The bridge exploded, but Ethan and his drone had already let go. Dropping from nearly twelve feet was a shock to the system, and they hit the shelf hard. Heat shimmered below, molten resin trenches glowing like rivers of magma, each one a scar from prior cannon shots. Above, the walls throbbed, swollen with pressure, their skin so thin he could almost see the slurry shifting inside. The ledge was slick as ice. One slip and he would fall into the molten glow.

  Miro didn’t fire at him. Not yet. Instead as the music swelled to a crescendo, the cannon spat red at his flanks with precise, deliberate shots. Each blast fused ribs together, reshaping the shelf into a narrowing funnel. Escape lanes closed with every strike. Ethan flinched from the heat, every flash sealing him in tighter.

  “Every path bends. Every wall closes,” the monster sang, his voice doubled and trebled in the resin. “The choir leaves no silence for you to hide in.” This was not an attack; it was herding.

  The shelf shuddered. At its far end, pores ruptured wide, and resin sloughed free in glistening ropes. Three crawlers spilled out, mandibles clattering as their claws scrabbled for grip on the glass. Their bodies glowed faint from the heat and steam curled off their limbs.

  There was no space to dodge. Ethan planted the axe haft sideways, bracing himself against the wall. The first crawler snapped at him and he shoved it back into Harold’s firing cone. The drone’s turret chattered, bursts hammering the creature into chunks. The second lunged with its head low. Harold swung wide, turret still rattling, sparks flashing as the crawler blew apart.

  The third was faster. It scrambled through resin shards and leapt at Ethan’s boot. Mandibles clacked shut an inch from his ankle.

  The turret whined high and locked. Smoke hissed from Harold’s side vents. The little drone jerked in place, his light flickering dangerously, like alarms going haywire.

  “Damn it,” Ethan groaned, shoving with the axe haft. The crawler scraped against his leg, its claws shredding the final remaining piece of the suit’s leather, but he drove it sideways with everything he had. Its body tumbled into the molten trench below, screaming as it died mid-fall.

  The shelf trembled again. Harold whined static, optics twitching while the turret remained locked. His lamp halo sputtered, scattering light across the slick glass. If Harold failed completely, if the lamp died, Ethan would be left alone in the dark with only the silence and the pulse, and the embers of red resin that barely illuminated the ground. Panic clawed at him, hotter than the air. Attrition was killing the drone, not the cannon.

  The same hum from earlier continued building. An intricate melody played, foreboding and overwhelming, yet the music gave Ethan a sense of calm. His chest rose with it, unwilling. The rhythm was clear: one, two, three, pause. The veins glowed brighter and dimmed with the sound. Miro vented heat from the cannon, the muzzle glow building for another shot.

  Ethan moved on instinct. He lunged forward during the pause. The blast carved the air behind him, scorching the shelf so close he felt the skin peel on the back of his neck.

  A surge of grim satisfaction hit his chest. It was not random; it was a system. If there was rhythm, there was timing. He could exploit that.

  Miro laughed through the chamber, a choir made of rot. “You dance already. The pulse writes itself in you. Soon you’ll sing along too.”

  The shelf narrowed to nothing. Ethan scrambled forward with molten glass yawning below and the resin wall sealing ahead. The cul-de-sac closed like a throat as ribs pressed in and heat rose. Harold limped back to his side, his turret venting smoke and close to overheating. The drone’s little frame shook with each step.

  Ethan leaned against the resin wall, his lungs dragging air that tasted of metal and ash. The chamber moved faster than he could. It reshaped itself with every blast, closed every exit, herded him like prey. He could not run much longer. He needed a plan.

  Ethan pressed his back against the resin wall. The chamber had pinched down to nothing: slick ribs closing in, molten glass glowing below. Harold limped beside him, his lamp halo weak and shivering, turret vents rattling smoke. There was no more running. Every cannon shot reshaped the world faster than he could adapt. The ledge narrowed with each blast, herding him into silence. Defense was death.

  The Ore was the only crack in Miro’s power..

  Forget the gun. Go for the heart.

  The music thickened once more around him, threading into his marrow. He found the rhythm: one, two, three, pause. This is it. This is how I’ll beat him.

  The veins glowed and dimmed with it, steady as a heartbeat. Ethan matched his breath to the rhythm, his chest rising on the beat, teeth clenched against the heat that scalded every inhale. At first, it was only a pulse. It swelled, layering over itself until the hum became an orchestra, its dark notes twisted and warped by the resin walls. Strings shrieked off-key, brass brayed like broken horns, and percussion thundered as deep as cannon fire.

  This close, it wasn't just sound. It pressed into him, clawing at his nerves, sliding hooks into his senses and his thoughts. Shadows moved in the corners of his vision. He saw figures that were not there, the dead crew walking just behind him, their lips shaping words he could not hear. A phantom hand gripped his shoulder, trying to wrench him off-balance. His stomach lurched, his brain convinced he was falling into the molten trenches even as his boots found purchase on the shelf.

  Ignore it. The Ore. That’s the only truth here.

  The orchestra swelled again, louder and dissonant. Voices threaded into the chords, whispering from the resin-like choirs hidden inside the walls.

  Stop. Rest. Kneel. You are nothing but marrow to be drunk; meat to be eaten.

  Every syllable dug deeper, curling around his spine. His body wanted to fold, to give in to the simplicity of obedience.

  Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.

  “No,” Ethan said, forcing the word through cracked lips. His grip tightened on the axe. The shaft bit into his palm, the wood solid and real against the lies. “I’m not yours.”

  He lunged into the firelight on the pause.

  The cannon howled, a brass note shaking the chamber. A beam scorched past his shoulder, heat blistering his back as it tore into the wall behind him. Resin ribs fused shut where it struck, sealing off escape, leaving only the path ahead.

  He didn’t falter. Harold clung close, his turret coughing short bursts into crawlers still spilling from new pores in the wall. Each burst flared against Harold’s fractured lens, throwing jagged beams that crawled across the glassy floor. Sparks danced in the humid air, vanishing into the red glow. The little machine’s frame rattled with every shot as smoke vented from its flank. It still fought, clearing a narrow path for Ethan to run.

  The music twisted harsher the closer Ethan came. High strings scraped like nails dragged across glass. A timpani pounded inside his chest, shaking his heart out of rhythm. He almost staggered when he heard Reyes (no, not possible) whispering his name from the horns, begging him to stop. Varma followed, her voice layered in the violins, saying she was waiting in the silence if he would just let go.

  He squeezed his eyes shut for one step, forcing the visions away. They’re dead. This is him, not them. Not real. Not real. Not real.

  The shelf narrowed beneath him, funneling toward Miro’s looming form. The monster’s chest burned furnace-red, his ribs flexing in time with the music. And there, at the very center, gleamed the Ore. Green light pulsed inside crimson, each flare perfectly in tune with the orchestra’s corrupted song.

  Ethan locked on it like a lifeline. Everything else was lies: the music, the shadows, the voices. The Ore was his truth. If he could focus on that, he'd be unstoppable.

  The orchestra, for that was what the music was now, built toward a crescendo. The walls groaned with the swell, Resin-sacs trembling, the molten trenches roaring with sudden fire it had no right producing. Miro spread his arms wide like a conductor commanding his choir, the cannon glowing brighter with every bar. How it hadn't exploded like his, he had no idea.

  Ethan timed his steps to the beat. One, two, three, pause. He sprinted on the gap, his boots squealing on slick glass, heat baking his skin. The music shrieked, trying to trip him with phantom hands and blind him with false light. He clenched his jaw until his teeth ached, blocking it all out. Just focus on the Ore.

  He raised the axe with both hands. Every muscle in his body rebelled, begging him to veer away or drop and let the song swallow him whole. He drove forward anyway, straight at the furnace chest.

  The cannon blared. He dodged, the orchestra screamed the sound of ovlivion. Ethan swung on the next pause.

  The axe head slammed into Miro’s chest plate, sparks exploding across the resin armor. The shriek of metal on alien plating was louder than the orchestra, cutting across the crescendo like a discordant crash. The blade struck the Ore dead-on.

  For a single instant, the world rang like a cracked bell. The orchestra collapsed mid-note, all instruments choking off as though their throats had been slit. The hum faltered, like the chamber’s own heart had stuttered. The veins of magma dimmed. The chamber was no longer whole, its oppressive integrity fractured.

  The Ore shuddered in its socket, then tore free. Green sparks scattered as it tumbled down a rib gutter, bouncing on top of magma as if it were water, spinning away in stuttering flashes of light until it clattered toward CelestOS. He stared up into the eyes of the ferocious Dr. Miro.

  Fuck, what am I doing?

  He briefly looked back at her. That part of the plan worked, now what?

  A heartbeat of silence passed before Miro roared.

  The sound was no longer music. It was raw and primal: half human rage, half insect shriek. The resin sacs around them quaked as if in sympathy, before they all burst open. The monster’s furnace eyes burned brighter than ever, twin furnaces stoked by fury.

  Before Ethan could draw another breath, Miro lunged.

  Resin-plated arms slammed into him, crushing him against a wall that burned like a forge. Ethan’s axe was trapped between them, the haft biting into his own ribs. His body convulsed against the heat, his skin blistering where the armor no longer provided protection. He shoved and twisted, but Miro’s weight was immovable.

  “You dare strike me?” Miro shrieked, his voice splitting into a dozen shrill echoes. “Then let me become a part of you!”

  Spittle sprayed, hot and metallic. The insect plates cracked and shifted across his frame, their seams opening like wounds. Ethan caught a glimpse of what lay beneath: a black-red slurry writhing, pulsing to its own broken rhythm.

  Harold barked static and fired at Miro’s flank. Bursts hammered the resin plates, shattering chunks, but it was like chipping stone. Sparks danced uselessly off the monster’s hide. Miro didn't even flinch.

  Ethan gritted his teeth and wrenched the axe sideways, trying to grind it deeper toward the hollow where the Ore had been. The haft scraped, showering sparks between them. For an instant he felt resistance give, the resin cracking, proof that Miro was not invincible.

  The monster bellowed in fury. With a sickening click, vertebrae snapped along Miro’s neck and spine. His forearm plates shifted, the seams widening before spines erupted.

  They punched into Ethan’s side and arm with surgical precision, barbed hooks driving deep. His scream tore raw from his throat.

  Cold fire spread instantly from the punctures. It raced up his veins like frost cracking glass, a sensation that both burned and froze. His muscles seized and his vision blurred.

  “Yes!” Miro exulted, his voice fractured into a choir of shrieks. “Let the Resin rise within you! Let the hymn rewrite your marrow!”

  Ethan tried to pull back, but the hooks dug deeper. His limbs spasmed, clenching half a beat late, as though another conductor had seized control of his body. His hand would not close when he commanded it; his knee buckled without his consent. Panic clawed at him. This was not pain; it was invasion.

  He smashed the axe haft against Miro’s chest, resin cracking under the blow. Blood slicked his gauntlets, hot and wet, mixing with resin sludge that hissed on contact with his skin. The grip did not loosen.

  Harold darted closer, his claws scrabbling against the glass shelf. The little drone rammed its turret barrel against Miro’s side and fired point-blank. Resin exploded outward, fragments pelting Ethan’s cheek. The distraction let him wrench the axe a fraction deeper.

  The veins overhead flickered, the chamber’s rhythm staggering.

  Miro shrieked, his fractured voice cracking into a cacophony of tones, none of them human. He lashed out with one resin claw, snapping inches away from the turret. The drone squealed and tumbled sideways, its claws scraping sparks as it teetered dangerously close to the molten trench below.

  “No!” Ethan’s roar tore his throat ragged. He shoved harder, his muscles screaming, the axe biting another inch toward the hollow socket. The pressure on his arm doubled.

  Something sharp pressed against his forearm from inside. A resin spur, stabbing through his torn suit and skin. The heat and cold blended into a single unbearable burn.

  The orchestra was not gone after all. It was inside him now. He felt the first notes resonate through bone, the first tendrils of the song creeping beneath his flesh.

  Miro leaned close, his furnace eyes flooding Ethan’s vision. “Do you hear it? Even your silence sings.”

  The hooks burrowed deeper. Ethan’s body convulsed, blood spilling in rivulets down his side, steaming on the hot resin floor.