His breathing became quicker, more frantic. His fingers clenched and his teeth ground together. Beneath shut eyelids, Hector’s dilated pupils danced. Saliva laced with bile dripped from his mouth to the steel floor. One last violent shudder ran down his spine. Hector’s eyes opened.
Industrial lamps cast circular rings of light and long shadows down the length of the gloomy tunnel. Thick electrical cords drooped from lamp to lamp. Rusted metal plates served as makeshift walls. Larger steel pylons and frames held up an ironclad roof. An aluminum-clad tube pumped oxygen through intermittent ducts, and a thunderous grinding, like a blade against stone, came from farther down the tunnel.
The helmet of Hector’s tactical suit was missing, but he could breathe and hear. From the look of it, he was still on the moon, which meant that someone had created an artificial atmosphere within the corridor. His wrist was shackled to a thin copper pipe that had beads of liquid sprinkled along its exterior. Hector tried jerking his wrist to see if he could break the pipe. It rattled. He yanked again. The steel shackle sliced into his skin, but the conduit bent. Hector laid back and slammed his boot into the pipe. It fractured. Murky water sprayed everywhere. He bashed the hairline crack again. It broke clean through. He clambered to his feet as water drenched the ground.
The deafening rumble stopped. A siren screamed. Shouts came from one end of the tunnel. Hector darted down the corridor toward where he’d heard the thunder. He turned a corner. At the end of the tunnel, a behemoth of a machine with a propeller-like blade ground into the ashen soil. He only had a momentary glance. The machinists spotted him and began to point and shout. Hector fled back down the passageway. He didn’t get far. The female bounty hunter and another man leveled their weapons at him.
“Told you the pipe wouldn’t hold,” said the bounty hunter.
“This ain’t a prison, sweetheart.” The heavyset foreman walked to the broken pipe and bent over to examine it.
“The next shot is lethal,” the bounty hunter said to Hector. “Kneel.”
Hector complied, but blurted, “Alexandra, it’s me! Hector! Your brother!”
She hesitated. Then, her eyes narrowed. She tossed him a set of inhibitor cuffs. “Shut up. Put those on.”
He slapped the cuffs out of midair. They clattered across the floor. “Don’t you remember me? Why are you working for them? What are you–”
The bounty hunter took one step forward and slammed the butt of her handgun into the back of his head. He slumped over, unconscious.
“That true? He your brother?” asked the foreman.
She gave him an icy glare. “What do you think?”
He raised his eyebrows and shook his head. “All right, all right. Just askin’. Is…your name really Alexandra?”
“Get him up. I need to get him back to XLS headquarters.”
