They exploded into motion. Ethan and Chloe, grunting with the raw effort, pushed and pulled the travois with all their strength, their boots slipping on the slick ground. They were no longer hidden. They were exposed, a desperate, fleeing meal.
The predators reacted instantly. The hunt was on. A wave of chittering, chitinous bodies surged after them.
Thirty feet. The tunnel mouth was a promise of life.
Twenty feet. The clicking of mandibles was deafening, a sound that would haunt Ethan's nightmares forever.
Ten feet. He could feel the predators' hot, fetid breath on his neck. He risked a glance back and saw a nightmare of snapping jaws and spindly legs just inches behind him.
With one final, desperate shove, they tumbled into the tunnel entrance. Ethan spun around, raising his ice axe, ready to make a final stand.
But the creatures stopped. They piled up at the entrance, a writhing wall of insectoid horror, but not a single one crossed the threshold. They stared into the tunnel, their alien eyes burning with frustrated hunger, then, as if obeying some silent command, they screeched and dispersed back into the darkness of the feeding ground.
An invisible wall. A boundary. They were safe.
Panting, gasping for air, they collapsed against the tunnel wall. As their heart rates slowly returned to normal, they began to take in their new surroundings. This was no natural cave. The walls were a smooth, seamless, pearl-white material that glowed with a soft, internal light. It was warm to the touch. The air was clean, dry, and circulated by an unseen system.
The short tunnel opened into a space that stole their breath.
They stood on a balcony overlooking a chamber of truly epic proportions. But it wasn't a cavern; it was a machine. Vast, silent, and perfect. Glowing conduits pulsed with soft light in the walls, crisscrossing in complex geometric patterns. There were no statues, no carvings, no sign of the raw, brutal nature they had just escaped. This was the heart of the Watchers' world—a sterile, silent, technological womb.
In the precise center of the chamber floor, there was a raised, circular dais. And on it, they saw one.
It was a living Watcher.
It sat motionless, its long back to them, its slender form identical to the statues in the gallery. It seemed to be in a state of meditation or dormancy. It was utterly, profoundly alone.
They stood frozen, afraid to breathe, afraid to break the sterile perfection of the silence.
Then, a voice spoke.
It came from nowhere and everywhere at once, a calm, resonant, and genderless tone that vibrated in the very air around them. It spoke in perfect, unaccented English.
"Welcome," the voice said. "The test is complete."