Pointing to the elevator wasn’t going the way she wanted, because he didn’t really seem to understand what she was saying. The air was so thin now, already used up by too many people. And she’d sealed off the rest of it, which wasn’t...

Damn it, she was going to start hallucinating if she didn’t hurry up.

Adding a frantic, “Please don’t kill me,” Mira turned her back on the undine and put her attention on the wall in front of her.

The glass paneling was attached by industrial grade metal. It was almost impossible to break the glass this deep into the ocean, unless it was weakened by repeated strikes as the monster behind her had proven. He’d busted through the crack easily enough, but she thought it was probably a massive stone after an earthquake that had originally caused that crack.

Her only option was to melt the rivets. They would give, and then she could hit it hard enough to pop the panel.

Firing up her welder, she started on the bottom ones. It took a bit to melt them. They were damn thick beasts, but she got the bottom done quick enough. Sweat trickled down the back of her neck and into her eyes, blurring her vision. Speed was of the essence, though, no time to wipe it away.

Hands grabbed onto her waist, lifting her to the higher rivets.

Mira gasped and looked down at the massive, clawed hands suddenly spanning her entire stomach and hips. “Fuck, you’re big,” she muttered, before turning her attention back to the remaining bolts she had to get through.

Just a few more, and she’d be done. Just a couple more, and then she could slam her feet into the panel and knock it free.

The air was gone. All of a sudden, just gone. Every breath she took was a struggle, like she was trying to breathe underwater. There just wasn’t enough oxygen because her fucking welder was using it all up to spark the fire.

The last rivet was almost melted. Almost, and suddenly, her welder went out.

“No,” she muttered, slamming it against the glass as if that would help. She sparked it again and again, but there wasn’t enough air to get the flame going. Nowhere near enough.

They were dead. Goners. They’d find her body floating with the undine’s. Or maybe he’d still be alive, eating her flesh in a tank of his own creation.

Fuck. This was bad.

She went limp, her lungs heaving as she tried to suck in what little air there might still be. But she was getting a little sluggish now. What had her father always said about breath? She exhaled something that wasn’t oxygen, that’s for sure. And she always had to be real careful to not use her welder in areas that didn’t have enough oxygen.

Mira just couldn’t remember why, as her brain struggled to keep her heart beating.

Heavy thuds broke through her thoughts, and she watched as the undine coiled his body and struck the panel. Again. Again. It had to hurt. His shoulder already hung awkwardly out of the socket, but he kept going. Hitting the panel over and over until a little water came out from the bottom.

She was delirious enough to giggle at the sight. If she’d had more air to speak, she might have even said, “Oh look, now I’m going to drown.”

But he didn’t stop at the sound she made. The massive, powerful tail of the undine did a lot of the work as he slammed his upper body on the panel so many times that it eventually bent back like the top of a sardine can. Peeled back and jagged too, just like she’d seen some of the engineers eat out of.

The water rushed in, sweeping her body back against the wall and pinning her there until the entire world turned into slow motion. Everything floated. Her welder, her hair, the undine who glided toward her with so much grace it made her eyes sting with tears.

Oh, wait. That was the saltwater.

He moved closer to her, those sharp teeth flashing, and she wondered if this was when she would die. It would be nice to not be awake for whenever he took a bite out of her body.

Instead, he moved closer and then sealed his lips over hers.

Oh, he was cold. That was her first thought. And she was surrounded by deep, icy ocean water that already squeezed her chest and made what little air was in there come out. Mere minutes and she’d go into hypothermic shock, if she somehow managed to breathe. Somehow, his lips were colder than all that, but smooth as they slid over hers.

His tongue swept out, licking at her lips and she was so shocked that she opened them without thinking. Maybe he was giving her some kind of mercy before she died?

His clawed hand came up and pinched her jaw, forcing her to open wider, and then he breathed into her. Her lungs sucked up the air, and she scrabbled at his arms, his shoulders, anything she could hold onto to suck in that air she desperately needed. Again he exhaled, and she inhaled even more before wrenching away from him, coughing into the water as her lungs tried to remember what to do with air.

She was drowning. Oh, she was drowning.

But the undine drew her face back to his and breathed again into her mouth. Mira had the delayed thought that she was pinned to the opposite panel, glass at her back, icy water surrounding her, making out with an undine who had just tried to kill her.

Inhaling again, she held her breath this time as he slowly drew away.

She could only barely see his face now that all the halogen lights had blinked out of existence. There were only the lights outside the tunnel illuminating his unimpressed expression.

Then he gathered her up against his chest and swam out of the hallway with her. Into the wild ocean.

The cold started settling into her fingers and feet. She couldn’t move them. Couldn’t even hold onto him as he swam toward the glass elevator she’d indicated.

And somehow, even though she was almost blacking out, she saw the depths flash before her eyes. So vast and dark. Never ending space that was both overwhelming and so freeing.

She’d spent her entire life trapped inside Beta. She knew every hallway that she was allowed to go in, every room where engineers were allowed to walk. But this? Oh, this was so much bigger.

The undine wrenched the elevator door open and threw her inside so quickly that water only filled it about halfway before the door slammed shut.

Mira took a few seconds to blink at the horrific amount of strength that took before she lunged toward the controls.

“Push... buttons...” she chattered through her shuddering teeth and managed to push one. She didn’t care which one, just any level.

The glass box heaved, clanking and shuddering, but it moved. She dropped onto her knees, freezing in the icy water as the box moved up.

Through the glass that fogged with her breath, she saw the undine watching her. He hovered in the water, his brows drawn down in confusion or anger as he watched her go up and up outside of the city. His long hair floated around him, all those electric blue flashes glowing up and down his beautiful body. And then, with a flick of a tail, he was gone.

Just in time for the door to open behind her and spill her out onto a very expensive floor.

OceanofPDF.com

Four

Arges

His mind was all frayed after the interaction with the achromo. She was not at all what he had come to expect from their kind.

Her plan was solid, although told to him through confusing hand gestures and words that made his head ache. She was like listening to a chirping child, constantly prattling on about things he didn’t care about.

The achromo was rather clever, though. If only she were stronger, she might have finished her plan impressively fast. Apparently, air was more important to them than it was his own people. She’d nearly passed out, and he was still holding his breath comfortably.