The tunnel was dark. The echoes made it sound like it went on forever. Going in blind probably wasn’t the best idea but Emryn was doing it anyway. Holding the rocky wall she followed the distant hissing of wild-spiders.

Emryn had killed most of Mallax’s puppets but they still had a few digging tunnels for them. If she wanted to catch anyone she needed to kill them off before they created a maze.

Emryn held firm to her chakram and listened. She heard faint scratches coming in waves. The wolf-spiders were digging. Judging from the sounds, they number around four. It would be harder to fight them in the dark.

Taking slow steps and trailing her hand against the tunnel walls, she followed the loudest route. Humans didn’t move through the ground as well as the wolf-spiders.

The scent of blood hit her nose. Emryn froze. Something else was in here. The warm breaths brushed against her neck. Dirt scrunched behind her and she swung. Emryn felt the chakram burrow through flesh, then the screeching started, a large contrast to the wolf-spider’s eerie silence earlier.

Emryn jumped back, ready for it to strike. At the exact moment it yelled out, shots fired down the tunnel, piercing its ink black skin and ripping its flesh. Emryn heard someone approach her, grabbing her shoulder. Emryn swung back.

“Watch it!” Malcolm yelled while dodging her attack.

“Malcolm?” Emryn exclaimed, reaching out into the darkness for him. He must have followed her down. Emryn knew if he was down here the others couldn’t be far behind.

Malcolm grabbed hold of her arm where the bandages were still stained with blood from earlier, and pulled her in closer. He placed something over her eyes that felt a lot like the glasses Alex always wore.

Emryn blinked them into focus. She could see everything through a fuzzing green filter.

“What were you thinking?” Malcolm slapped her shoulder. “I know you’re crazy but come on, running after them without a plan? It’s like you went back to being stupid.”

Emryn slapped him back. “Don’t hit me,” she argued. “I needed to stop them from getting away.”

“Right, cause you’ll do so well catching them when you can’t see.”

“I don’t need to see them. If I can kill their ugly pets and block off their exits, I can easily take them all down.”

Malcolm groaned. “It still wasn’t a good idea.”

Emryn’s pride wanted to argue further but she knew they didn’t have time for it. “It doesn’t matter now, did the others follow you?”

“Probably,” he shrugged. “But I didn’t really wait around to find out.”

Emryn rolled her eyes. And yet he called her stupid. She doubted Malcolm would be able to take down Seth on his own.

“You should wait for the others, I’ll go up ahead,” she said.

“Don’t be dumb. If we’re going after them, we’re going after them as a team.”

“You’ll hold me back.”

Malcolm scoffed. “I just saved your life.”

“I would’ve been fine on my own.”

Malcolm chewed at the inside of his cheek, looking away to roll his eyes. When he began walking away, Emryn followed. She didn’t want to admit it aloud but he did make some fair points.

“They’re not too far ahead. I can hear their footsteps,” Malcolm said, looking around at the tunnel walls. The jagged rocks were broken in patterns. The imprints of force made the stones look like crashing waves. It reminded Emryn of the aftermath of her gravity manipulation. Rough and chaotic.

Emryn listened closely to the echoes bouncing around the burrowed passageways. There were faint sounds coming from all over. As if the Mallax wolf-spiders had broken apart from being a pack in order to create an unsolvable maze.

But Emryn could also hear steps behind them. “Malcolm.” She paused, grabbing his arm. With one swift nod behind them, she got him to stop. Malcolm slowly raised the tip of his gun.

Together they waited for whoever it was to get closer. A shadowy figure emerged from the end of the tunnel and Malcolm tensed. Even with the night vision glasses it was hard to make out who it was.

Emryn narrowed her eyes. She knew those lanky steps. “Wait,” she instructed, pushing Malcolm’s gun down.

“Malcolm! Emryn!” Alex was huffing heavily as he ran to them, almost collapsing on the two when he made it. “I thought…” He took ragged breaths. “I would never…” Another breath. “Find you guys.”

Malcolm regarded him slowly, eyeing him up and down. “It might’ve been better if you hadn’t found us.”

“Rude,” Alex mumbled, leaning up.

More footsteps sounded and soon enough Simone and Zaiden were with them as well. Malcolm glared when he saw Zaiden. “What are you doing here, you’re hurt.”

“I’ll be fine. The wound isn’t deep. Let’s focus on finding O’Connor.”

Emryn’s worry was split. Zaiden was hurt and not in a condition to fight, but having him close meant she could watch over him. Once he was here, she didn’t want him out of her sight.

“They’ve most likely gone down this path,” Emryn pointed towards the loudest tunnel. “Judging from what I can hear, they only have three wolf-spiders left. If we can kill them we’ll almost guarantee O’Connor’s capture.”

“They’ll have nowhere left to run,” Zaiden said, more to himself than anyone else. “Can you pinpoint where the other wolf-spiders are?”

Emryn nodded. “They stopped splitting off from each other not long ago. Right now they’re all gathered in a group with the rest of the Mallax soldiers.”

They didn’t waste anymore time, not caring to wait for anymore backup. The five of them raced through the dirt maze, relying heavily on Emryn’s hearing to guide them to their goal. They ran for longer than expected. This time Alex wasn’t the only one who was tired. Emryn had to slow her pace for them to remain as a group. She was glad she heard the familiar chatter of life when she did.

Raising her hand she signaled for them to stop. There was light emanating from around the corner. Her arm came back to push them close to the wall, landing against Zaiden’s chest. The others followed suit and the five of them huddled against the wall, no one daring to make any noise. Emryn listened closer, needing to know if Seth was among the group.

“I thought we weren’t going to leave anyone behind this time,” someone said.

“We’re not. They’ll meet us here.” Emryn’s heart sank. Seth. He was with them. She knew she shouldn’t care, especially after what he just did, but no matter how hard she tried she couldn’t forget the boy from Cell 13.

He might as well be a different person, she reminded herself. This man before her wasn’t the one she knew.

Emryn looked back at Zaiden and nodded. They had found O’Connor.

Simone activated the heated blades on her axes and the others readied their guns. Malcolm looked uncharacteristically nervous as he held his. Emryn couldn’t blame him. There were only five of them against an unknown number of Mallax soldiers and three wolf-spiders.

Emryn crouched down, picking up a loose rock. They needed to lore the closest wolf-spider out first. She could hear its rough hissing by the opening.

The rock chattered to the ground, volume just loud enough to get the creature’s attention. Its long tar colored legs stepped into their view and before it could attack, Emryn plunged her chakram into its skull. It’s blood gurgled, spraying out.

The wolf-spider made a strangled hissing noise but Simone was quick to slash its throat. As soon as it calasped to the floor, Zaiden was using its badly as a shield and shot at a second wolf-spider on the other side of the room.

The camp stirred to life and the Mallax soldiers quickly got in their feet. There weren’t that many of them, maybe seven, and with the shock advantage they would be taken down easily.

The wolf-spider Zaiden shot was clawing into the wall, withering in pain. The tunnel it was next to collapsed with its body. Malcolm and Simone rushed in right after. Simone used her axes to cut down any gun the soldier were too slow to fire and Malcolm tackled one of them to the ground. Alex and Zaiden stayed under the cover of the wolf-spider corpse and supported from the rear. And Emryn launched herself after the last wolf-spider.

Seth moved into action, blocking her from the final beast. He smiled and she hesitated. It wasn’t him. This couldn’t possibly be the friend she knew.

Emryn swung at him, be he was faster than she thought. Seth dodged easily. Emryn threw attack after attack but his combat skills were greater than anyone she’d ever gone against. Emryn sliced her chakram through the air and Seth lowered down and used his forearm to press against the flare side of the blade. The chakram was knocked out of her hand and chattered on the hard rock floor.

Seth pulled a knife out of his belt and pinned Emryn to the wall, blade pointed at her neck. “This seems familiar doesn’t it?” Seth smirked. He was close. Too close.

Someone shot at the two of them, the bullet zoomed past and Seth barely moved out of the way fast enough. The led grazed his cheek, causing it to bleed momentarily. Alex had shot at him and effectively separated them a little. Emryn took advantage of the distraction and twisted the wrist he was using to pin her. She shoved him into the wall, using the weapon in his own hand to keep him there.

“Surrender,” Emryn commanded, pushing his blade deeper.

Seth’s mouth turned up in a grin. “No I don’t think I will. I’m having far too much fun.”

“You an idiot and a fool,” Emryn seethed.

Seth gazed down at her, unfazed. He really was enjoying himself. “Come on,” he said, leaning down. “You can do better than that Sunshine.” Emryn bit back her reply. At that moment she couldn’t even trust her own voice, not around him. All the while Seth was ignoring the blood dripping down his neck, too engrossed in his teasing to care.

The eyes of the person she once loved more than anyone else in the world were now dark and cold. Emryn lost more and more of her resolve the longer she stared at them.

Zaiden’s arm came in between them, shoving Seth back once more and separating Emryn from him. “You would be wise to keep that mouth of yours shut, O’Connor,” he warned, pushing his forearm harder against Seth’s collarbone.

Seth smiled sickly at him. “Or what, Amin? Are you finally gonna try to kill me?”

“Take a look around you. Your men are down and you’re pinned against a wall.” Emryn was so focused on Seth she had stopped paying attention to the battle around her. She hadn’t noticed the way her companions were holding the Mallax soldiers down while the rest lay injured on the floor. There was one wolf-spider left but it looked too injured to fight.

Seth’s eyes drifted behind Zaiden to where his men were being held, his grin momentarily gone. “Do you think you’ve won?” he said, the corners of his lips raising again. “Do you think this is enough?” Before Zaiden knew what was happening, Seth’s hand dug into the wound on his shoulder and he was on the ground in seconds.

“Don’t try to pick a fight you can’t win,” Malcolm warned, pointing his gun at the head of the Mallax soldier in his arms.

Seth held Malcolm’s gaze for a moment too long, a million thoughts passing through his mind. Emryn knew that look. It was the same look he had when they were kids. Like life was a game and he knew more rules than she ever could.

“Don’t worry,” Seth said, raising his hands up. “I won’t.” Everything after happened so fast, Emryn could do nothing but watch. With a whistle he signaled the last wolf-spider to spring to life. Simone and Alex tried to shoot it down but its corpse-like body wouldn’t stop moving. Its torn up limps dug at the tunnel walls until the passage back to base collapsed at top of it, killing it in an instant and cutting off their only way home.

Zaiden tackled Seth to the floor but he couldn’t wipe the wicked smile off his face. Emryn knew in Seth’s eyes, he had already won.