The cold, smooth metal of the vent shaft pressed against my palms and knees. Darkness, absolute and suffocating, swallowed me whole. Only the frantic thudding of my stolen heart – Psi-Nine's heart, amplified and pounding against my ribs like a war drum – and the harsh rasp of my own breath broke the silence. The chaotic symphony of the alarm, the shouts, the Succubis' hum, all faded rapidly behind me, muffled by the twisting metal intestines of the facility. I was alone. Buried alive in the dark.
But not truly alone.
The psychic stain of Psi-Nine's death clung to me like a second skin. Fragmented memories flickered behind my eyes, unwanted ghosts in the blackness: the Parisian sun on cobblestones, the rough burlap sack, the Tall One's impassive eyes, the searing agony of the Rooms Below. Each flash was a fresh lash of guilt, a reminder of the monstrous act that fueled my escape. The stolen strength thrummed in my veins, cold and potent, yet it felt alien, unclean. A loan taken from a soul damned by the same captors I fled.
*Monster.* The word echoed in the cramped space. Not just a label anymore, but a visceral truth. I had psychically devoured a dying man. The revulsion warred with the exhilarating power, the desperate need to survive. *Find Mark. Kill him.* That singular purpose, forged in the snows of Moscow and tempered in this white hell, was the only compass I had. It had to be enough to navigate the darkness, both without and within.
My enhanced senses strained against the void. Sight was useless. But hearing… hearing became my world. The distant, erratic *THUMP-THUMP-SKREE* of the damaged Heart below vibrated through the ductwork, a discordant bassline to my flight. The groan of stressed metal as the facility settled after the disruption. The faint, almost imperceptible *whirr-click* of distant machinery. And closer… the skittering of tiny claws? Rats? Or something else adapted to the underbelly?
Smell was overwhelming. Dust, thick and ancient, choked my nostrils. The stale tang of recycled air. The faint, lingering ozone of electrical systems. And beneath it all, the pervasive scent of the Court: bleach, chemicals, and something colder, more metallic – the scent of the Succubis, of Silas's psychic chill. It was the smell of the prison itself, seeping from the walls.
I crawled. Blindly. Instinctively downward, drawn by the increasing vibration of the erratic Heart. The vent shaft was narrow, forcing me to move in an awkward, crablike shuffle. My claws scraped rhythmically against the metal, the sound loud in the confined space, a beacon announcing my passage. I tried to lift my hands, to crawl on fingertips, but the unnatural sharpness threatened to puncture the thin metal. I was reduced to dragging myself forward on my forearms, my knees scraping painfully despite the stolen resilience.
Time lost meaning. Minutes bled into what felt like hours. The darkness pressed in, a physical weight. The air grew thicker, warmer, carrying a new scent – a damp, mineral smell, like wet stone deep underground. The vibration intensified, shaking the duct beneath me, making my teeth rattle. The erratic pounding of the Heart was closer now, punctuated by grinding shrieks and violent clangs that echoed up the shaft like the screams of tortured metal. *Break the Howling.* Melin's command echoed. Was the Howling *this*? The damaged Heart? Or something else?
A faint glow began to seep into the darkness ahead. Not the sterile white light of the cells, but a dim, pulsing, sickly green luminescence. It emanated from a junction where my shaft met another, larger one angling steeply downward. Hope, cold and sharp, pierced the despair. Light meant a way. It also meant exposure.
I slowed my crawl, moving with agonizing slowness, every sense screaming for danger. The junction was wider, a small metal platform where four ducts converged. The green light came from a series of faintly glowing strips running along the walls of the largest duct, descending into the depths. Bioluminescent paint? Some form of emergency lighting? It cast long, distorted shadows, painting the grimy metal in shades of eerie jade.
Peering cautiously down the lit shaft, I saw it stretched deep, disappearing into a green-tinged gloom. The air flowing upwards was warmer, carrying the mineral dampness and a new, unsettling sound beneath the Heart's discordant thumping: a low, almost subsonic *hum*. It wasn't mechanical. It felt… organic. Alive. And it resonated with a faint, primal unease in the core of my stolen being. *The Howling?*
Before I could commit to the descent, a sound froze me. Not from below. From behind. Back the way I came.
*Click. Scrape. Click.*
Slow. Deliberate. Metallic.
A Succubus.
They were in the vents. Hunting.
Panic, cold and sharp, threatened to paralyze me. They moved with that same terrifying, silent efficiency, unimpeded by darkness. They would find me. Their hollow strength was beyond my stolen power. The needle… the Harvest…
I looked down the green-lit shaft. My only path. But it was exposed. A glowing tunnel leading straight to whatever lay below. I looked back into the impenetrable blackness from which the scraping sound emanated, growing steadily closer. Trapped.
*Think!* The soldier's mind, buried under the vampire's instincts and the trauma, clawed its way to the surface. *Use the environment. Use your senses.*
My eyes scanned the junction platform. The green light strips. The seams in the metal. The grime. Then I saw it. Above the entrance to the shaft I'd crawled from, a small, recessed panel. An access point? A maintenance hatch? It was slightly ajar, perhaps loosened by the earlier tremors.
The scraping sound was closer. Maybe twenty yards back. Closing fast.
No time for caution. I pushed upwards, bracing my back against the ceiling of the junction, my feet against the opposite wall. My claws found purchase on the lip of the recessed panel. With a grunt fueled by fear and stolen strength, I *pulled*. Metal shrieked in protest. Rivets popped. The panel, roughly two feet square, tore free, clattering down into the dark shaft I'd emerged from.
I didn't hesitate. I hauled myself up and into the newly revealed space – a cramped vertical shaft, barely wider than my shoulders, leading upwards into absolute darkness. The air was stale and thick with undisturbed dust. I pulled my legs up just as the first glimpse of a pale, expressionless face, illuminated by the green glow, appeared at the entrance of the duct I'd fled. Empty dark eyes scanned the junction, pausing on the torn access panel above.
I held my breath, pressing myself against the grimy metal wall of the vertical shaft, dust tickling my nose. My heart hammered against my ribs, a frantic drumbeat I was sure they could hear. The Succubus didn't look up immediately. Its head tilted, processing. It took a step onto the junction platform, its movements unnervingly silent on the metal. It scanned the other ducts, the green-lit descent.
*Go down. Please go down.*
It took another step towards the edge of the platform, peering down into the green gloom. Then, slowly, deliberately, its head tilted upwards. Those dark, empty pools fixed on the hole I'd torn, on the darkness where I hid.
Time stopped.
Its hand, pale and smooth, reached up towards the opening.
Suddenly, a violent tremor rocked the entire vent system. A massive *CRUNCH-SKREEE* echoed from far below, followed by a surge in the erratic pounding of the Heart. The green lights flickered violently. The subsonic hum deepened, vibrating the metal with palpable force. A shower of dust and debris rained down from above.
The Succubus paused, its hand inches from the opening. Its head tilted again, not towards me, but downward, towards the source of the disruption. Systemic instability. A higher priority than a single escaped subject? Its programming seemed to war for a microsecond. Then, with that same terrifying efficiency, it turned away from the shaft and stepped towards the green-lit descent. It didn't run. It simply moved with purpose, disappearing down the glowing tunnel, swallowed by the green gloom.
I slumped against the shaft wall, gasping silently, the dust thick in my throat. Sweat, cold and clammy, slicked my skin despite the warmth. That had been too close. Far too close. The Court's systems were failing, buying me precious, terrifying moments.
But I couldn't stay here. The vertical shaft offered only temporary refuge. Upwards likely led only to more ducts, possibly dead ends or back towards the occupied levels. Downwards, towards the Heart and the Howling, was the only path Melin had indicated. The only path forward, even if it led deeper into the beast's maw.
Gritting my teeth, I began a slow, arduous descent down the cramped vertical shaft, using my claws and knees to brace against the walls, lowering myself inch by agonizing inch. The darkness was absolute again, the only sound my ragged breathing, the scrape of claws on metal, and the ever-present, increasingly violent discord of the damaged Heart below. The subsonic hum was stronger here, vibrating through my bones, setting my teeth on edge. It felt… hungry. Angry.
After what felt like an eternity, my foot met not metal, but open air. I dangled for a moment, probing downwards with my senses. The shaft ended. Below was another space. Cooler air washed over me, carrying a complex symphony of smells: ozone, hot metal, the mineral dampness, something acrid like burnt wiring, and beneath it all… *blood*. Old blood. Lots of it. And something else… a sweet, cloying rot that made my stomach churn despite the lingering fullness from Psi-Nine.
Carefully, silently, I lowered myself down, dropping the last few feet onto a solid, slightly yielding surface. Not metal. Concrete. I crouched instantly, senses flaring.
The green bioluminescent strips were here too, casting their sickly light. I was in a vast, high-ceilinged space – some kind of subterranean service tunnel or access corridor. Pipes, thick and rusted, snaked along the walls and across the ceiling, dripping condensation. Conduits pulsed with faintly visible energy. The floor was slick with moisture and grime. The air thrummed with the combined cacophony of the damaged Heart – much louder now, a physical pressure in my ears – and that deep, unsettling subsonic hum. The *Howling*? It seemed to emanate from the walls themselves, from the very rock the facility was built into.
And the smell… the blood smell was pervasive. Not fresh, but old, spilled, soaked into the concrete. The coppery tang mixed with the sweet rot – decay. This place had seen death. Lots of it. Discarded equipment littered the edges of the tunnel: broken carts, dented barrels leaking unknown fluids, tangled coils of cable. Graffiti, faded and cryptic, marked the walls in places: symbols I didn't recognize, numbers, and a recurring motif that looked like a jagged sound wave or a stylized scream.
I moved forward, hugging the wall, my steps silent on the damp concrete. The tunnel stretched ahead, curving slightly, the green light fading into darkness. The thumping and the Howling grew louder with every step, pulling me deeper. My senses, still hyper-acute, picked out details: rat droppings, a discarded, blood-stained rag, a single, pristine white button lying near a drain grate.
Then I heard it. Not the machinery. Not the Howling. Voices. Muffled, tense, coming from around the bend ahead.
"...total cascade failure in Sector Gamma! The core resonator is fluctuating beyond safe parameters! Silas is furious!"
"Furious? He's unhinged! Blaming Engineering for O-1's little tantrum? That psychic surge came *after* the Custodians reported the feed event! It overloaded the dampeners!"
"Doesn't matter. He wants containment. O-1 is priority Alpha. Jark-Alpha is being prepped for Sigma Protocol now. Melin-Prime is under maximum observation. Silas thinks she triggered something in O-1."
A harsh laugh. "Of course he does. Blame the broken tools. Look, the Heart is critical. If that resonator blows, the Howling containment fails completely. We lose the Anchor Stone, Silas loses his foothold here, and half the facility goes up in a psionic backlash. We need to vent the buildup *now*. Manual override at Junction 7."
"Junction 7? That's deep in the Resonator Chamber! With the Howling spiking like this? It's suicide!"
"You want to explain to Silas why we let the core breach because we were scared? Move! Take the suppression kit. And watch the vents. Gamma-6 reported O-1 fled into the network before losing contact. He could be anywhere."
Boots scraped on concrete, moving away quickly.
I pressed myself flat against a cluster of large, cold pipes, my mind racing. *Junction 7. Resonator Chamber. Howling containment. Anchor Stone.* Silas's power *was* anchored here, physically. Break the Howling, break the Anchor? And Melin… they thought she was connected to me, to what I'd done. Was she? Had her command sparked something?
The voices belonged to Court personnel. Humans. Afraid. Heading towards the epicenter of the chaos. Towards the Heart, the Resonator Chamber… Junction 7. Where I needed to go. They were my unwitting guides, but also a deadly threat.
I waited until the footsteps faded, then ghosted forward, following the curve of the tunnel. It opened into a nightmarish vista.
The service tunnel ended at a railed gallery overlooking a colossal, cavernous space bathed in the same sickly green light, now interspersed with violent arcs of blue-white energy that snapped and crackled from damaged conduits. Below lay the **Heart**.
It wasn't a machine. Not entirely. It was a grotesque fusion of technology and… something else. A massive, pulsating central core, like a diseased heart the size of a bus, made of dark, veined stone shot through with glowing crystalline filaments. Pipes and cables, thick as tree trunks, plunged into it, throbbing with captured energy. This was the source of the discordant *THUMP-THUMP-SKREE*. Sections of the stone core were cracked, leaking not blood, but viscous, shimmering energy that hissed and spat where it touched the metal walkways surrounding it. The air crackled with unstable power.
Surrounding the Heart core, embedded in the cavern walls and floor, were massive, intricately carved stone monoliths – the **Resonators**. They hummed with power, vibrating intensely, their surfaces covered in glowing, shifting runes. But some were dark, cracked. Others pulsed erratically. This was the source of the subsonic **Howling**. It wasn't just a sound; it was a physical force, a pressure wave that vibrated the very air, making my bones ache and my stolen blood churn. It felt like standing inside the throat of a slumbering god of madness.
The Howling wasn't just noise; it was containment. A psychic dam. Holding back *something* emanating from the largest monolith directly opposite the gallery – a towering, obsidian-black stone pillar radiating intense cold and palpable malice. The **Anchor Stone**. Silas's tether. Tendrils of dark energy, like frozen smoke, pulsed from it, weaving through the air and connecting to the Resonators, to the Heart, perhaps to the entire facility above. I could *feel* Silas's presence here, a suffocating blanket of cold intellect and rage, even more potent than through Jark.
Below, on a network of gantries and walkways surrounding the chaotic Heart, figures moved. Court technicians in bulky, insulated suits scrambled like ants, welding, shouting over the din, trying to contain the leaking energy. Two figures in dark uniforms, carrying a heavy case, were hurrying along a high walkway towards a specific platform jutting near a cluster of wildly pulsing Resonators – **Junction 7**. The manual override.
My path was clear. Terrifyingly clear. I had to reach Junction 7. Break the Howling? Vent the buildup? Disrupt the Anchor Stone? Melin's command was terrifyingly vague, but the objective was undeniable: Cripple Silas. Cripple the Court's power here.
But how? The gallery offered no direct descent. Stairs and ladders led down to the main floor, but they were exposed. Guards in similar dark uniforms patrolled the perimeter, weapons drawn, scanning not just the chaos below but the shadows, the vents – hunting for me. The Succubis were undoubtedly down here somewhere, navigating the chaos with their inhuman calm.
The two technicians with the suppression kit reached Junction 7, a small platform dominated by a large, complex console covered in levers, dials, and blinking lights, all glowing an angry red. They frantically started working.
As I watched, a violent surge of energy erupted from a cracked Resonator nearby. It wasn't light or electricity; it was a wave of distorted *sound*, visible as a ripple in the air. It struck a technician on a lower gantry. He didn't scream; he… *unraveled*. His body vibrated violently for a split second before dissolving into a fine, red mist that scattered on the howling wind. The suppression kit clattered to the walkway near Junction 7, momentarily forgotten by the horrified surviving technician.
Opportunity. And horror.
The Howling wasn't just containment; it was a weapon. Unstable, lethal.
The surviving tech at Junction 7 fumbled with the console, his movements frantic with terror. He pulled a large lever. A deep, groaning sound echoed through the chamber, competing with the Heart's thumping. A section of the cavern wall near the ceiling slid open, revealing a massive vent. The Howling's pitch changed, deepening, becoming even more oppressive as energy was vented upwards, but the pressure on the Anchor Stone seemed to lessen fractionally. It was working. Temporarily relieving the strain.
But it also created a new element: a roaring updraft of hot, ozone-tinged air blasting from the vent high above Junction 7. It whipped across the gantries, making the technicians clutch railings, snatching at loose tools and debris.
A plan, desperate and likely fatal, formed in my mind. It involved the updraft, the high walkway to Junction 7, the dropped suppression kit… and a leap of faith powered by stolen strength and monstrous desperation.
I took a deep breath of the charged, metallic air. The ghost of Psi-Nine's terror flickered in my mind. The cold hatred for Mark Velics solidified in my core. The Howling vibrated in my teeth.
It was time to dance with the devil in the heart of the Howling dark. I coiled the stolen power in my legs, my eyes fixed on the distant, chaotic platform of Junction 7. The updraft roared like a hungry beast above it.