The soft clink of Isla’s boot against the smooth stone step echoed through the chamber, each sound swallowed by the vastness of the Endless Sea’s core. Her fingers brushed against the wall as they ascended, the lilac-glowing veins of stone pulsing faintly beneath her fingertips. The glow flickered, responding to her presence like a cat’s half-lidded gaze—aware but uninterested…lethargic.

Too quiet.

Her eyes darted up the spiral ascent ahead, her gaze catching on the backs of Evelyn, Kael, Maeva, and Hollow as they moved up the narrow stairwell. The sound of boots, the Site Administrator’s heels scuffing on stone, and faint, steady breaths were the only signs of life. No ambient hum of generators. No quiet conversations from other personnel. No distant rattle of machinery.

Her footfalls slowed for a moment. She twisted, glancing back down the long drop to the abyss below. The central pillar rose like an obsidian spear, unnervingly smooth and vanishing into the dark, bottomless void. No seabed. No other landmass. Just blackness. The perfect abyss, with a singular, unyielding spike of rock piercing the still, endless sea to support them.

Her throat tightened. If that breaks…this whole facility will fall into the abyss. Have they even tested how far it goes? Probably not…which is why we’re here. How is it so smooth and clean if they only just unearthed it after thousands of years? It has to end, though. Everything has an ending…or should have an ending.

“Don’t fall behind,” Evelyn called over her shoulder, her words sharp but without bite. She hadn’t even looked back, of course. Just knew she was lagging.

She always knows everything. Damn witch… Maybe she is with everything she’s shown me.

Isla’s gaze lingered on the black void below for one more second before she resumed the climb. Her hands flexed at her sides, a habit of calming her nerves. She knew better than to let her imagination linger in places like this. She’d learned that lesson on deep-sea expeditions—when the pressure of the ocean wasn’t the only thing pressing on your mind. There were other pressures. Older ones. Quieter ones that refused to stay in the darkness.

Her eyes flicked to Evelyn’s back, the clean, immaculate lines of her long coat swaying as she ascended. You feel it, too. I know you do… You’re nervous. You’re just better at faking it.

“Sure is…empty,” Hollow muttered from somewhere near the middle of the group. He sounded distant, as if his voice had to push through molasses to reach her. His fingers drummed nervously on the smooth stone rail, or at least it felt like stone. “This whole place feels wrong. Like we’re sneaking in after hours.”

“Don’t remind me,” Kael replied, his voice light with forced humor. “Half-expecting to see some poor bastard janitor show up with a mop and scream ‘What are you doing here?’ like it’s a horror flick and he’s the last guardian.”

“Yeah,” Maeva snorted, her heavy footfalls thudding with solid authority. “Except in horror flicks, the janitor’s the first to die.”

“See, that right there is why you never stay late at work,” Kael shot back, tapping the back of Hollow’s vest. “First rule of survival, buddy. Don’t be the last one on-site after hours. Ain’t nobody making it out of a locked secret facility of monsters at 3 a.m.”

Stolen novel; please report.

“Tell me about it,” Hollow grunted. “Bet it’s why we got no one here now. Whole team got scared and bailed. Packed their bags and left. Can’t blame ‘em.”

“Or,” Isla muttered, her voice low, “they didn’t leave willingly.”

The group fell silent at that. Their footsteps echoed louder than before, each thud feeling like a countdown. Her words only got a sly, half-turned smirk from the organizer of this horror-inducing expedition party.

Hollow cleared his throat, a little too loud. “Budget cuts. Right, boss? Yeah. It’s gotta be budget cuts.”

Sure, Hollow. Budget cuts. That’s definitely why this whole mythical place feels like a graveyard. Isla’s lips pressed into a hard, thin line. Budget cuts don’t leave chairs half-pushed out from tables. Budget cuts don’t leave empty lockers with personal gear still inside, she noted, glancing into rooms as they entered a hallway.

“Don’t overthink it, Dr. Reyes,” Evelyn called back, her voice smooth as oil on sheets of steel. She didn’t turn around. Her fingers traced one of the glowing veins, her nails softly tapping the stone. “I’m currently hiring replacements. You’ll have more company than you’ll want in a few weeks… If you make it back.”

“ ‘If’ being the key word there, huh? And hiring,” Isla’s eyes narrowed. “That’s one way to phrase it, I suppose.”

“An honest way,” Evelyn countered, pausing briefly at a junction to let the others catch up. Her eyes flicked over Isla like she was inspecting a product she’d bought off the shelf. “Sometimes, to grow, you must cut away dead branches and examine them to see how they failed before grafting on new…more sturdy specimens. Our previous staff were…incompatible with the site’s needs, it seems. I’m still puzzling over that tongue twister.”

AKA, some shit went down, and you don’t want to talk about it.

Hollow leaned toward Kael and muttered, “Bet that means dead.”

Kael snorted. Maeva shot them both a warning look at their snickers.

I guess you have to joke to stay sane.

“Incompatible, huh?” Isla’s eyes lingered on Evelyn’s cold, unreadable face. “That word comes with a lot of sharp edges…like ‘killing’ and ‘murder,’ wouldn’t you say?”

Evelyn didn’t deny it, her smile razor-thin. “You’ll find, Doctor, that in places like these, people either rise to the challenge or…don’t. Strange things can happen when exploring a new world… Difficult decisions have to be made at times. Can you do that?”

Her eyes held Isla’s for a moment longer than necessary. Not a stare. Not a glare. Just a silent, cold reminder of something they both knew.

There are no heroes here, is that what you’re saying? Can I make the hard call when it’s two impossible choices? What are you getting at, Evelyn? Is this about Jill back in college? It’s hard to read you, but I know one thing—there’s something bigger here than you’re telling us. If you’re willing to play the devil to keep it buried, then it’s worse than you’re letting on.

The challenge sent a familiar prickle of defiance through Isla’s chest. She knew Eve was getting under her skin—and Eve knew it too. But after seeing that immortal fish, there was no backing down now. No chance in hell.

“Are you questioning your own decision to put me in charge?” Isla returned with a sharp grin, voice cutting like a scalpel. “Didn’t think you were the type to second-guess yourself.”

Evelyn’s eyes gleamed, gray clouds swirling with answers she wouldn’t give. “Me? Never,” she said with a soft, dangerous lilt. “Just making sure you aren’t.”

I thought so. You’re not going to give us everything. And if you’re hiding the worst of it—when you’ve already shown us this much—then it’s worse than anything we’ve imagined. I’m not about to close my eyes to it. Maybe curiosity does kill the cat… But I know where to push and when to cut my losses. I’ll take that bet, Eve… And win. Which is just what you want. Dammit.