Chapter 107 The Gas Line Noose

Chapter 107 The Gas Line Noose
Marcus

My heart froze solid in my chest. The damp smell of the old subway terminal suddenly felt like a trap. Behind Mason, inside the broken lift, the black machine’s yellow eyes glared at us like two miniature suns. But the tiny black remote in my uncle's trembling hand was a thousand times more dangerous.

The main gas line. He wasn't just threatening a street or a block. He was talking about the life support of the entire lower sector. If that line blew, the fire would race through the pipes, cooking thousands of families in their sleep.

"You're a monster," I whispered, my voice shaking with a deep, sickening realisation. "They are your people, too, Mason. You grew up in this city!"

"I grew up to own it, Marcus," Mason hissed. The white foam from the leak was drying on his skin, making his face look like a cracked plaster mask. His single open eye was bloodshot and wild. "If I can't have the network, then no one gets the city. Drop the girl. Walk away from the lift. This is your last warning."

My mind raced through our options, but the math was completely zero. Jax was leaning heavily against the dirty brick wall, his hand completely soaked in blood from his ruined shoulder. Sarah was holding Lily tight, her knuckles white as she gripped her iron wrench. And Maya was a cold, heavy weight in my arms, her small life dripping away by the second.

We couldn't fight two war machines and a madman with a bomb remote.

I need a miracle, I thought, a bitter tear burning the dust on my cheek. Julian, Dad... anyone.

Sarah

I could hear the hiss of the gas pipes. Now that my mind knew the danger, the quiet whistling sound in the dark terminal felt like a snake waiting to strike.

"Marcus," I whispered softly, stepping closer to his side. "The remote. Is it hard-wired or wireless?"

"Wireless," Marcus muttered back, his eyes glued to Mason's thumb. "A short-range radio trigger. If he presses it, the spark signals the main valve behind the wall."

"Then we don't need to break the remote," I said, a desperate plan forming in my head. My ribs throbbed with a dull, sickening pain, but the thought of our home sector exploding gave me a sharp spike of energy. "We just need to block the signal."

"With what?" Jax choked out from the wall. "We don't have any tools left, Sarah. The master drive is melted."

I looked at Maya. The ports in the back of her skull were still warm, a faint purple glow tracing the lines of her neck. The bio-chip inside her brain was still active, still searching for a network to connect to.

"Marcus, use the child," I said, my voice tight. "She’s an antenna. If you plug your skin into her port, can you turn her into a jammer?"

Marcus looked at Maya, his face twisting in absolute agony. "It could fry what's left of her mind, Sarah! I could kill her!"

"If you don't do it, we all die anyway!" Mason screamed from the lift doors, his thumb tensing over the green button. "Three! Two!"

Marcus

The countdown hit my brain like a physical blow. There was no time to argue. There was no time to be safe.

"Forgive me, Maya," I sobbed.

I slammed my left index finger directly into the open cybernetic port behind the little girl's ear.

The moment my skin touched the cold metal pins, a violent shockwave of raw, stinging static shot straight into my arm. My vision went completely black for a split second. The blue data lines on my skin didn't just light up, they exploded into a bright, blinding white glare that illuminated the entire dark subway station.

I didn't try to direct the energy. I just let the static scream out of my body, using Maya's bio-chip to project a massive, invisible wall of raw radio noise across the hallway.

"Die!" Mason roared, and his thumb slammed down hard on the green button.

Nothing happened.

The remote clicked softly in his hand, but the signal couldn't break through the thick cloud of white-hot static radiating from my skin. The green light on his controller flickered wildly and died.

"What? No!" Mason shrieked, frantically mashing the button over and over again. "Shoot them! Unit One, clear the hall!"

The black war machine behind him didn't hesitate. It lunged forward, its heavy steel body tearing through the ruined elevator doors as its yellow eyes snapped into a furious, bright red light. The triple-barrel mini-gun on its arm began to spin with a terrifying metallic shriek.

"Get to the tracks!" Jax yelled, throwing his weight forward and slamming his body straight into the second robot's knee to slow it down.

Sarah grabbed Lily and sprinted down the dark subway tunnel, her boots splashing through the dirty water on the floor. I stumbled backward, my arm still locked to Maya's head as the white light poured from my skin, blinding my vision.

I ran blindly into the dark tunnel, the freezing air hitting my face. But before I could take ten steps, a heavy, cold metal hand clamped down hard on my right ankle from behind.

The force was incredible. I was jerked off my feet, my chest slamming hard into the concrete floor as Maya slid out of my grip.

Through the darkness of the tunnel, I turned my head. It wasn't the robot holding my leg.

It was Mason. He had crawled through the static, his face bloody and ruined, his fingers digging into my skin like iron claws. In his other hand, he held a long, jagged piece of shattered glass from the elevator doors, aiming the sharp point straight down at my eye.

"If the city won't burn," Mason whispered, his face just inches from mine, "then you bleed first!"

Mason has Marcus pinned in the dark tunnel with a shard of glass! With the war machines right behind them, who will strike the final blow in the dark?