Erik wished he had a spear. He could have taken one of the rifles, but he was a lousy shot to begin with. Being unarmed in the base was like being naked in a blizzard. He held his hands in tight fists to keep them from shaking. Everything about the entire night had put him on edge.

  He didn't like that he was helping outlaws infiltrate the base, even if he owed them his and Klaus's lives. He didn't like that they had been separated from the other two outlaws, even though he had no real reason to trust them beyond his experience in Cragg Hollow. He really didn't like that it had all been so easy.

  He had expected the base to put up an actual defense. In his mind, Tartarus had been an impenetrable fortress, a rock of defense for the Empyrean. Despite his experience and his souring mood toward the Military Police as a whole, he thought that the base could at least stand against an attack if the worst happened and an invasion of rebels came to destroy the island.

  But now, he couldn't see it standing against a single crew of outlaws.

  Assuming he hadn't helped Alex, nothing they had encountered would have stopped the outlaws. Short of Commander Milton himself stumbling across the crew or one of the captains who weren't even normally on the base noticing the outlaws, not a single thing had been in the way of them infiltrating the base.

  The reality of the situation sunk into his mind. If Alex had been anyone else, if he had wanted to destroy the base, he could have done it without even trying. The Military Police weren't prepared to fight off an actual attack. They would fold the moment a serious foe came against them.

  "Is it because we've destroyed all the competition?" he whispered.

  "What was that?" Alex asked as he led the way down the hall.

  "Nothing." Erik wanted to keep the thoughts to himself.

  There were strong people in the Military Police, for sure. Captains and lieutenants could hold their own in a fight against an outlaw. Commanders and the ranks above them could easily stand against several groups and face off against the strongest of cursed people. But what if they faced an army? Alex had beaten the guards like they were nothing to him.

  The Military Police were good for little more than operating the world's daily affairs and keeping the people from revolting. He couldn't even honestly say that they kept the people safe anymore. What if Alex had shown up to ransack Aherlow? Could Commander Milton even stop him?

  These thoughts dominated his mind as they approached a corner, and Alex raised a hand to stop them both. He pointed up with one finger as he peeked around the corner, and Erik slid to the nearest wall to hide. Down the hall, two men spoke, their voices soft, but the metal walls of the complex easily carried their voices out to Erik.

  "Do you ever hate how quiet it is?" one of them asked. "Why can't we ever see any action?"

  "Be careful what you wish for, kid," the other said, his voice cracking with age. "Quiet days are good for us. I don't want to imagine that thing escaping."

  "She's not so bad," the younger one said. "She always smiles at me when we feed her."

  "Cats smile before they catch a mouse, too. Don't make me get you put on a different duty. That thing's a tool, nothing else."

  "Sir." The younger man's tone changed. "I understand."

  Erick wanted to hear more, but the men didn't continue. Once the men were done talking, Alex seemed ready, stepping out into the hallway and striding forward without a moment's hesitation. Again, Erick wanted a spear in his hands, even though he knew it wouldn't be useful for anything now.

  "Who are—"

  "Step."

  Boom. Thud.

  In seconds, the fight was over, and Erick peered around the corner to see Alex advancing toward the door at the end of the hallway. It was another thick metal door, the same as the one outside, and Alex didn't pause as he held up a hand. The gears holding the door shut creaked. Like the entrance, it opened before the outlaw, and Erick did his best to hold back the sinking feeling in his stomach.

  The door opened into darkness.

  "Come on," Alex said as he stepped inside and down what looked like a set of stairs.

  Erick followed after him, only pausing next to one of the unconscious guards on the floor. A spear was in the man's hand, and Erick grabbed it without a second thought. He gripped the spear's shaft tightly, looking down into the dark descent before him. He didn't know what awaited them down there, but everything in his person screamed at him that he should be running away. He should run and get Klaus and run for their lives. That was their best chance at escaping this entire situation alive.

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  He recalled for a moment Adhirah Ardya, Chief of the Sky, who had responded to Cragg Hollow when it had been overrun with crab monsters. She had slit a man's throat to summon a Scion, a being with unimaginable power that had destroyed the island with a bright white light. What if the same thing happened to Aherlow? What if other monsters were hiding down those dark stairs? Those doubts ate at him as he pushed himself to the entrance and started down the stairs.

  "If only you were here now, Agatha," he whispered. "I could use some insults of encouragement."

  Shadows consumed him, but he saw a light at the end of the stairs below. Alex looked back up to him, illuminated in that darkness, as he waved Erick down. Erick gulped down the lump in his throat as he took each step slowly. He held the spear in two hands and picked his way down until he stood with Alex before the open door.

  It stood open in front of him like the jaws of a ravenous beast. According to Alex, a creature that had managed to call the outlaw out in the depths of the nightsea rested inside the room ahead. Alex crossed the space to get here, infiltrated a Military Police base, and broke into the most secure area in the base.

  The moment Erick entered that room, he knew that there was no going back. He had aided and abetted a criminal, breaking the doors wide open for the enemy. Was it worth the price of repaying the debt he owed Alex for saving his and Klaus's lives? Yes. However, that didn't change the fear that welled up inside of him.

  "We don't have time for this," Alex said, starting in the room. "If you're that worried about it, go back to the guard station and wait. I need to get this over with before someone catches us."

  That woke Erick up from his stupor. The fear was still there, but he buried it as deep into his stomach as he could. He needed to be the hero he dreamed he was back on Cragging Hollow. He needed to push forward and face whatever this creature was with Alex. He pushed forward, gripping his spear in both hands as he followed Alex into the white room.

  White lights overwhelmed his eyes for a few moments. He blinked a few times to get the sparkles out of his vision as he entered the room. The room was entirely white, lit with the white stones that served as lighting for the entire base—far more of them than he had ever seen before in one room. There was no space for shadows to exist. The room was the antithesis of darkness.

  Erick rubbed at his eyes, looking around and expecting to see bars or chains to hold some mighty monster, but there was nothing of the sort. The room was entirely empty except for the far wall, where a figure was pinned against the wall, entombed in a thicket of heavy cable and wires. Erick thought back to Klaus's brother, the man who lay stuck to a stone bed, fused into the stone around it by heavy brown tendrils. Yet, this person wasn't the same. The woman was very different from the creature that Han's brother had become.

  "Well, this isn't what I expected," Alex said as he walked toward the woman.

  It wasn't what he had expected. Alex said that, and Erick was sure he hadn't misheard the man. However, those few words alone did little to express the thing before them. To call it a woman was an overstatement. Her skin was deathly pale, and apart from her facial features, there was so little left of her to tell exactly what she was. Her arms and legs were gone, tattered, and a stained white gown covered up the numbs that had been her limbs. One breast pushed out on the right side of her chest, but the one on the left was almost entirely flat like it had been cut off. Her head had been shaved completely bald, and metal wires stuck deep into her skull through metal tubes that had to have been drilled into her skull.

  Whatever she was, Erick wasn't sure if he could see such a thing as human anymore.

  His hand gripped his spear tighter but regretted the thought that first came to mind. That was the path of a coward. His first instinct, to stab the woman and put her out of her misery, faded away as he recalled precisely the reason he had joined the Military Police. He was supposed to protect people like her. And yet, here she was at the bottom of Tartarus, in the custody of the Military Police.

  The truth carved at the back of his mind like a hot knife. Like Doctor Livesay's experiments on Cragg Hollow, this woman was a victim of experiments done under the banner of the Military Police. She was no different from the townsfolk who had been taken by the crab masks. For the second time, the organization he had worked under so diligently had been responsible for such an atrocity.

  "Well, I'm here," Alex said, ignoring the conflict brewing in Erick.

  Erick could only watch as Alex finally approached the woman, looking up at the woman's face as he stuffed his hands in his pockets. Erick held on tighter to his spear, unwilling to move closer to the woman. All he wanted to do was run out of the room to heave up the turmoil boiling inside of him. However, fear kept him rooted on the spot.

  "You came," she spoke, her voice hoarse and cracking. "You finally came, WPN Nine."

  "I did," Alex said, looking the woman up and down but stopping his eyes on her flattened chest. "And I think I know who you are, though I don't know your number."

  "You can call me WPN One." She smiled at him, one of her stumps moving up from the bed.

  A sliver of light touched Alex's cheek, a line of power that even Erick could see before retreating back to the woman. Erick gulped. Though she was armless, she had a curse. While it didn't change the state she was in, Erick took a step back toward the door. She might have been crippled, but she wasn't harmless.

  "I see you brought Erick with you all the way to the end," she said, raising her head slightly to look at Erick. "Don't be afraid, Erick. The songs you hummed while working helped keep me sane these last few weeks."

  "You—you were listening?" Erick stuttered.

  "I was. I listened to everything across the base and Aherlow. That is why I am here, and that is why I called Ortega."

  Erick stepped forward, lowering his spear but keeping it in one hand. "Who are you?"

  "I am a weapon created by the Empyrean," she said, smiling a toothless grin. "I existed to protect the Empyrean and nothing more."

  "And why did you call me?" Alex asked. "Why did you want me here."

  "It's simple," the woman said. "I want you to end me.