Tracer fire cracked the ridge like broken lightning. The night wasn't black—it was red and screaming. Shots lit the dark in strobing bursts. Muzzle flashes caught glimpses of insectoid limbs and twisted, lunging forms. A fine spray hung in the air, barely visible in the flashes. Sand kicked up in waves, flecked with shrapnel and bone. Asher ran blind. He didn't remember when he lost his rifle. Somewhere between the ridge and the trench it was torn from him—or maybe he dropped it. No, it broke. It didn't matter. His ears rang. His hands bled. His knees buckled every third step. But he kept going. Behind him, the outpost was burning. Ahead, the trench waited. Beth's voice cut through the storm, calm but sharp. "Move! To the trench—now!" Asher obeyed. No thought. Just momentum. He stumbled down the slope, nearly falling flat before a hand grabbed his collar and yanked him upright. Beth. Her eyes scanned for threats, not him. "You're not dying here," she snapped. "Get your feet under you." He nodded. Tried. Failed. His legs felt like jelly. The world was on the verge of spinning. No, that was Asher.
Another figure sprinted past them—Ryvak. His face a mess of blood and dirt. He was dragging something. No—someone. A soldier severely injured. Screaming. Still alive. Thorne shouted from behind, a roar of authority. "Cover fire! Cover fire!" The trench loomed ahead. Just a shallow dip in the earth, reinforced with sandbags and rusted plating. Barely cover. Barely hope. They dove in. Asher collapsed against a crate, gasping. Something sticky coated his gloves. Beth landed beside him, already turning, already raising her weapon. The drones came fast. Skittering. Crawling. Too fast. One dropped into the trench. Asher fumbled for anything. His hand found metal—a steel rod. He swung. Hit nothing. Then again—connected. The drone reeled. Snarled. Reset. He was dead weight. Then Thorne's pike slammed through the creature. It dropped without a sound. "Get up," Thorne barked. Asher obeyed. This time he didn't fall.
They fought. Beth reloaded without looking. "Joints. Eyes. Knees. Soft tissue." She fired twice. Both hits dropped a drone each. Ryvak screamed again—not out of panic this time. Rage. Pain. He used his body like bait, drawing one drone into the kill zone. Another soldier fell. Another drone burst apart. The line held. But then the air shifted. A new sound. Not claws. Not teeth. A voice. Not spoken. Heard. A sentinel stepped into view—lanky, bone-white, and still. Its eyes blank. Its limbs too long. It opened its mouth, but the scream hit inside their heads. Asher collapsed. Vision blanked. His ears bled. He tasted metal. Beth clutched her temples. Ryvak convulsed. Only Thorne stayed up. The scream stopped. And the second wave hit. They poured over the trench. Crawling, falling, leaping. They didn't die right. They didn't move right.
Asher stood. Something inside him—something cold and hard—moved him. His will to survive. He still had so much to live for. He caught a drone mid-leap and slammed it into a wall. Beth put a round through its skull. They moved together. Not perfectly. But enough. "Left!" Beth screamed. Thorne was already there. He threw his pike like a spear. Impaled one. Ryvak's blade broke. He didn't stop. Just grabbed a chunk of drone shell and used it like brass knuckles. They didn't win. They survived barely. Then the Hive fell back. Smoke. Shrieks. Then silence. Asher dropped to his knees. Beth crouched over one of the soldiers. She used her medical skills but to no avail. It was too late for the soldier. Thorne stood guard, unmoving. "More are coming. We're not done. Get ready. We're gonna move." Asher looked toward the horizon. "Why retreat?" he asked. Beth's eyes met his. "She's studying us." Thorne nodded once. "She's boxing us in. We can't stay here." They all sat in silence, breathing in dust and blood and static. The trench felt like a coffin now.
Asher's voice broke the silence. "Back there… you saw that guy crawling?" Thorne didn't respond. Asher pressed. "The soldier. The one begging." "I saw him." Thorne didn't blink. "You didn't stop." "There was no time." Asher stared at the dirt. "There was a second." "There were fifty others who needed it more." It wasn't judgment. It was math. Thorne's voice was made of numbers and weight and command. Asher didn't argue. He just nodded slowly and thought. "I didn't care about him either. But if that had been me…" He didn't finish the thought. He didn't need to. Beth looked at him. Really looked. But she said nothing. He leaned back, hands shaking. Weakness. Uselessness. In this world, mundane humans had no business fighting monsters—not with the weapons they had, not with the odds they faced. Asher hated feeling helpless. But even more than that, he hated what it meant to let go. "I don't want to be like him," Asher muttered, half to himself. Beth's voice came quieter this time. "No one plans to be. But this world... it pushes hard."
He thought about the soldier left behind. About Thorne walking past him. About his own pause. Not from mercy. Just a spark of defiance. He wasn't better. Not braver. Not more noble. But he wasn't ready to be that cold. Not yet. The trench settled into an eerie quiet. Beth finished tightening Ryvak's leg wrap, her gloves stained, movements brisk but careful. Ryvak's voice came groggy. "You guys ever think maybe we're not the top of the food chain anymore?" Thorne didn't answer. Beth didn't blink. But Asher? He exhaled and stared at the sky, smoky stars fading in and out. The Stone pulsed faintly in his spine. Not painful. Just present. A reminder. A watcher. It hadn't spoken since the desert—hadn't needed to. It was patient. Always waiting. He could already feel it—whispering just beneath the surface. Not just power. Influence. Something shaping him. And for the first time, Asher wondered—not if it would change him. But how much it already had. And if staying alive meant eventually becoming the kind of man who walks past the dying… was that still surviving?