D-Block was a meat grinder. Taran, Zopi, and the others were pinned down, trading fire with a seemingly endless wave of Plasmagheist soldiers. The air thrummed not just with gunfire, but with the straining hum of the ancient generator.
"The valves!" Taran roared over the din, slamming a fresh magazine into his rifle. "Alev, Raine—get that third one open! We lose power, and this whole trap is worthless!"
The plan was simple in theory, insane in execution: lure a god into a cage. The Cylinder Room in D-Block was their only shot. But first, they had to get it online.
---
Netoshka was in a blur, her boots skidding across the concrete top of the massive hydro-electric dam that fed the facility's secondary power grid. Her real objective wasn't the dam itself, but the canyon it created—a perfect funnel leading straight to D-Block.
A wave of ethereal crimson energy materialized before her, coalescing into the smirking form of Plasmageist.
"My, my. You are swift, Glitching Aberration," his voice echoed, a chorus of static and malice.
"Yet you flee from a direct confrontation. Tell me, Vermissen Netoshka, does my presence truly inspire such fear?"
Netoshka didn't break stride, her mind cold and focused. Engaging him was suicide. Luring him was the mission.
"Tsk. You sure are a loud one, aren't ya?" she called back, her voice dripping with a feigned boredom that masked her racing heart.
"Don't you ever get tired of hearing yourself talk, you crazy old ghost?"
His form flickered with anger.
"Why did you come here? What do you want with my serum?"
He launched a shockwave that tore a trench in the concrete at her heels.
She didn't answer. Instead, she leaped from the dam's edge, using her grappling hook to swing down into the canyon below. It was a gamble. She was leading the predator to the trap, and she was the bait. As she fell, she primed every piece of explosive semtex she had left, slapping them onto the dam's support structure in a desperate, reckless pattern.
Plasmageist took the bait, diving after her in a streak of red lightning. The second his attention was locked on her descent, she glitched. The world stuttered for a split second, and she was suddenly phasing through the rock face of the canyon, leaving a fading afterimage for him to follow.
The real Netoshka slammed against the inside of a maintenance tunnel, gasping. The cost of the maneuver was a searing headache and a nosebleed. Outside, the semtex detonated.
The dam didn't collapse, but a massive section of its concrete facade sheared off, crashing down into the canyon in an avalanche of rock and dust, momentarily burying the ethereal form of Plasmageist.
Not a kill. A delay. She was already moving, spotting an abandoned motorcycle. She had minutes, maybe less.
As she poured fuel from a red canister into the tank, a low, building hum began to permeate the air. The rocks imprisoning Plasmageist began to glow, then vaporized. He emerged, not enraged, but with a terrifying, calm intensity. The air itself grew heavy.
"A clever trick," he conceded, raising a hand. Crimson and purple energy swirled between his palms, forming a sphere of pure annihilation. "But no more games."
He launched it. Netoshka tried to dodge, but the ball of energy shifted course, homing in on her. Instinct took over. She raised her hands, not to block, but to unmake. A field of black mist and flickering digital static erupted before her. The moment the energy sphere touched it, it didn't explode; it glitched out of existence with a sound like tearing fabric.
Plasmageist stared, genuinely stunned.
"What is this?!"
Netoshka didn't wait. She kicked the motorcycle to life. As Plasmageist recovered and began hurling more lightning spears, she wove a complex pattern of glitching afterimages—distractions to cover her retreat. She hit a ramp, glitching the bike's trajectory just enough to evade a final, massive shockwave, and shot toward the Grimshire Facility.
Bursting through the main gate, she abandoned the bike and sprinted for D-Block, keying her comms.
"Taran! Status report! I'm here, and he's right behind—"
Her words were cut off as a dome of crimson energy and black matter erupted from the ground, engulfing the entire facility and town in a bloody glow into the sky. The distant hum became a deafening roar. Escape was no longer an option.
The cage was now sealed.