Chapter 20
CHAPTER TWENTY
Rhyx’s hand tightened around hers—a sudden compression that made Alina’s breath catch.
“They’re here.”
The words were calm, almost conversational, but she felt the tension coiling through his body like a spring being wound too tight.
Above them, filtering down through countless tons of Martian rock, came a sound she wouldn’t have been able to hear on her own—but she could see it in Rhyx’s stillness, in the way his head tilted slightly as he tracked vibrations she couldn’t perceive.
“How many?”
“Five vehicles. Perhaps twenty people.” His blue eyes, luminous even in the dim light of the small chamber where they’d been resting, met hers. “They’ve reached the main cavern.”
Twenty people. Her stomach dropped. This wasn’t a casual survey team or a scientific expedition. This was a full search party. Military precision, GenCon resources, and Martin’s obsessive determination all wrapped together in a package specifically designed to find her.
No, she corrected herself. To find what she was hiding.
“We need to move.”
Rhyx was already rising, pulling her up with the same effortless strength that still caught her off guard even after all this time.
His movements were fluid, economical, betraying none of the urgency she knew he must be feeling.
Where she was trembling, heart racing, palms slick with fear-sweat inside her gloves, he was perfectly controlled.
A warrior, she reminded herself. He said he was a warrior.
In that moment, she believed it absolutely.
“Stay close.” He led her deeper into the tunnel system, away from the chamber that had served as their temporary refuge. “There’s another way to the surface—older, less direct, but it opens far from the main entrance.”
“How do you know?”
“I feel it.” He pressed his free hand against the tunnel wall as they walked, his golden scales scraping lightly against the rough stone. “The air moves differently here. There’s an opening ahead, perhaps two kilometers. We can reach it before they finish searching the cavern above.”
Alina wanted to ask how he could possibly know that, how he could navigate these lightless passages with such confidence when she could barely see her own feet.
But the questions died on her lips. She’d learned to trust his instincts over the past weeks—learned that whatever alien senses he possessed, they were as reliable as any scientific instrument she’d ever operated.
More reliable, perhaps. Instruments could be fooled. Rhyx couldn’t.
They moved quickly through the darkness, Rhyx guiding her around obstacles she couldn’t see, warning her of sudden drops and uneven footing before she could stumble.
The tunnel twisted and branched, rose and fell, but he navigated it with the same casual certainty that she might walk through her own laboratory.
What if they catch us?
The thought kept circling back, no matter how hard she tried to push it away.
She knew what would happen if GenCon got their hands on Rhyx.
He would become a specimen—a subject to be studied, dissected, analyzed for whatever secrets his impossible biology might yield.
They would strip away everything that made him unique, reduce him to data points and tissue samples and classified research files.
But it wasn’t just GenCon she feared.
Be honest with yourself, Alina.
Her own colleagues, her own superiors, the very institutions she’d spent her career serving—they wouldn’t let him go either.
Oh, they’d dress it up in different language.
Scientific necessity. The advancement of human knowledge.
The potential benefits to the colonization effort.
But in the end, the result would be the same.
Rhyx would disappear into some research facility, and she would never see him again.
I can’t let that happen.
The fierceness of her own conviction surprised her. A month ago, she’d been a researcher—dedicated to her work, yes, but ultimately obedient to the systems that governed her life. Rules and protocols and proper channels. That was how science worked. That was how civilization worked.
Now she was running through underground tunnels with an alien who called her his mate, willing to throw away everything she’d built rather than see him caged.
What happened to me?
She knew the answer, of course. He happened.
Rhyx, with his impossible existence and his absolute devotion and his way of making her feel like the most important thing in the universe.
He had awakened something in her that she hadn’t known was sleeping—a capacity for defiance, for passion, for the kind of love that didn’t care about consequences.
“Alina.” Rhyx’s voice was low, urgent. “Stop.”
She froze, her hand still gripped in his.
“What is it?”
“The vibrations have changed.” He was pressing both palms against the tunnel wall now, his expression focused. “They’ve split their forces. Most are still in the main cavern, but a smaller group is moving…”
He trailed off, his brow furrowing.
“Moving where?”
“Toward the surface exit I was leading us to.”
Ice flooded her veins.
“They know about the tunnel?”
“No. They can’t.” But he sounded less certain now. “Perhaps they’re simply covering all possible exits from the mountain. Standard search protocol.”
“Or Martin figured it out.” Alina’s mind raced through the possibilities.
Martin was arrogant, yes, and she’d always thought that arrogance blinded him to anything that didn’t fit his preconceptions.
But he wasn’t stupid. If he’d gotten access to detailed geological surveys, if he’d studied the lava tube networks that honeycombed this entire region…
“It doesn’t matter how they knew.” Rhyx’s voice hardened. “We have to keep moving. They’re still far from the exit—we can reach it first if we’re quick.”
“And if they’re waiting for us when we get there?”
He looked at her, and in the faint luminescence of the mineral deposits that lined the tunnel walls, she could see something shift in his expression. Something predatory.
“Then I will deal with them.”
“Rhyx—”
“I will not let them take you, Alina.” The words were quiet, absolute. “Whatever happens, whatever I have to do—I will keep you safe.”
She wanted to argue. Wanted to tell him that keeping her safe wasn’t worth throwing away his own life, that she would rather surrender than watch him be hurt.
But the words wouldn’t come, because she knew—knew with a certainty that went beyond logic—that he wouldn’t listen.
That arguing would only waste precious time.
“All right,” she said instead. “Let’s go.”
They ran.
The tunnel grew narrower as they ascended, forcing them to move single-file with Rhyx in the lead.
Alina’s lungs burned despite the suit’s oxygen supply, her legs aching from the uneven terrain and the constant upward slope.
But she didn’t slow down, didn’t complain, didn’t do anything except follow the golden gleam of Rhyx’s scales and trust him to lead her somewhere safe.
Just a little further. Just a little more.
The light changed first—a gradual brightening that told her they were approaching the surface.
Then came the temperature shift, the cold Martian atmosphere seeping into the tunnel and making her shiver despite the suit’s insulation.
And finally, the exit itself—a jagged opening in the rock face, barely wide enough for two people to pass abreast, spilling pale Martian daylight into the darkness.
Rhyx stopped at the threshold, holding up a hand to halt her.
“Let me check first.”
He stepped out into the light—
And froze.
“Well.” The voice was familiar, smug, dripping with satisfaction. “Dr. Falkner. I was hoping you’d choose this particular rabbit hole.”
Martin Reece stood fifteen meters from the cave entrance, flanked by two GenCon guards in full tactical gear. Their weapons—pulse rifles, military-grade—were already raised and aimed directly at the opening where Rhyx stood silhouetted against the darkness.
Alina’s blood turned to ice.
“Martin.” She pushed past Rhyx, ignoring his hiss of protest, placing herself between him and the weapons. “How did you—”
“Find you?” Martin smiled, that cold, triumphant smile she’d grown to hate.
“Please, Alina. Did you really think I wouldn’t notice the discrepancies in your research data?
The unusual power draws from the lab’s equipment?
The way you kept redirecting survey teams away from this particular mountain range?
” He shook his head, almost pitying. “You were never as clever at deception as you thought.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Don’t insult my intelligence.” His gaze shifted past her, and she saw his expression change—the smugness faltering, replaced by something that looked almost like shock. “What… what is that?”
Rhyx stepped forward, moving to stand beside her despite her attempt to keep him back.
In the pale Martian light, he was unmistakably alien—the golden scales, the inhuman angles of his face, the vertical slits of his pupils.
There was no hiding what he was, no passing him off as a large cyborg or an unusual colonist.
He was other, and Martin could see it clearly.
“That,” Alina said, her voice steady despite the terror clawing at her chest, “is none of your concern.”
“None of my—” Martin’s voice cracked with incredulous rage. “You’ve been hiding an alien in the survey zone? An actual non-human life form? Do you have any idea what this means? What this is worth?”
“He’s not a commodity.”
“Everything is a commodity, Alina. That’s what you’ve never understood.
” Martin’s eyes were bright with avarice now, the shock giving way to calculation.
“GenCon will pay a fortune for this. Hell, Earth Government will pay a fortune. The first confirmed extraterrestrial intelligence since humanity left the Earth? This is the discovery of the century.”