The heavy iron floorboards didn't just hold Lucien down; they tried to press his ribs straight through his spine.
"Take me instead!" Lucien roared, his face jammed sideways against the freezing metal grating. He could hear his own Vanguard armor cracking under the localized gravity field, every breath leaving his throat in a ragged, pathetic hiss.
He locked his silver eyes on the ceiling speakers.
"You want high quality biological keys? My blood is pure! Use me to power the terminal and let the girl go!"
"Request denied," the ship's automated voice responded from the walls, its mechanical tone completely smooth and empty. "Biological makeup of secondary specimen is mathematically insufficient for primary processing. Extraction protocol of Core Seed must proceed."
Inside the glass isolation tube, the thick, white paralytic gas had already risen past Elara's waist. Her legs were completely numb, turning into dead weights that sent her sliding down the cold glass wall.
