The underground tunnel breathed like a living thing.
A low hum vibrated through the walls, pulsing in a slow, steady rhythm—too regular to be natural, too quiet to be machinery. Mira felt it through the soles of her shoes, a faint tremor that traveled up her legs and settled behind her ribs.
The deeper they went, the more the air changed. Warmer. Thicker. Metallic, with a strange sweetness that made her throat tighten.
Zayn stopped suddenly, raising a hand.
"Quiet," he whispered.
Mira froze behind him.
Leena bumped into her shoulder, muttering, "Bro you can't just—" before Mira shushed her.
Ahead of them, the tunnel curved sharply to the left. Wires dangled from the ceiling like tangled vines, sparking faint blue light. The shadows between them shifted.
Something moved.
A shape.
Low to the ground.
Fast.
Mira's heart jumped into her throat. "Was that—?"
Zayn shook his head. "Not him. That wasn't… human-shaped."
Leena's voice lowered. "Wait. What do you mean *not human-shaped*? You said only those creepy coat men were down here."
Zayn exhaled shakily. "I said I *knew about* them. I never said they were the only thing down here."
Mira glared at him. "Great timing."
"I didn't want to panic you."
"Well, panic achieved," Leena said.
Something skittered in the darkness. Claws on concrete.
Mira stepped closer to Zayn. "We need to keep moving. The longer we stand here, the more time we give whatever's down here to find us."
Zayn nodded, but his face had gone pale under the flickering lights.
"We're close," he whispered. "The signal source. The thing marking people. The system that's been tracking you."
"How close?" Mira asked.
Before Zayn could answer, the tunnel shook—just a small tremor, but strong enough that dust rained from the ceiling.
Leena grabbed Mira's arm. "Tell me that was a train."
Zayn swallowed. "Trains aren't running down here anymore."
The tremor came again. Louder. Stronger.
Then the lights went out.
Total darkness swallowed them.
Mira's breath lodged in her throat. She couldn't see her own hands, couldn't tell where the walls were. Only the sound of her breathing—and someone else's, too fast, too close—filled the space.
"Zayn?" she whispered.
"I'm here."
"Leena?"
Silence.
Then—
"I'm here. I just… I can't… I hate the dark," Leena whispered, her voice trembling. "I really hate the dark."
The tunnel trembled again.
Something scraped across the floor.
Closer.
Mira's hand moved slowly toward her pocket, fingers curling around the small switchblade she'd stolen from the corner shop last week. Just in case. Just like this.
The scraping grew louder.
Zayn hissed, "Don't move—"
But a burst of white-blue light exploded from ahead of them, blinding Mira. She threw an arm over her eyes.
When her vision cleared—she saw it.
A creature.
Not human.
Not machine.
Something between.
Its body was low and long like a hound, but its form shifted in glitch-like stutters, flickering between solid and static. Metal plates covered parts of it, fused into sinew and muscle. Its eyes glowed faint blue—the same eerie glow as the device the coat man used.
Leena whispered, "What. The hell. Is that?"
Zayn's voice was barely audible. "A scout."
The creature sniffed the air, its head jerking sharply like a malfunctioning robot. It stepped toward them, claws clicking in an irregular rhythm, static leaking from its joints with every movement.
Mira froze.
The creature turned its glowing eyes toward her—
—and every light in the tunnel flickered back on at once.
For a split second, Mira saw everything in full brightness:
The scout.
Its teeth.
The wires running into its spine.
The sigil branded into its metal flank—
the same symbol Mira had seen painted on the streets above.
The three-lined eye.
Then the tunnel exploded with noise.
A roar—not from the creature, but from behind Mira—echoed through the underground, shaking dust from the ceiling and sending vibrations through the floor.
The creature shrieked.
Zayn grabbed Mira's hand. "RUN!"
They bolted.
The creature lunged forward, claws slicing sparks from the ground, body glitching violently as it gave chase. Mira heard its breath—ragged, electronic, wrong—mixed with the pounding of her own footsteps.
"Left!" Zayn shouted.
They skidded into a side corridor, barely missing a hanging cable. The creature slammed into the wall behind them with a metallic snarl, sending cracks spiderwebbing through the concrete.
Mira's lungs were on fire. Every step felt like she was running through water.
The tunnel split again.
Zayn didn't hesitate—
"Right!"
They sprinted into a narrower passage, this one lined with old pipes and emergency signs coated in grime. The hum in the walls grew louder, vibrating through Mira's bones.
"What is that sound?!" Leena cried.
Zayn gasped, "The system! The grid! It's waking up—"
A distant, mechanical roar cut him off.
Not the scout.
Something bigger.
Deeper.
Angrier.
Mira felt the air around them shift, like pressure dropping before a storm.
"Zayn," she whispered, "what's behind us?"
Zayn didn't answer.
He didn't have to.
Because when Mira looked back—
just for a second—
she saw two glowing blue lights approaching through the shadows.
Not eyes.
Floodlights.
Whatever was coming down the tunnel wasn't a creature.
It was a machine.
A huge one.
The grid itself was moving.
And it was hunting them.