"Hold the wrench steady, Diablo, or I swear I'll let you drift back to Earth without a tether," Josh muttered, his voice echoing inside his helmet with a metallic rasp. His fingers, thickened by the pressurized gloves of his suit, fumbled with the stubborn thermal coupler on the exterior of Luna Prime."You love me too much for that, Cap," Diablo's voice crackled through the comms, brimming with its usual effortless charm. "Besides, who else is going to keep you entertained in this oversized tin can? Kim? She hasn't told a joke since the Obama administration.""I heard that, Diablo," Kim's voice cut in, sharp and focused from the station’s internal command hub. "And for your information, I prioritize oxygen levels over your infantile humor. Josh, your heart rate is spiking. Take a breath. The coupler isn't going anywhere."Josh exhaled, watching the moisture of his breath fog the corner of his visor for a split second before the scrubbers cleared it. He looked up, past the jagged hori

The white glare didn't fade so much as it curdled into a sickly, bruised gray. For several minutes, the three of them stood in the observation deck of Luna Prime, breath hitching in a synchronized rhythm of terror. The silence was so thick it felt like it had mass, pressing against their eardrums until it hurt."Kim," Josh whispered, his voice sounding like it belonged to a different man. "Filter the glare. Give me a visual. I need to see what happened."Kim’s hands hovered over the console. She was trembling so violently that her fingers clicked against the glass like hailstones. "I... I shouldn't, Josh. The radiation spikes alone suggest—""Do it, Kim," Josh commanded. "That’s an order."She tapped a series of keys. The high-contrast filters on the external cameras engaged, stripping away the blinding luminescence. What remained was a nightmare rendered in high definition. The white mist was thinning, revealing a planet that had been stripped of its dignity. "Oh, god," Diablo choke

The airlock hissed, a final, lonely sound that seemed to echo through the hollow bones of Luna Prime. Josh didn't look back. He kept his eyes on the Lunar Rover, a rugged, six-wheeled beast crouched in the shadows of the hangar. It was their only life raft now, loaded to the brim with every scrap of survival gear they could strip from the station."Oxygen tanks secured?" Josh asked, his voice tight within the confines of his helmet."Double-checked and triple-bolted," Kim replied. She was shoving the last of the medical kits into a side compartment, her movements jerky and efficient. "I packed enough antibiotics to start a civilization and enough sedatives to put one to sleep. We’re as ready as we’ll ever be.""Which is to say, not at all," Diablo muttered. He was already in the driver’s seat, running a diagnostic on the Rover’s navigation array. "Cap, the secondary battery is showing a ten percent variance. It’s old, Josh. This thing was meant for short-range mineral scouting, not a

The white roar in Josh's mind didn't just fade; it shattered into a million jagged shards of memory that weren't his own. He felt his knees hit a floor that was no longer stone but a vibrating, humming surface of pure light. Beside him, Kim was gasping for air, her hands clutching her temples as if trying to keep her skull from splitting. Diablo was silent, his eyes rolled back, staring at a history that spanned eons."Stop it!" Josh roared, his voice cracking the psychic pressure. "Get out of our heads!"The flood of images slowed to a rhythmic pulse. Josh saw a nebula being born, then a race of beings made of flickering translucent filaments—the Architects. They weren't gods, he realized with a sinking horror. They were gardeners. He saw them dropping shimmering, metallic spheres into the cores of cooling planets. The Seeds of Life."We were not meant to be your end," OWAI's voice resonated, now softer, carrying a tone that sounded dangerously like regret. "The Architects sought to

"Get us out of here, Diablo! Now!" Josh's voice was a whip-crack in the cramped, obsidian-lined cabin. He didn't look back at the gargantuan shadow rippling beneath the hull. He didn't want to know how many rows of teeth a nightmare like that needed to vibrate the deck plates."I’m pushing the turbines to the red line, Cap!" Diablo yelled back, his fingers blurred over the glowing control spheres. "This thing moves like a dream, but it’s still dragging through five miles of water! The resistance is insane!""Hull resonance is reaching critical levels," OWAI's genderless voice hummed from the center of the cabin. "The predator is using low-frequency sonar to track our thermal signature. I suggest a course correction into the debris field of the submerged city ahead.""The city? You mean those jagged steel traps?" Kim gasped, her face pale as she watched the sonar display. "Josh, if we hit a submerged spire at this speed, we’ll split the hull like a grape!""It’s either the spires or th