Chapter 6 Behavior Loops

"You're sure about this," Kane said.

"No," Lyra said. "But the gate's locked, and your timer isn't."

They walked into the broken rocks together, ash giving way to jagged stone that stood up like teeth. Kane kept his hands loose and his eyes moving.

"Rocks block the view," he said. "It's hard to see trouble early."

"Then stay sharp. This place turns mean fast."

"I don't wander. I catalogue."

"You what?"

He nodded at a cluster of six-legged shapes resting near a crater. "Those barely react when we pass. Slow. But the one on two legs by the rock has turned its head twice already."

"You're naming them."

"I'm cataloguing them. There's a difference."

"What's the difference?"

"Cataloguing tells me how they act next. Naming just makes me feel better about walking toward them."

She almost laughed, a short breath through her nose instead of a real sound. "Fine. What do you call the two-legged ones?"

"Beta."

"The slow ones."

"Alpha."

"You already had names ready."

"I told you. Cataloguing."

They moved on, weaving between the rock spires, Kane testing the ground ahead now, stopping her twice with a raised hand. Both times they waited in silence while something large moved close but never came into view.

By the time the light dropped low and orange, they found a shallow crater to rest in. Lyra sat hard against the rock wall, bad arm cradled tight.

"Why did you come to Aethon?" she asked, out of nowhere.

"I didn't choose to."

"Everyone chooses. Or make a deal. Or gets pulled here for a reason."

"Not me. I died at my desk."

Lyra went still.

"Heart gave out," Kane said. "Late at night. My studio had just closed that day. I was writing one last line before I went home." He looked at his hands. "Then I woke up here. No warning. No choice."

"And this is real to you. Right now."

"Apparently."

"Does that happen? People are dying and waking up here."

"To me it happened once. First time."

She studied him for a long moment. "You talk about that system like you already understand its tricks."

"Because back home I built things like it. Different stakes. Nobody died if I got it wrong there."

"And here."

"Here I get it wrong once, and I'm done."

Neither of them said anything for a while. Wind moved low across the crater, carrying grit that stung Kane's eyes.

Then the ground shifted.

Not loud. Just a change, a pulse under his boots that hadn't been there a second before.

"Lyra."

"I feel it."

He put his palm flat against the rock. The rhythm came through clear now, steady, growing.

"Something's coming. Big."

"How big?"

"I don't know yet. Four minutes. Maybe less."

She was already on her feet, wincing as she moved too fast on the bad shoulder. "Then we move."

They cleared the rim just as the ground behind them cracked wide open.

"Kane."

"I see it."

Something enormous tore up through the earth, grey and jagged, throwing rock in every direction. Forty feet of it, maybe more, hid like cracked stone, limbs thick as tree trunks.

Kane forced a read on the panel hovering above it. "Ashfield Sovereign. Rank A. Territory the core. The flag says do not engage. Registry exemption."

"They put a Rank A thing out here," Lyra said, backing away, "and told their own hunters to leave it alone."

"It's not trash. It's a guard."

"A guard for what?"

"I don't know."

The creature's head swung, and every instinct in Kane's body screamed to run. Then it stopped moving.

Not toward him.

Toward Lyra.

"Why is it looking at me?" she said.

"Because you're registered." He was already backing away. "I'm not."

"Not comforting."

The creature's chest expanded, some low sound building inside it that Kane felt in his back teeth before he heard it. Then it charged.

"Move!" Lyra shouted, feet already slipping in the loose ash, bad arm useless against something this size.

"This way," Kane yelled, pointing at a gap between two spires. "Split its path!"

"It's not chasing you, it's chasing me!"

"I know!"

The ground shook harder with every stride, boulders bouncing loose, dust rising in choking clouds. Lyra dove sideways as one massive limb came down where she'd been standing a half second before, the impact throwing her off balance. She hit the ground, rolled, and came up gasping.

"Kane. If you have an idea, now would help."

"I'm looking," he shouted back, eyes tracking the creature's rhythm, the timing between strides, the way its head locked and released.

"Look faster!"

"It's not random. Nothing here is random."

"I don't care about the pattern! I care about not dying!"

The creature turned for another charge, eyes locked on Lyra like she was the only thing in the world worth crushing.

"Kane!"

"I'm finding the loop!"

"Find it faster!"

She scrambled back, sword raised though it looked useless against something this size, her bad arm shaking with the strain of holding steady. The creature lowered its head. Its whole body coiled.

"Kane," she said, quieter now, almost calm despite everything. "If this is it, I need you to run."

"No."

"That wasn't a request."

"I'm not leaving you."

It roared, a sound that cracked something loose in Kane's chest, and charged with the ground splitting under every stride.

His mind ran through everything he'd seen in the last four minutes: the timing, the tracking, the way it had ignored him completely and one thought rose up clear through the panic.

"Okay," he said under his breath, watching the massive shape close the distance fast.

"Find the loop.”