## **Chapter 21: Beneath the Steel**
They waited in the tunnels beneath Auric's western transit district, pressed into the shadows and breathing silence like oxygen. Above them, the city churned with the Empire's frantic response to the flare from Sector Eight—drone traffic doubling, checkpoints expanding, and silence across official broadcasts. The regime had always survived by projecting calm, by convincing everyone that resistance was futile. But now, the illusion flickered.
Kian crouched low near the tunnel's exit, his gloved fingers etching a half-circle into the dusty floor. "The Pulse Core's sitting behind three magnetic locks," he whispered, the words forming clouds in the cold underground air. "Two I can short. But the last… it's analog. Steel seal. Manual breach only."
Rex knelt beside him, scanning the schematic on his wrist. "Manual's fine. We don't need subtle." He glanced toward the others behind them—Serena, quiet and focused, and two scouts nicknamed Shrike and Lorne, both ex-tactical officers who now carried makeshift gear and the weight of new loyalty.
Serena tapped her pack. "Transmitter's primed. Once we reach the core, I'll connect to the power rails. Should jumpstart the signal array." Her tone held a strain of warning. "But if the containment system inside's degraded, that charge might ricochet."
"I'll handle it," Kian said.
The route ahead climbed through a steep service ladder and emerged through a pressure-locked grate under the vault's cooling ducts. The vault wasn't large—four levels deep and shaped like a gear buried in concrete—but it connected three surveillance grids and half the city's environmental feedback loops. Disabling it wouldn't just block the Empire's view. It would confuse them. For hours.
They climbed in silence, boots carefully placed, eyes darting toward vibration sensors. At the final hatch, Rex looked back at Kian. "Timing starts the moment we breach. Ten seconds. That's it."
"I only need six," Kian replied.
Rex opened the hatch.
They emerged into a dim corridor that pulsed with faint red warning lights. Pipes hissed quietly along the ceiling, and the floor trembled faintly with mechanical activity. Kian moved first, kneeling by the access panel for Lock One. He pressed his hand to the metal, closed his eyes, and released a measured pulse.
Sparks flared—and the lock clicked open.
They moved as one.
At Lock Two, the panel fought back. The Empire had upgraded these—Kian could feel it. Older locks cracked under pressure. This one resisted, its circuit trying to redirect. But Kian pressed harder, diverting his power into the fuses and melting through the relay. It collapsed in a hiss of heat.
Lock Three was steel. Serena yanked a crowbar from her gear and jammed it beneath the panel's seam. With Rex's help, they pried it free and slipped inside the Pulse Core chamber.
The core was beautiful. A suspended glass column wrapped in copper bands and rippling light, humming with latent energy. Around it, the walls pulsed with control interfaces—some digital, others analog, a hybrid of old and new. That was good. The system wasn't cohesive. That meant it could be broken.
Serena unloaded the transmitter and set it against the housing rails. "Lina's patch will go live the moment the transmitter feeds power. The data will route through the nexus and bounce across every audio panel in the city." She glanced at Kian. "Your window is five seconds."
Kian knelt in front of the relay conduit, fingertips grazing the copper cabling. The moment he connected, the charge met him like a question—eager, pulsing, uncertain. He inhaled slowly. This time, he didn't push. He listened.
"I don't want to break you," he whispered. "I want to speak through you."
The relay shifted.
Then it accepted.
The circuit roared to life.
Across half the city, monitors blinked. Screens shimmered with static, then aligned. A single phrase appeared, over and over: **Are you ready to rise?**
In apartments, on transport loops, in loading docks—people stopped.
Back in the vault, alarms screamed. Someone had noticed.
Rex's voice crackled in their ears. "Multiple hostiles. Floor Two breach in thirty. You're boxed in. I'll run a red echo distraction, buy you time."
"No," Kian said. "You'll get pinned."
"I've done worse," Rex growled. "Move."
Serena lifted the transmitter, dropped it into her sling, and pulled Kian upright. "We need high ground. Duct system?"
He nodded. They sprinted out of the chamber and into a sloped hallway, just as heavy boots pounded the corridor behind them. Serena veered right, leading them into a derelict server room, its ceiling partially collapsed. Kian leapt, grabbed a conduit brace, and hoisted himself into the crawlspace. Serena followed.
Bullets slammed the wall beneath them.
Crawling fast, they moved through the heating vents, the transmitter pulsing warm against Serena's back. A drone clattered behind them. Kian turned, reached into the vent grill, and sent a magnetic spike backward.
The drone's lights blinked—then died.
At the rooftop, wind howled across them as they climbed onto the ledge. Serena slapped the transmitter onto a vent mast, locking it into place. Kian reached up and fed it one final surge.
The transmitter flashed once—then again.
And from the city below, an identical flash answered.
One symbol.
Drawn in light.
The rebellion's first call-and-response.
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