Chapter 395: The Engagement Ceremony (xi)

After the first explosion occurred and chaos ensued, Angel didn’t slow down once they cleared the emergency stairwell. She kept Reva close, one hand locked around her wrist as alarms screamed behind them and smoke rolled through the lower halls. Security was already scattered, priorities broken, everyone running in different directions. No one stopped them. No one even looked twice.

The hovercar was waiting where Angel had parked it, systems already hot and doors sliding open the moment she came within range. She shoved Reva inside, jumped into the driver’s seat, and punched the throttle. The car tore away from the tower just as another blast rippled through the structure above.

Reva hadn’t said a word yet. Her hands were clenched in her lap, eyes fixed on the shrinking skyline. Only when the tower disappeared behind other buildings did she finally look at Angel.

“Is he—”

“He told me not to answer that yet,” Angel cut in, softer than her tone suggested. “We go to the dock first.”

The dock was already in chaos when they arrived. Cargo lights burned white against the night, engines humming, crews shouting over each other. Viola was the first one to spot them. She sprinted toward the hovercar with Lyra right behind her, tail flicking hard enough to give away her nerves.

The moment Angel and Reva stepped out, Lyra’s eyes scanned past them, searching. “Where’s Xavier?”

“He told us to leave at the promised time even if he doesn’t show up,” Angel responded. “He said he’ll meet us on Jupiter.”

Lyra’s ears flattened. “No. I’m not going without him.”

Reva turned sharply toward Angel, fear finally breaking through her composure. “What does he mean, meet us later?”

Angel met both of their gazes. “It means he’s alive. It means he has a plan. And it means he doesn’t break his word.”

Lyra shook her head, fists clenched. “You don’t know that.”

“I do,” Angel replied. “Because he’s done this before. Every time he tells people to run, it’s because he’s buying time. You two should know it better.”

Viola stepped in then, placing a hand on Lyra’s shoulder. “We can’t stay,” she said quietly. “If the tower goes fully, the airspace will lock down. We won’t get another window.”

Lyra hesitated, eyes burning, then finally looked at Reva. Reva nodded once, slow and reluctant. “He told us to trust him,” she said. “So we do.”

The ship waited at the far end of the dock, already prepped. It wasn’t sleek or flashy, not some polished flagship meant to impress. The hull bore signs of age, layered plating reinforced with newer alloys, thrusters upgraded far beyond what the original frame had been built for. It looked like a ship meant to survive long journeys and bad decisions, not win beauty contests.

Angel oversaw the hovercar being secured into the cargo bay herself, making sure it was locked down before waving the others aboard. Requiem followed with his daughter close to his side. Viola took point, guiding Lyra and Reva up the ramp as the engines spooled higher.

The countdown began the moment the hatch sealed.

Angel stayed behind on the dock.

She stood there, hands shoved into her jacket pockets, watching the ship through the rising heat distortion. On one side of the city, her friends were leaving the planet. On the other, far beyond the skyline, Xavier was still inside the chaos he’d created.

Then, the explosion hit without warning.

It wasn’t just loud. It felt like the city itself flinched. A deep, rolling shockwave tore across the horizon, followed by a column of fire and debris where the Blackwood Tower had stood. Screens around the dock flickered as emergency broadcasts cut in, voices shouting that the tower had collapsed completely.

Inside the ship, Lyra screamed Xavier’s name. Reva went rigid, breath caught in her throat. Requiem closed his eyes, jaw tight, while Viola gripped the railing hard enough to leave marks.

Angel didn’t move.

Tears ran down her face as the ship lifted off, engines roaring, pulling away from the city and the burning skyline behind them. She watched until it vanished into the clouds, then finally turned away, wiping her eyes with the back of her hand.

“Don’t you dare die,” she muttered under her breath. “You promised.”

A while ago in the Blackwood Tower.

The descent rig tore Althea away from the tower in a violent drop, the harness biting into her shoulders as the launcher kicked her out into open air. Wind screamed past her ears, city lights stretching into warped lines below. The tower loomed beside her, half-lit, fractured, pieces still falling off it like a dying beast shaking itself apart.

She forced her breathing steady and triggered the stabilization sequence. The rig corrected its angle, slowing her fall just enough to keep her from blacking out, then pushed her away from the tower’s outer skin. Heat washed over her as another internal blast went off somewhere above, rattling the air hard enough to make her teeth click together.

Althea hit the ground hard but controlled, boots skidding across a reinforced landing zone that had once been meant for executive evacuations. She rolled once, unhooked the harness, and came up on one knee with her weapon already in her hand out of pure habit.

The scene around her was chaos held back by fear.

Fire suppression teams stood at a distance, heavy rigs idling, crews arguing with commanders who refused to let them advance. Combat squads had formed loose perimeters, rifles up but useless against a structure that could collapse on its own without warning. Police drones hovered overhead, their feeds flickering as interference from the tower’s failing systems scrambled signals.

And then there were the people.

Hundreds of them. Emergency workers, medical teams, evac coordinators, city officials, and civilians who had ignored orders to stay back. Everyone was staring at the tower, waiting for it to decide whether it would fall completely or give them a few more minutes.

Althea followed their line of sight and spotted them near one of the armored evac corridors.

Luther stood apart from the others, posture straight, clothes torn and stained with blood that clearly wasn’t his. His presence alone seemed to keep people from getting too close. Even shaken and wounded, he radiated something that made trained responders hesitate.

Lucian was beside him, face pale, eyes unfocused, hands trembling as if he hadn’t yet caught up to what his body had survived. A medic tried to approach him and thought better of it when Luther glanced their way.

Althea took a step forward, then stopped herself. Her wrist console chimed, updating casualty estimates and structural projections. The numbers were bad. Worse than anyone wanted to say out loud.

She looked back at the tower, smoke pouring from shattered floors, alarms still echoing faintly through the night. Somewhere inside, Xavier was either dead, escaping, or doing something that would make all of this even harder to explain.

Althea lowered her weapon and exhaled slowly.

“Damn you,” she muttered, not sure whether she meant Xavier, the system, or herself.

Behind her, another explosion shook the ground, and every emergency unit instinctively pulled back another step, leaving the tower standing alone against the city lights, daring anyone to come closer.

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