Chapter 95: The Glow in the Pit

Several kilometers from the Museum, Max Cole watched the fight through binoculars. Even at that distance the two Kings were impossible to mistake. Their bodies rose above the ruins, vanished behind clouds of dust, and came out again still locked. Max lowered the glasses. His mouth had gone dry.

"That is insane," one of his men muttered.

Another shook his head. "How are we supposed to live in a city with things like that walking around?"

Nobody had an answer. Max had built his influence on calculated risk. He knew when to use force, when to talk, and when to leave before a situation stopped being controllable. The fight in front of him made one thing clear. His weapons meant nothing against those creatures. Even if he gathered every firearm he owned, there was no guarantee he could scratch either King, let alone kill one.

He turned to Blaze. "We’re leaving."

Blaze kept staring through his own binoculars. "Where?"

"Anywhere that isn’t here." Max’s face hardened. "Tell Chairman Elon we need to abandon Silvermont. The longer we stay, the better the chance one of those things crosses our path."

Blaze finally lowered the glasses. His mechanical arm trembled slightly. He tried to hide it by curling his fingers into a fist, and the metal joints clicked anyway. He had faced zombies, mutant animals, and armed survivors. None of them had made him feel as small as this. "Understood."

Max did not waste another second. "Then move. I don’t intend to die because someone thought a ruined city was worth holding."

His men started gathering equipment. For once nobody complained about leaving supplies. They had just watched two King-rank creatures turn buildings into rubble. There was no prize in Silvermont worth gambling a life against that.

On the other side of the city, Kate stood on the roof of the Wealth Building. The wind tugged at her clothes. The golden feathers of her wings caught the sun. Far past the surrounding blocks, enormous clouds of dust rose over the Museum. She could hear the distant roars even from here. She narrowed her eyes. The rex and the Snake King were fighting with enough force to reshape the streets. If either of them turned toward the southern district, the whole area could stop being livable.

Her attention was not only on the battle. She glanced at the woman behind her. Daisy Miller had barely spoken all morning. For nearly five days Daisy had been waiting for Ethan to reach the Wealth Building. At first she had been sure he would find a way. Ethan had survived things that killed most people. He had fought mutants, slipped armed groups, and grown abilities that did not make sense. Five days had passed. He still had not appeared. Kate had tried to explain that the Museum was ringed with dangerous creatures. Daisy had not been willing to let the hope go. Now, watching the distant fight, she looked like she was arriving at a conclusion she had been avoiding.

"He’s still in there, isn’t he?" Daisy asked, quiet.

Kate turned. "Daisy..."

"Please don’t tell me there’s still a chance if you don’t believe it."

Her voice was steady. Her fingers had curled tight around the edge of her sleeve. Kate went silent. She did not want to hurt her. Lying would not make the situation kinder.

"The Museum is in ruins," Kate said at last. "Those two are fighting directly over it. If Ethan was trapped inside when it started, getting out would be extremely hard."

Daisy’s eyes glistened. "But he has the Survival Space."

"I know."

"He can hide in it. He can store supplies. He can teleport."

"I know, Daisy." Kate’s voice softened. "Even Ethan has limits."

Daisy looked away. For several seconds she did not speak. She stared at the distant dust, shoulders tightening as another roar crossed the city. Then her eyes filled. "No..." she whispered. "He can’t be dead."

Kate stepped closer and put a hand on her shoulder. "I’m sorry."

Daisy shook her head, hard. "No. You don’t understand. He promised..."

Her voice broke. She pressed both hands over her mouth and still could not hold the sob. Kate felt a knot form in her chest. She had seen people die in the apocalypse. She had watched survivors lose families, homes, and every reason they had to keep going. Seeing Daisy wrestle with the chance of losing Ethan was different. Daisy had held on to him as a reason to believe things could still work. Without that, the future looked darker.

Kate pulled her into a brief embrace. "Let’s wait until tomorrow. If he hasn’t arrived by then, we’ll have to decide."

Daisy nodded against her shoulder. "One more day."

She wiped her face and stepped back. Her eyes were still red, but something had hardened. If Ethan did not arrive by tomorrow, she would go back to the western district and look for Debbie, Nina, and the others herself. Kate might disagree. The road could be suicide. Daisy could not simply walk away without knowing what had happened to the people she cared about. Even if she died on it, at least she would have tried.

Back at the Museum, the two Kings kept fighting. Their movements had carried them farther from the building, and the ruined exhibition hall was briefly free of them. Ethan watched the screen. The moment the rex and the Snake King moved past the nearest blocks, relief hit him. Now.

He turned to the others. "I’m going out."

Elena looked at him at once. "Are you sure?"

"No. If I stay here waiting, we’ll run out of oxygen before I get another chance." He checked the system. Time Stop still had several minutes on the cooldown, but the rex had moved off the entrance to the underground pit. If the Snake King’s arrival had held its attention long enough, he might get a look at the source of the energy and be gone before either of them came back. "I’ll be quick."

Then he activated the ability and left the Space.

The air in the Museum was thick with dust. Ethan appeared among the ruins, dropped low, and scanned. The destruction was worse than he had expected. The eastern wall had collapsed almost completely, twisted steel jutting from the rubble. Broken slabs covered the floor. The remains of display cases lay scattered in the debris. The air smelled of dust, blood, and something faintly metallic. Far off, another roar shook the building. He turned toward it. The two Kings were still at it, their bodies moving deeper into the city. Good.

He did not waste time. He checked the system, then tried to activate teleportation. Nothing. His face darkened. He tried again. Still nothing. "You’re kidding me."

The Hornscale Beast was gone, and the spatial restriction had not fully left. Or something else was interfering. He clenched his jaw and forced himself to think. The Space was running out of oxygen. Every failed attempt cost time, and he could not afford to stand in the middle of the Museum spending the minutes he had left.

Then he felt it. A pulse of energy rose from under his feet. He froze. The sensation was unmistakable. The same strange fluctuation he had noticed before the rex came out of the pit, only stronger now. The energy rippled through the ground and brushed his spatial perception like a distant heartbeat. He turned toward the enormous hole in the center of the ruined lobby. Could this be what brought the Tyrannosaurus Rex back? The idea was almost absurd. The creature had come up from under the Museum as if it had been sleeping in the earth for millions of years. If something had revived it, whatever caused that change could be one of the most valuable finds since the apocalypse started. It could also be lethal. He knew that. He could not ignore an opportunity that seemed to touch his Space.

He drew his sword and approached the pit with care. The broken edge of the floor crumbled under his boots. He stopped, tested the ground, then descended over a sloping mass of rubble. The farther he went, the stronger the energy became. A faint white glow appeared under the dust. He slowed.

At the center of the pit lay an enormous meteorite. Roughly the size of a small car, its irregular surface glowing with a soft, almost pearlescent light. The pulse he had felt in his bones was coming off it in slow, steady beats, and the air around the stone tasted wrong, clean in a way the ruined Museum had no right to be. Ethan stopped at the edge of the glow, sword still in his hand, and did not reach for it yet. Outside, far off, the two Kings roared again. Under his feet, the stone kept pulsing, patient, as if it had been waiting a very long time for someone to come down and decide what it was worth.