In that instant, the Silk Worms' breaching charge blew the chamber doors apart. Kingpouge reached for his concealed plasma pistol, but Laika was faster. She didn't attack him. Instead, she lunged for the safe, her metal-reinforced jaws tearing through the biometric lock like wet paper. She grabbed the data-slate—the whole of his empire, the kill-codes, the blackmail files, the fortune—and leaped out the shattered window into the rain-slicked dark.
He turned, a flicker of annoyance crossing his scarred face. "I said heel, girl." kingpouge laika
They say she vanished into the deep tunnels, the ones that lead to the geothermal vents and the forgotten aquifers. They say she buried the data-slate under a pile of old bones and broken machine parts, where no king or worm would ever find it. And they say, on certain nights when the rain is heavy and the neon flickers, you can still see her—a one-eyed hound, free for the first time, running not toward any master, but simply away . In that instant, the Silk Worms' breaching charge
