Page 41 of Stardusted

Then—

A voice.

Ashout.

I thought it was my name. But it couldn’t be.

I risked a glance over my shoulder just in time to see a silver-and-black blur explode from the far side of the lab, past the murderous robot bearing down on me. The blur moved so fast it barely seemed real, just a streak against the madness.

And then everythinglit up.

Electricity spiderwebbed across the room, splitting into branching tendrils of lightning that danced along the floors, the walls, the ceiling.A beam of neon pink energy shot out from behind me, searing my vision.That scream I’d been holding in finally burst free as I dropped to my knees?—

Not a moment too soon.

The beam of light tore overhead, slamming into the far wall with a devastatingcrack. Plaster and stone detonated. The pink lance traced a glowing arc of molten concrete, and the wall blackened in its wake, trembling. Ceiling chunks rained down. I threw my free arm over my head, the other still pressing the tablet to my chest.

That was…that was a laser beam.

The robot had just shot a freaking laser beam at me.

Somehow, the walls held, but blue lightning still writhed across them like snakes made of cold fire. Smoke thickened, bitter and burning. It scalded my lungs and coated my throat, stinging my eyes.

Tears streaming, I staggered sideways across the quaking floor.My shoulder smacked the wall, and a pulse of current bit into my skin. Arcs of lightning whipped around me in a chaotic, silent storm.

But I was getting out of this damn lab. I fought through it, fought forward. The door.The exit wasright there.If I could just move?—

But it was like pushing through a wall of static pressure. There was electricityeverywhere. Had a wire gotten severed? Where the hell was it coming from?

I couldn’t gather my senses. Light and sound crashed in around me, too loud, too much. Everything tilted, the room fading in spots.

God,I was going to black out. Right in front of thatthing?—

My knees buckled. I threw out my arms to catch myself, the artifact held tightly in my right hand. I landed by the exit and rolled to my side. The tablet clattered to the floor beside me.

For a moment, I simply lay there, gasping the smoke-laden air, my vision wavering.

The stone slab lay inches from my face. Close enough I could see hairline fractures had formed across its surface. Time seemed to slow.

That pull. It was back. That enigmatic, whisperingurge.

The world around me roared and broke apart, but I couldn’t look away.

A strange, nostalgic ache bloomed in my chest. I raised my head, frowning at the markings carved across the tablet’s surface. I didn’t recognize them. They looked like they could be Sumerian, the crude shapes, dots, glyphs. But it wasn’t quite a match. Maybe a version I’d never seen before.

And then there was the fact they wereglowing.

I couldn’t look away from this weird stone artifact despite the murder-robot raging nearby. Roars, crashes. Bangs. The room shook with impacts. If I didn’t know better, I’d think there was a fight raging behind me.

But I couldn’t look. I was trapped. Stuck in some invisible web.

And the stonewasstrangely beautiful.

A pale, purple-pink light bled from the grooves and swirls like it was lit from within. In a daze, I reached out, fingers splayed over the surface without quite resting on it.Heat pulsed beneath my palm.

It reminded me of how the asphalt had felt beneath my hand two nights ago. The night everything changed. Otherworldly heat, impossible and eerie.

Now, the glowing lines moved.No, not the symbols…the surface itself. The stone’s grainy texture shifted, rippling beneath my touch as the glow intensified.