her voice unnaturally loud in the confined space. "The shaft walls are too thick, or Zaire has initiated a full network blackout."
Captain Akanni leaned heavily against the wall he had just created. His face, illuminated only by the faint, residual red glow of his eyes, was slick with sweat. He was breathing heavily, the raw expenditure of Geokinetic power having taken a significant toll. He had torn a hole in the Citadel's hull and sealed it, an act of creation and destruction that had saved them but cost him dearly.
"He won't need comms to find us," Akanni rumbled, his voice strained. "Zaire is a Banisher Scion. He's a hunter. He will analyze the breach, find the molecular disturbance from your asset, and he will send his best."
Kwandezi stood apart from them, his body a coiled spring of lethal potential. His Ultimate Transmuted blades were still in his hands, the perfected steel seeming to drink the meager light, appearing blacker than the shadows. His off-the-charts instincts were screaming, his senses expanding to fill the new environment. He could feel the vibration of the Citadel's massive geothermal core far below them, a low, rhythmic thrum like a sleeping heart. He could feel the skittering of rats in the walls and the slow, cold drip of water.
And he could feel Akanni. The Captain's power, though diminished, felt like a mountain at his back—stable, massive, and utterly immovable. His instincts tagged Akanni as the apex predator in this confined space, and he hated him for it.
"You saved your 'weapon,' Captain," Kwandezi stated, his voice a dry rasp. He didn't turn to face him. "Not us."
A low chuckle rumbled from Akanni's chest. "Semantics, boy. The weapon is useless if it's melted down by a paranoid fool like Zaire. And you... you are the only weapon I've ever seen that can make a Banisher Scion panic."
"So what now?" Aisha interrupted, pushing between them, her gaze shifting from the massive Captain to the volatile teenager. She still clutched the Void-sealed briefcase, the object that had started this all. "We're trapped. We can't go up; the hangar bays will be locked. We can't go back; Zaire has the corridor."
"So we go down," Akanni said. He pushed himself off the wall, his strength returning. "This Citadel... it's a lie. The Banishers built their pristine fortress of obsidian and steel on top of the old world's bones. This shaft is part of the original Lagos Industrial Transit Network, built long before the Void-borne, before the Veil. It was a transport hub for the geothermal plant that now powers this city."
He pointed into the oppressive darkness of the tunnel. "This shaft network runs deep. It passes the geothermal core, and, more importantly, it connects to the primary Citadel Waste Conduits. It's unglamorous, unmonitored, and it will drop us outside the main Clean Zone wall, into the 'Grey Zone' territories."
"The slums," Aisha breathed, understanding. "Outside the VDC's protection. A perfect place to disappear."
"Zaire will anticipate that. He knows you," Kwandezi countered, finally turning. His purple-tinged eyes were cold and analytical. "Your battle IQ is high, Captain, but you're a creature of the VDC. You think in terms of logistics and containment. Zaire thinks in terms of elimination. He won't just guard the exits. He'll flood the network."
As if summoned by his words, a new sound echoed from the direction of the breach. It wasn't the heavy thud of boots. It was a faint, high-pitched whine, like a million insects on the wing, growing closer.
Kwandezi's instincts flared. "Move. Now. He's not sending men. He's sending seekers."
Akanni didn't question him. He took the lead, his massive form surprisingly agile in the narrow shaft. Aisha followed, her plasma pistol now equipped with a low-light tactical beam. Kwandezi took the rear, his twin blades held in a reverse grip, his senses straining against the dark.
They ran. The shaft was a ruin of rusted gantries, collapsed support beams, and thick, ankle-deep dust. The air grew hotter, the thrum of the geothermal core growing louder with every level they descended.
"How much farther to the conduits?" Aisha panted, her specialized suit filtering the worst of the dust, but the heat was oppressive.
"Another klick down," Akanni replied. "We're approaching the core's primary shielding. The ambient heat will be... intense."
The high-pitched whining grew louder, echoing, confusing. It was coming from multiple directions.
"They're in the parallel shafts," Kwandezi hissed, stopping. He held up a hand. The trio froze behind a massive, rusted turbine. "They're fast. Small."
A pinpoint of blue light appeared a hundred meters back, then another, and another. A swarm of them. Banisher Hunter-Seeker Drones. They were the size of a human fist, propelled by silent magnetic impellers, and armed with high-voltage tasers and neural-scrambling frequencies. They were designed to flush out rats, and in this Citadel, Kwandezi and Aisha were the rats.
"They're programmed to detect non-Banisher energy signatures," Aisha whispered, her eyes wide with dread. "My suit, your power... we're beacons to them."
"They're also made of metal and silicon," Kwandezi replied, his voice dangerously calm.
"We can't fight a swarm, boy," Akanni grunted, his hand resting on a thick, rusted support strut. "We need a bottleneck."
"We need a distraction," Kwandezi corrected. His battle IQ was processing the new variables: the drones, the heat, the unstable environment, and Akanni's raw power.
He looked at the massive, rusted turbine they were hiding behind. It was ancient, its fans blades thick with rust.
"Captain," Kwandezi said, his voice a low command. "You're a Scion of the earth. That includes iron, doesn't it?"
Akanni's red eyes glinted in the dark. He saw the plan. "It'll be loud. It'll bring Zaire down here himself."
"Let him come," Kwandezi said. "Aisha, get to the next junction. Seal the door. Give us thirty seconds."
"What are you...?" Aisha began.
"Go!" Akanni roared.
Aisha didn't hesitate. She sprinted down the tunnel toward a heavy bulkhead door 50 meters away.
The swarm of drones rounded the corner, a cloud of blue lights and whining blades.
"Now, Captain!" Kwandezi yelled.
Akanni grabbed the rusted support strut and pulled. With a groan of tortured metal, he ripped the half-ton beam from the wall. He didn't just use strength; he used his Geokinesis, commanding the iron molecules to obey. He swung the beam like a colossal baseball bat, smashing it into the ancient turbine.
The turbine exploded. It wasn't a chemical explosion, but a catastrophic structural failure. Massive, rusted fan blades, each weighing hundreds of pounds, tore loose, flung into the tunnel by the force of Akanni's blow.
The drones were momentarily crushed, a wave of them obliterated by the sheer kinetic force. But more poured in, swarming over the debris.
Kwandezi stepped forward, his perfected blades a blur. He wasn't fighting the drones. He was transmuting the air itself. He created pockets of super-dense, super-heated atmosphere directly in their flight path. The drones hit the pockets and their sensors and impellers instantly slagged, their metal casings melting from the focused, molecular-level heat.
It was a perfect defense, but it was costing him. The heat from the core was already intense, and his own power was adding to it. Sweat streamed down his face.
"Aisha!" Akanni yelled.
"Sealed!" she screamed back from the bulkhead.
"Get to her, boy!" Akanni bellowed. He slammed the massive strut into the ground, creating a wall of debris.
Kwandezi didn't need to be told. He sprinted, vaulting over the wreckage, his blades a whirling defense as the last few drones tried to intercept him. He dove through the bulkhead door just as Aisha hit the emergency seal.
The heavy steel door slammed shut with a deafening clang, sealing them in, plunging them once again into darkness. They were safe from the swarm.
They slumped against the door, the only sound their own ragged breathing and the distant, furious tink, tink, tink of the remaining drones bouncing uselessly off the other side of the bulkhead.
"That," Akanni panted, "was inefficient. But effective."
"We're burning energy we don't have," Aisha said, rebooting her suit's short-range sensors. "And we just told Zaire exactly where we are."
"Good," Kwandezi replied, his voice a low growl. He was staring down the new tunnel, which was glowing with a faint, oppressive orange light. The geothermal core was close. "Let him come. The heat down here is high enough to warp steel. It'll make my work easier."
He was no longer just running. His battle IQ was adapting to the environment. He was luring his step-brother, the Scion of Order, into a place of absolute, elemental chaos.