The tram rattled through the transition tunnel between the upper-class houses and the residential blocks, and Tess watched Petra’s face change as they emerged into the light.
Sector 5’s residential blocks sprawled around them, forty floors of ferrocrete apartment buildings stacked against each other like dominoes that had forgotten to fall. Neon advertisements flickered on every available surface. Teal steam rose from vents in lazy spirals. The walkways between buildings were packed with people.
“I didn’t know it could look like this,” Petra said.
Tess glanced at her. “Like what?”
“Alive.” Petra pressed closer to the window. Below them, children were playing a kind of ball game in a courtyard between buildings. A street vendor had set up shop on a corner, steam rising from whatever was cooking on his cart. People were talking to each other, not just hurrying past with their heads down. “The last time I came through here, it was… quieter. Darker.”
The tram began its descent toward the residential platform, and Tess looked at the district through fresh eyes. She’d been to Sector 5 before, but always to the wealthy side—the Tertian estate, the manicured gardens, the polished everything. This was different. This was the part of the city that actually housed people.
And Petra was right. It was thriving.
That’s you, Tess reminded herself. That’s what happens when the power flows properly. When people don’t have to ration everything.
The Aether distribution node she’d repaired had been a minor fix in the grand scheme of things. A few hours of work, a handful of AP, some sore fingers from working on substrate. But the power that flowed through it fed the entire city, including these residential districts. All those people down there, going about their lives, had no idea that a nineteen-year-old girl from Sector 7 was the reason their lights stayed on.
Tess decided she preferred it that way.
“Come on,” she said as the tram settled onto the platform. “Block seven is a twenty-minute walk from here.”
***
The walk took closer to thirty minutes because Petra kept stopping to look at things.
A food stall selling skewered meat that smelled like heaven and probably cost four credits. A repair shop with a hand-painted sign advertising “HONEST WORK, HONEST PRICES.” A group of teenagers gathered around a holographic display showing some kind of sports match, cheering and groaning in equal measure.
“This is so normal,” Petra said, like she’d discovered a new species.
“That’s because it is normal.” Tess steered her through a knot of pedestrians. “This is how most people live, Petra. Without the gardens and the fountains and the private skippers.”
“I know that. I just…” Petra trailed off, watching an elderly woman haggle with a vendor over the price of something Tess couldn’t see. “I can’t believe how different it looks. How different it feels. It looks like more than just ‘getting by’”
Tess didn’t have a response to that. She’d grown up knowing exactly how thin the margins were, how quickly “getting by” could turn into “not getting by at all.”
“Block seven,” she said, pointing ahead. “That’s the building.”
Mikhail’s apartment complex loomed over the surrounding structures, forty floors of identical windows and rust-stained balconies. The entrance was a set of heavy doors flanked by planters that had probably held actual plants at some point. Now they held cigarette butts and the remains of someone’s lunch.
Petra studied the building as if she were planning an assault.
“Service entrance?” she asked.
“What?”
“There has to be a service entrance. Back stairs. Maintenance access.” Petra was already scanning the perimeter. “We can’t just walk in the front door.”
“Why not?”
Petra looked at her like she’d suggested they set the building on fire. “Because people will see us. They’ll remember us. ‘Two women came to visit the Knight on the fourth floor.’ That’s what gets reported.”
“Reported to who?”
“Anyone. Everyone.” Petra grabbed Tess’s arm and pulled her around the corner of a neighboring building. “Look, I know this isn’t the estate, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t eyes. The Network has informants everywhere. All it takes is one person deciding they want a reward.”
Tess considered arguing. Then she considered the alternative: spending thirty minutes sneaking through a residential building like they were infiltrating a military installation.
The second option was admittedly kind of fun.
“Fine,” she said. “What’s the plan?”
Turns out the plan involved the maintenance stairs.
“There.” Petra pointed at a narrow door set into the building’s rear wall, half-hidden behind a collection of waste containers. “Service access. Should lead to the stairwell.”
“Should?”
“I’m extrapolating from the building’s layout. Standard residential construction, pre-Network era. The service routes are always in the same places.” Petra moved toward the door with practiced grace, checking corners, timing her approach to avoid the few pedestrians moving through the back alley. “Follow my lead.”
Tess followed. It felt ridiculous—ducking behind waste containers, pressing against walls, moving in short bursts between cover. But Petra was taking it seriously, and Tess got caught up in the momentum.
The service door was unlocked. Of course it was. This wasn’t a secure facility; it was an apartment building. But Petra eased it open like she expected armed guards on the other side, peering through the gap before slipping inside.
The stairwell beyond was narrow and poorly lit, emergency strips providing just enough illumination to avoid tripping. It smelled of cleaning solution and old metal.
“Fourth floor,” Petra whispered. “Unit twelve. Stay low, stay quiet.”
“Why are we whispering?”
“Because sound carries in stairwells.”
They climbed. Petra moved like she’d been trained for this, each footstep placed with deliberate care. Tess tried to match her, though she suspected she looked more like someone trying not to wake a sleeping roommate.
Second floor. A door opened somewhere above them, and Petra flattened against the wall, one hand raised in a “stop” gesture. Footsteps descended, passed their landing, and continued down. Petra waited a full thirty seconds before moving again.
Third floor. They passed a window that looked out over an interior courtyard. Laundry hung on lines strung between balconies. Someone was playing music, tinny and distant.
Fourth floor. Petra held up a hand at the stairwell door, pressing her ear against it.
“Clear,” she whispered. “Hallway’s empty. Unit twelve should be… left, then right, end of the corridor.”
They slipped through the door. The hallway was standard residential—scuffed floors, numbered doors, the faint smell of a dozen fresh meals being cooked in a dozen different apartments. Petra moved with absolute focus, checking each intersection, timing their movements to avoid any doors that might open.
It was, Tess had to admit, impressively professional.
They reached Unit 412. Petra positioned herself on one side of the door, gesturing for Tess to take the other side.
“On three,” she breathed. “I’ll knock. You watch our backs.”
“Petra, this is an apartment building. We’re visiting someone.”
“Trust the process.”
Tess bit back a laugh and took her position.
Petra knocked. Two precise raps, like she was delivering a coded message.
Footsteps inside. A pause. Then the door opened, and Mikhail Soto stared at them with an expression somewhere between confusion and mild concern.
He was taller than Tess remembered. Broader, too, though that might have been the shirt—a fitted athletic thing that made it very clear he spent serious time training. His dark hair was shorter than it had been during the dungeon incident, cropped close in a military cut. He looked from Petra to Tess, then down the empty hallway behind them.
“Lady Petra?” he said. “What are you doing?”
“We’re being stealthy,” Tess said, a smile on her face.
Mikhail shook his head. “Why? No one cares. There’s not even cameras in the building. I doubt anyone would even recognize you.”
Petra’s face went through several emotions in rapid succession. Tess watched her cycle through surprise, denial, recalculation, and finally settle on something that was almost embarrassment.
“I knew that,” Petra said.
She definitely did not know that.
“Do you want to come in?” Mikhail stepped back from the doorway, a hint of amusement cracking his stoic expression. “Or would you prefer to keep lurking in my hallway?”
***
The apartment was small and aggressively organized. Military neat, exactly as Sara’s file had described. A single bed, crisply made. A desk with a datapad and a stack of what looked like training manuals. A shelf with a few personal items—athletics trophies, a framed photograph Tess couldn’t see clearly, and a vibroblade in a display case.
The vibroblade caught her attention. It was old, the handle worn smooth from years of use, but the blade itself gleamed like it had been polished that morning.
“Nice place,” Petra said, settling onto the apartment’s single chair without being invited. “Very… efficient.”
“It’s temporary.” Mikhail closed the door behind them and moved toward a small heating element in the corner. “I put in for larger quarters two years ago. Still waiting on the approval. Tea?”
“Please,” Tess said, more to have something to do with her hands than out of any real thirst.
“The joys of bureaucracy,” Petra said.
“Something like that.” Mikhail filled a kettle from a small tap, his movements precise and economical. He set it on the heating element and turned to face them, leaning against the counter with his arms crossed. He wasn’t being hostile exactly, but he wasn’t being warm either. “I assume this isn’t a social call.”
“What gave it away?” Tess asked. “The sneaking through your building or the showing up unannounced?”
“Definitely both.” His expression didn’t change, but something in his eyes suggested he was enjoying this more than he was letting on. “So. What do you want?”
Tess glanced at Petra, who nodded slightly. Your show.
Right. Here went nothing.
The kettle hissed softly. Mikhail didn’t move to attend it.
“You were there on Floor 1,” Tess said. The words came out steadier than she felt. “When I opened maintenance doors that should have been locked. When I did things that a normal Technician shouldn’t have been able to do.”
His face gave nothing away. “I remember.”
“You didn’t report it.”
“No.”
Tess waited, but he didn’t elaborate. The silence stretched until she couldn’t stand it anymore.
“Why?”
He considered the question for a moment. The kettle’s hiss grew louder. When he spoke, his voice was matter-of-fact. “Wasn’t my story to tell. Whatever you are, whatever you were doing down there, it saved Petra’s life. That’s what mattered.”
“That’s it?” Tess heard the edge in her own voice and tried to soften it. “You didn’t ask questions, didn’t want to figure out what was going on? Didn’t think about who might want to know?”
“I asked questions.” Mikhail shrugged. “I just asked them to myself. Figured if House Tertian wanted me to know, they’d tell me. If they didn’t…” Another shrug. “Not my business.”
“But if you’d told the wrong people…” Tess trailed off. She was thinking about Inspector Senna, about the official order forbidding her from entering the dungeon again. If Mikhail had gone to the Network instead of staying quiet, she’d be locked out permanently. Or worse.
“The Network, you mean.” Mikhail’s gaze was steady. “I know what you’re asking. And no, I didn’t consider it. I work for House Tertian, not the Network. My loyalty is to Lady Petra and her family. Whatever I saw down there, it was their information to share or keep. Not mine to sell.”
The kettle whistled. Mikhail turned to pull it off the heat, and some of the tension in Tess’s shoulders eased.
“Thank you,” she said quietly. “For not… for keeping it to yourself.”
Mikhail poured hot water into three mismatched cups, his back to them. “Don’t thank me yet. You still haven’t told me what you actually want.”
“And you’re okay with that? Not knowing?”
He turned back, holding one cup. For the first time, his expression shifted. Not exactly curiosity, but close. “That depends. Are you here to tell me what I wasn’t supposed to ask about?”
Tess took a breath. “I figure you already know I’m not a normal Technician class. The details don’t matter right now. What matters is this: I can do things in the dungeon that other people can’t. I can access systems, repair infrastructure, open doors that have been locked for twenty years. And I need help doing it.”
“Help with what?”
“Floor 2.” Petra leaned forward in her chair. “The Alpha that almost killed me is blocking the only path forward. Every delving party that’s tried to advance has hit the same wall. We’re going to take it down.”
Mikhail’s eyebrows rose a fraction. “You want to fight the Alpha. The thing the breathes fire and melts through plasteel?”
“We want to shut down whatever’s spawning it,” Tess said. “Permanently. No more Alpha, no more barrier. The dungeon opens up, delvers can actually advance, and… other things become possible.”
“And you can do that.” It wasn’t a question. “What other things become possible?”
“Better power flow to the city if I can get to the right nodes. More resources. More everything.” Tess gestured vaguely at the window, at the thriving district beyond it. “You’ve seen what happens when the infrastructure actually works. Imagine if it worked better.”
“That was you, wasn’t it? The increased power?” Tess nodded, and he sipped some tea, quiet for a long moment. His gaze moved from Tess to Petra and back again.
“You need a team,” he said finally. “A group to go down there and cover you while you do… whatever it is you do.”
“I’ve got the stabbing covered,” Petra added.
“The stabbing. Right.” Mikhail walked to the window, looking out at the residential district below. “I’m on mandatory leave. Supposed to be resting.”
“Are you?”
“I was supposed to be at a training camp in Sector 10 this week. Advanced combat certification. It got canceled.” He didn’t sound happy about it. “So now I’m here, reorganizing my sock drawer for the third time and going slowly insane.”
Petra snorted. “You actually wanted to go to boot camp for fun?”
“It’s not boot camp. It’s advanced certification. There’s a difference.”
“Is the difference that one sounds slightly less miserable than the other?”
Mikhail turned back to face them. “The difference is that one gets me promoted and the other one involves me sitting in this apartment for another two weeks staring at walls.”
“So come with us,” Tess said. “Help us deal with the Alpha. I can’t promise it’ll count toward your certification, but I can promise it won’t be boring.”
“There’s something else,” Petra said. “This won’t exactly be an official Delve. I’ll explain more if you’re in.”
“An unauthorized dungeon operation?” Mikhail’s voice was flat, but his eyes were calculating. “Off the books?” He frowned. “Unauthorized by who, exactly? I don’t work for the Network, Lady Petra. I work for your family.”
“My family is behind this completely,” Petra said. “It’s just the Delver’s Guild and the Network we’re… working around. No big deal.”
Mikhail stared at her. “No big deal. So if we’re caught, we lose our delving rights. Forever. And we’d be lucky to stay out of prison.”
“That’s why we’re not going to get caught.”
“What if we fail?”
“Then we get out and call it a bad idea. We have a couple of advantages that should make it less dangerous than last time.”
The silence stretched. Mikhail looked at the vibroblade on his shelf, then back at Tess.
“That was my father’s,” he said.
Tess followed his gaze. “He was a delver?”
“Knight. Like me.” Mikhail didn’t elaborate, and something in his tone suggested she shouldn’t push. “He always said the dungeon rewards people who show up. That waiting for the perfect moment just means waiting forever.”
“Smart man.”
“He had his moments.” Mikhail turned fully to face them, his posture shifting from guarded to resolved. “I leveled up during that mess with the Alpha. Level 6 now. First actual progress I’ve made in a year.”
“Following Petra seems to be good for advancement,” Tess observed.
He almost smiled. “Fine. I’m in. What’s the plan?”
Petra was already standing. “We have access to the dungeon that bypasses the main gates. Private entrance, no surveillance. Bee can guide us through Floor 1.”
Mikhail blinked. “Bee?”
“Ah.” Tess pulled out her communicator, set it on Mikhail’s desk. “There’s one more thing you should probably know about.”
“Hello, Mikhail Soto.” The voice that came from the communicator was calm. “I am Central Operations and Resource Engine, Build Iteration B. You may call me Bee.”
Mikhail went still. “CORE-B?”
“That is correct.”
“The dungeon AI.” His voice was flat. “The dead dungeon AI. The one that’s been offline for twenty years.”
“Reports of my death were somewhat exaggerated,” Bee said. “Though not entirely inaccurate. I am… disconnected. Isolated. Tess found me and helped restore partial functionality.”
Mikhail sat down heavily on the edge of his bed. He stared at the communicator, then at Tess, then at Petra.
“You found the dungeon’s AI,” he said. “And you’re bringing it back online. And you didn’t think to mention this earlier?”
“It’s a lot to explain,” Tess said. “And honestly, most people wouldn’t believe it.”
“I’m understanding why you were so concerned about who I might have talked to.” Mikhail ran a hand over his face. “What else? Is there anything else I should know before I agree to this?”
“I have been listening to this conversation,” Bee said, “and I believe your participation significantly improves our probability of success. Though currently I can only access Floor 1 systems. Therefore we must progress to Floor 2—each floor will require repairs to restore my access.”
“Restore access.” Mikhail’s voice was carefully neutral. “For the dungeon AI that everyone thinks is dead. You’re… actually repairing the dungeon.”
“I understand this is a lot of information in a short time,” Bee said. “I can provide additional context if you require it. However, I should note that I have observed you for the duration of this conversation and have formed a favorable assessment of your character. You kept Tess’s secret when revealing it would have benefited you. That suggests integrity.”
“Or self-preservation. I didn’t know what I was dealing with.”
“Those are not mutually exclusive. I observe that integrity and pragmatism often coexist in effective individuals.”
Mikhail laughed. It was a surprised sound, like he hadn’t expected it to come out of his mouth. “The dungeon AI just called me effective.”
“I believe the more precise term would be ‘potentially useful,’” Bee said. “But I am learning that people prefer softer language when discussing their value.”
“She’s still working on the social skills,” Tess said.
“I am a work in progress,” Bee agreed.
Mikhail shook his head, but he was still almost smiling. “Private dungeon access. An AI guide. A plan to shut down an Alpha spawner.” He looked at Petra. “When you said you wanted to go back down there, I didn’t think you meant immediately.”
“Not immediately,” Petra said. “We need to prepare. Coordinate. Make sure we know what we’re walking into.”
“So when?”
Petra glanced at Tess, who shrugged.
“We have the access,” Tess said. “We have the team. I don’t see why we can’t get started right away.”
Petra grinned. “Okay. Then let’s go. Right now.”
“Now?” Mikhail stared at her. “You just said… I haven’t even had breakfast.”
“The estate has excellent kitchens,” Petra said, already heading for the door. “We can brief you over food. Mother will want to meet you anyway.”
“As in Sara Tertian. The Duchess.”
“She’s not as scary as she seems. Usually.” Petra was practically bouncing with energy, planning suddenly becoming action. “Come on, we’re wasting time.”
Mikhail sighed.
Tess pocketed her communicator and headed for the door. “Grab whatever gear you need. We can take the tram back to the Estate.”
Mikhail didn’t move immediately. He stood in the center of his small apartment, looking at the vibroblade on his shelf, the athletics trophies, the life he’d built inside these walls.
“My father also used to say that the worst fights are the ones you don’t see coming.” He grabbed a strapped bracelet with some kind of device on it—his personal shield, Tess guessed—and affixed it to his wrist. Then he stopped, his gaze returning to the vibroblade in its display case.
He stood there for a long moment. Then he reached up and lifted the blade from its mount.
“Dad would have wanted to be part of this,” he said, more to himself than to them. “Restoring the dungeon. Helping the city.” He tested the weight of the blade in his hand. “He always believed it could be fixed. That someone just had to try.”
Tess didn’t know what to say to that. Petra, for once, stayed quiet too.
Mikhail slid the vibroblade into a sheath on his belt, his expression settling into something resolved. “At least this fight, I’m walking into with my eyes open.”
“Is that a yes?”
“That’s a ‘let’s go before I change my mind.’” He moved past Tess toward the door, then paused. “We’re not taking the service stairs again, are we?”
Petra’s voice drifted back from the hallway: “The service stairs are tactically sound.”
Mikhail sighed. “As you say, Lady Petra.”
Tess smiled and grabbed her communicator. Bee’s voice came softly.
“I have updated my probability calculations,” she said. “They are somewhat more encouraging now.”
“Only somewhat?”
“I prefer to manage expectations. But yes.” A pause. “I believe this might actually work, Tess.”
Coming from Bee, that was practically a ringing endorsement.
Tess closed Mikhail’s door behind her and headed for the stairs.