Page 73 of Destined For Her Alien Daddy

She turns toward me with fever-bright eyes. “That means they didn’t just bury the evidence. They ordered the erasure.”

The upper corridor flashes white.

Brakk’s first charge detonates with a contained thunderclap that slams pressure down the passage and throws dust across the shaft entrance. The floor jumps under my boots. Anita stumbles, and I catch her elbow long enough to keep her upright before releasing her.

“Now,” I say.

We descend.

The ramp curves along the inside of the massive shaft, smooth enough to make traction uncertain. The central void falls away to our right. Our lamps reveal drifting motes of silver dust suspended over empty darkness, each speck rotating slowly as if caught in invisible currents. Behind us, Brakk’s second charge detonates. The blast does not stop pursuit, but it buys seconds, and seconds are the coin of survival.

The Choir answers with disciplined fire.

Plasma bolts cut through the dust above us, striking the outer wall and blooming into brief blue-white flares. The attackers have line of sight from the upper threshold. They are using low-yield weapons suitable for ruins, careful not to bring the shaft down around themselves. Professional restraint again. I despise them for it. Fanatics should be sloppy. These are not.

“Down and right!” I shout.

Anita ducks behind a low section of curved stone with Sira beside her. Brakk drops onto one knee and returns fire with a compact pistol that looks absurdly small in his broad hand. I take position behind a raised support rib and fire upward in measured bursts, forcing the first Choir pair back from the lip.

Their armor is better than standard scavenger gear, matte black with adaptive friction plates and stabilizing knee braces. Each carries climbing spools, breach tools, and compact sensor masts folded along the spine. Ruin warfare kit. They came prepared for shifting ground and collapsed routes.

“They’re geared for this place,” Brakk shouts.

“I see that.”

“I hate it when murder cults have procurement departments.”

A Choir round strikes the support near my shoulder, showering my face with hot stone fragments. I blink through the sting and drop the shooter as he leans too far around the threshold. He falls backward out of view without a cry.

Anita crawls to the next segment of cover while keeping the archive case under one arm. She should remain low. She should stay where I can block the angle. Instead, she sees an inscription panel glowing on the inner wall and reaches toward it with her scanner.

“Anita!” I shout.

She does not look at me. “It’s mapping the lower route.”

A bolt hits the floor two handspans from her knee.

I cross the open ramp before fear can become thought. My shoulder slams into her, driving both of us behind a fractured support as fire rakes the space where she was crouched. She hits the stone with a grunt and turns on me, furious.

“I had it!”

“You almost had a hole through your spine.”

“That panel shows branching access routes.”

“Then read it from cover.”

“I can’t if you tackle me every time⁠—”

The shaft groans.

At first, I think another charge has gone off. Then the entire descending structure shudders in a wave that moves downward faster than sound. Silver lines flare across the ramp. The air thickens. My inner ear twists violently.

Gravity inverts.

Everything not anchored falls upward.

The sensation is immediate and nauseating. Loose debris, dust, spent charge casings, and droplets of blood tear away from the ramp toward the shaft ceiling far above. Brakk roars as his boots lose traction. Sira catches a raised seam with one hand, her body whipping upward like a banner in storm wind. Anita slips from behind the support.