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Trent grips my shoulders, his eyes intense. "Once we're in the current, stay close to me. If we get separated?—"

"We won't," I interrupt. I've spent three years with this man at my side. I'm not losing him now.

The extraction tube opens with a hydraulic whoosh, revealing a circular passage filled with rushing water. It looks like a nightmare.

"Go now!" Trent shouts as the door finally gives way, security forces pouring into the chamber.

Trent grabs my hand and pulls me toward the tube. We jump together just as neural disruptor blasts hit the wall where we stood seconds before.

The current catches us immediately, cold water enveloping us in its relentless grip. I barely have time to take in a breath before we're sucked deep into the extraction system, the arcology and everything I've ever known vanishing behind us.

Water roars in my ears as we're propelled through the tube at terrifying speed. My enhanced senses struggle to adapt to the overwhelming input—pressure changes, temperature fluctuations, the disorienting tumble as the current throws us through bends and drops.

Trent's hand remains locked with mine, our fingers intertwined in a grip that defies the forces trying to tear us apart. His face is barely visible through the murky water, his eyes remained fixed on mine, steady, certain, keeping me anchored when everything else is chaos.

The tube descends sharply, pressure building in my ears as we go deeper. My lungs burn like hell, my body fighting against the unnatural environment. Just when I think I can't stand it any longer, something changes.

My vision shifts, adapting to the murky darkness. The burning in my lungs eases as my body somehow processes the limited oxygen more efficiently. My skin tingles with an odd sensation, as though responding to the water pressure in ways it shouldn't be able to.

More modifications activating? I don't have time towonder as the current picks up speed again, hurling us through the final section of the extraction system.

Ahead, I see light, faint but growing stronger. The tube's end.

The pain in my lungs is growing unberable, the world going grey at the edges. I’m not sure how much longer I can hold my breath for, I feel so close to opening my mouth and sucking in water and drowning and…

Trent gives my hand a hard squeeze and points as the light envelopes us.

We burst from the extraction system into open water—actual, natural water, not the carefully processed liquid Unity provides. It's darker, colder, alive with microscopic organisms my enhanced vision can somehow detect.

Trent tugs my hand, pointing upward. We kick toward the surface with whatever we have left of our Sentinel strength, the ascent excruciatingly slow because of the heavy maintenance uniforms dragging us down.

Our heads break the surface simultaneously. I gasp loudly, sucking in my first breath of outside air.

It's shocking, raw and rich and overwhelming. Unity's air is sterile, filtered of all impurities. This air is thick with scents my enhanced senses struggle to categorize—soil and vegetation and chemical traces from the damaged atmosphere, all mixed together in a complex bouquet that makes me dizzy as hell, though that could still be from my lack of oxygen.

"This way," Trent says, already swimming toward the shore of what appears to be a small lake. The filtration outpost stands nearby, a utilitarian structure with no Unity markings or symbols.

As we swim, I look up and freeze mid-stroke.

The sky.

It’s the fuckingsky.

I've seen images of the outside world, of course. Training materials, surveillance footage, historical archives. Butnothing prepared me for the reality of an actual sky stretching endlessly above me, uncontained by arcology walls and ceilings, but instead craggy mountains that rise around us.

It's evening, the sun setting in a blaze of colors I never knew existed. The atmospheric damage creates strange light patterns—iridescent streaks where pollutants catch the dying sunlight, patches of darkness where particulate matter blocks it completely. It's broken and beautiful and absolutely terrifying in its vastness.

"Zara," Trent calls from ahead. "We need to keep moving."

I tear my eyes away from the sky and follow him to shore, my body shivering as the air hits my wet clothes. The ground feels strange beneath my feet, uneven, yielding, alive in a way Unity's perfectly engineered surfaces never were.

We approach the filtration outpost cautiously, Sentinel training taking over as we assess the structure for threats. The door opens before we reach it, and I instinctively drop into a defensive stance.

A woman emerges and I recognize her immediately. Lyra, the sympathizer who's been helping care for Eden. Her eyes widen in shock as she takes in our soaked maintenance uniforms.

"You?" Her voice carries equal parts surprise and suspicion. "The maintenance workers from Kaplan's section? What are you doing here?"

"It's complicated," Trent responds, maintaining a cautious distance. "We used the extraction system to escape Unity forces."