74. Hannah
Hannah
“No.”
Clay grabs my arm so fast it almost hurts.
Absolutely terrified.
Absolutely furious.
“You are not going down there.”
The reactor chamber shakes violently around us.
Warning sirens screaming.
Steam flooding the air.
Concrete collapsing from the ceiling.
And beneath it all—
Ascension Core pulses brighter.
More unstable.
Closer to rupture.
Gabriel’s face is pale as he studies the terminal.
“The coolant rods have to be manually realigned.”
Russ checks the timer.
00:03:02
Three minutes.
Clay steps directly in front of me.
“I’ll do it.”
“No,” Gabriel snaps immediately.
“The system’s damaged. Whoever goes down there needs reactor access knowledge.”
My stomach drops.
Because I understand now.
The layout.
The override sequence.
The emergency stabilizers.
Memory kept pieces buried inside me for years.
But Ascension trained me to survive this place.
Wu smiles weakly from the floor through blood and pain.
“She finally understands her purpose.”
I turn toward him slowly.
“No.”
A step closer.
“I’m ending yours.”
The reactor chamber trembles again.
Hard enough now the railing splits near the lower access platform.
Gabriel’s voice sharpens:
“Hannah, listen to me carefully.”
He pulls up the failing reactor schematics.
“The manual stabilizer must be engaged in this order—”
“I know.”
Everyone looks at me.
Fragments flash violently through my mind now.
Training simulations.
Emergency drills.
Wu teaching containment procedures to “advanced subjects.”
Dear God.
They prepared children to maintain reactors.
Clay sees realization hit me.
And panic floods his face.
“No.”
His voice breaks slightly.
“Hannah, absolutely not.”
I grab his hand hard.
And for one second—
everything slows.
The bunker.
The alarms.
The war.
Just him.
The man who taught me what love felt like after a lifetime without it.
“You said we end this together,” I whisper.
Clay shakes his head instantly.
“This isn’t together.”
The pain in his voice nearly destroys me.
Above us…the reactor shields begin collapsing one by one.
Blue-white energy flashes violently through the chamber.
Gabriel looks seconds from panic now.
“We are out of time!”
Wu watches us all with bloodied amusement from the floor.
“Human attachment,” he says weakly.
“Predictably tragic.”
Russ steps forward calmly.
Then shoots Wu directly through the other leg.
Wu screams again.
Russ lowers the rifle.
“I’ve wanted to do that all night.”
Honestly?
Same.
The countdown flashes:
00:02:11
Clay cups my face suddenly.
Rough hands trembling.
“You come back to me.”
Emotion cracks straight through my chest.
Because he sounds terrified.
Not of death.
Of losing me.
And after everything Ascension stole from me—
being loved like this still feels impossible sometimes.
I press my forehead against his briefly.
“You gave me my life back.”
“Hannah—”
“No.” My voice shakes now too. “Listen to me.”
The reactor chamber groans violently beneath us.
I force the words out anyway.
“You taught me I was human before I remembered it myself.”
God.
The look in his eyes.
Pure heartbreak.
Pure love.
Pure desperation.
Gabriel suddenly shouts:
“NOW!”
No more time.
I kiss Clay hard.
Fast.
Desperate.
Everything I feel poured into one second.
Then I tear myself away before I lose the ability to do it at all.
And I run for the lower reactor ladder.
“HANNAH!”
I hear him behind me.
But I can’t stop.
Because forty-three children are somewhere above us fighting for freedom.
Because Ascension has other facilities.
Because Wu cannot be allowed to erase the truth.
Because somebody has to end this.
Heat slams into me as I descend toward the reactor core chamber below.
Blinding blue light pulses through cracked containment walls.
The coolant system is failing catastrophically now.
Steam burns against my skin.
Alarms deafen me.
And beneath the screaming reactor—
I finally see it.
The manual stabilization chamber.
One lever.
One emergency override wheel.
And flooding the entire lower platform—
radiation coolant leaking across the floor.
Gabriel’s voice crackles through the comm in my ear:
“Hannah, once you engage the stabilizers, the reactor will vent pressure manually.”
“How long?”
A pause.
Too long of one.
Then quietly:
“…you’ll have ninety seconds to get out before the chamber seals permanently.”
My breath catches.
Because we both know what that really means.
Above me—
far above me—
Clay is shouting my name.