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Rose didn’t have time to scream as Luca jerked her from the cave entrance and threw her to the ground. His arms locked around her in a vise-like grip as he rolled, positioning his body between her and the cave.

For an instant, the air glimmered like glass about to shatter. Then came a wall of heat, flattening them to the ground. Pain exploded in her ears in a tyrannical shock wave as sand scoured her bare arms. Heat seared her nostrils, scorched her lips. Luca’s hand curved protectively around her head, locking her in place.

Her lungs screamed for air that wasn’t there, the explosion having stolen it all, her chest muscles frozen in shock. And just when darkness threatened the edges of her vision, air rushed back. Her lungs dragged in scalding breaths saturated with the stink of burning fuel. Luca’s grip eased, and she twisted free, pushing up onto her hands and knees, her palms scalded by the super-heated ground. Her hands were grazed as she staggered to her feet and swayed.

The entrance to the cave was gone, plugged with rock.

Finn .

She lurched forward on unsteady legs, her shocked brain struggling to coordinate movement.

An arm caught hers. “Rose.”

She spun against Luca’s restraint, wrenching free. Her vision was hazy with tears as she pointed at the collapsed entrance. “He’s in there. We have to get him out.” She stumbled to the settling rubble where thick gray dust rose in choking clouds. Falling to her knees, she clawed at the rocks, ignoring the sharp edges that bit into her hands and tore at her nails.

Nothing mattered except finding him.

He’d done it. He’d really done it. She pressed her hands against the rock and lowered her head, her body wracked with sobs she could no longer contain.

The look in his eyes when he’d floored the jeep. God.

Luca climbed past her. “Ethan, can you hear me. This is Luca. We have a situation. Finn was caught in the detonation.”

He scrambled to the top of the rubble pile and began digging with his bare hands, shoving stones aside, sending cascades of pebbles running down like deadly rain.

“There’s space here.” He hurled rocks over his shoulder as if they weighed nothing, his movements desperate.

“Rose!” Luca’s voice cracked with urgency. “I have something.”

His head disappeared into a gap in the rocks.

Rose eased back on her heels, reality crushing in. It was all wrong. No one could survive this. No one. She buried her face in her hands, the grit abrading her skin.

“Here. Here!” Luca slid onto his belly, wriggling his body through the gap. With a slither of loose debris, his legs vanished, then his boots, swallowed by the mountain of stone .

She scrabbled up to the gap, heart threatening to escape her chest. “Luca?”

Hot air billowed from a dark tunnel.

“Rose, I have him!”

Finn.

She didn’t hesitate, worry for him overriding all fear of darkness and confined spaces. She squeezed into the gap, rock scraping her shoulders as suffocating dust clogged her nose and mouth. Her fingers probed forward blindly, seeking escape, her body inching forward.

A firm hand seized her wrist, pulled hard. She popped free of the wriggle hole, colliding with Luca in a tangle of limbs.

Jesus.

Her breath sawed in and out, her limbs tremulous..

“You okay, Doc?”

She moved her arms. Wriggled her toes. “I think so.”

A single beam of yellow light cut through the darkness, catching crystalline drops of water that glinted on the cave ceiling. The hollow plink of falling drops echoed.

The jeep was several feet away, a broken metal carcass on its side, one headlight beam flickering yellow upward like a dead eye.

Luca grinned, his teeth gleaming white against his dirt-smeared face. “Come on.” He jerked his head. “Over there. He’s behind an outcropping that’s protected him. The blast must have thrown him clear.”

She stumbled with him through the darkness, half-crouched, half-running, guided only by the dancing beam of his flashlight. She clung to Luca as small rocks skittered away from her feet, threatening to topple her.

“Here.” Luca slowed.

She dropped to her knees at Finn’s side. His eyes were closed, his face pale and dirty in the harsh light. She pressed two fingers to his neck, held her breath. A pulse. Her head dropped. Thank God.

“His legs are trapped. We need to get him free. Take this.” Luca thrust a small penlight into her hand.

She wedged it between her teeth, so her hands were free to dig, trying to ignore the creak of stressed rock above them. And there, at the edge of her hearing, a subtle whine.

She froze mid-dig, the penlight beam trembling as she took it from her mouth and swept it across the cave.

“Rose?” Luca was panting.

“Do you hear that?”

“Rock fall in a destabilized cave system. Shit, yes.” Luca smeared rock dust across his face as he wiped his eyes.

His flashlight beam cut deeper into the cave. Dust motes danced, casting phantom shadows on the walls. But here and there, metallic particles, tricksy in the artificial light. Tiny clusters lurching in the air.

“Luca. There are nanobots here. Some survived.”

“Fuck.” Luca dropped his flashlight, hands clawing desperately under Finn. “Hurry.”

“We have to stop them.” Her eyes streamed as she pushed to her feet, stumbling toward the wrecked jeep. Each step kicked up more dust, more metallic glints in the darkness.

“ Rose. ” Luca’s urgent whisper echoed off the cave walls. “Get back here.”

“I have a plan. Keep digging.” She felt her way along the jeep’s twisted frame, heart pounding against her ribs.

“A plan?”

“Yes.” Her penlight carved a weak path through the darkness. The neodymium magnets glinted dully. Some were scattered across the jeep bed, others strewn across the cave floor. She gathered them frantically, using her shirt as a makeshift basket, their heavy shapes bruising her ribs.

She climbed back into the jeep. “I’m going to create a magnetic trap using the dive magnets. Once they’re caught, we need enough heat to disable them without blowing us all to hell.”

Rocks clattered loose where Luca dug arm-deep beside Finn. “How the hell are you planning to generate heat without turning this place into a crater?”

She dropped through the window frame into the backseat, glass crunching under her feet. The box she was looking for had wedged itself under the driver’s seat. She wriggled it out, metal slicing into her palm. Blood made her grip treacherous, but she kept going. Finn and Luca depended on her.

“I have an idea.” She lifted the box clear of the jeep, tossed it over the side. It cracked against bare rock, spilling dive flares like fallen matches. “The heat from flares won’t destroy them, but should be enough to interfere with their ability to replicate. Shut them down .”

Working fast, she arranged the military-grade magnets in a circle around the jeep, each placement precise. If the field wasn’t strong enough...

A sharp crack split the air. Rock shrapnel rained down, stinging her neck like angry wasps.

Luca’s curse reverberated through the cave as he fought to free Finn. “Almost there, Rose. Shit, he’s heavy.”

“How much longer?” she called.

The magnets alone might not cut it—she needed more power. The batteries from the initial explosion were fried, but the jeep’s battery…

The hood was buckled, the battery exposed.

She scrambled forward, retrieved the jump leads, and clamped them onto the terminals. A blue spark snapped as raw energy surged into the magnets, amplifying their field.

Luca’s voice ricocheted off the cave walls. “Three minutes. Minimum.”

We don’t have three minutes.

The swarm thickened erratically, their movement choppy and fitful. They were stunned, hopefully more.

She ripped wires from the engine, her hands shaking as she connected the final magnet.

Her fingers slipped. The magnet hit the ground.

The swarm lurched toward the sound.

“Rose!” Luca shouted.

She twisted—another surge of nanobots seeping from the cave behind her. A tide of ramping destruction.

No time.

She slammed the final magnet into position, completing the field. The nanobots wavered, caught between competing magnetic forces.

Her fingers closed around the flares. Four left. It had to be enough.

She struck the first flare against the cave floor—violent red light erupted, painting the cave bloody. Heat surged, merging with the amplified magnetic pull.

The vortex howled to life, dragging the swarm into its core.

“Got him!” Luca’s shout pierced the din. “Moving now!”

Her pulse rose to her throat as she struck the remaining flares in rapid succession, sealing the trap. The nanobots spun in a frenzied dance, dragged into the magnetic cyclone, glowing like dying stars, casting writhing shadows across the cave walls.

She staggered back from the jeep, away from the whirling storm. Luca was gone—Finn’s boots vanishing in her blurred vision as he dragged him through.

Rose threw herself after them, crawling on her elbows. Sharp rock tore at her skin, but the pain didn’t matter. Behind her, the tornado shrieked, the pitch rising, scraping at her eardrums?—

Then it collapsed.

Searing heat licked at her heels.

Get out. Get out.

Fresh air slammed into her face as she tumbled free. She rolled onto her back, lungs heaving, the endless night sky, black velvet scattered with stars above her.

Her arms shook. Her legs wouldn’t move. She twisted her head. “Luca? You okay? Finn?”

Someone coughed.

“We’re alive, Doc.” A ragged inhale. “And officially done with caves.”

She let her head fall back, breathing in the cooling night. The breeze carried only the scent of heated rock and dust—no metallic tang, no electric hum. No whisper of microscopic hunters.

The swarm was gone.