She whimpers.
Traz hushes her with a low growl in her ear.
She presses her little face into his shoulder and doesn’t make another sound.
Good girl.
We move.
Half a block later, we hit a crowd.
Scavengers.
Dealers.
Eyes gleaming like rats in the half-light.
They part for us, sensing danger.
Sensing death on our heels.
Traz keeps one hand on his blaster, the other on Aria.
I shield Joren with my body.
Silpha mutters a curse and yanks us down a side street slick with oil.
Every footstep feels like it echoes to the rooftops.
Traz glances back again.
His jaw’s tight.
Worse than tight.
Like he’s bracing for the inevitable.
And gods help me, I feel it too.
The city isn’t just breathing.
It’s hunting.
A few blocks later, Silpha calls a halt.
We duck into the wreckage of an old hover depot.
Rust stains the floors.
Broken shells of speeders sit in twisted heaps.
Traz draws us into the darkest corner.
"Five minutes," he mutters.
"Five minutes isn’t much," Silpha snaps, pacing like a caged cat.
"It’s what we got," Traz growls back.
