Chapter 26: — "Project Escape.ƎXƎ: Part 3 — Through the Vireo Veins"

The car shot into the tunnel like a bullet, the tires screeching against the concrete as the walls blurred past us. The lights flickered, some shattered completely from the shockwave of the chase outside, and the echo of the engine filled every inch of the tunnel.

Kaito gripped the wheel like he was about to strangle it, teeth clenched, sweat dripping down his temple. The car’s engine was coughing, black smoke rising from the vents.

Rin slammed her palm on the dashboard and shouted over the noise, “Booster’s overheating! We can’t keep this pace for long!”

I glanced out the side window, rows of cameras lined the walls, tiny red dots blinking to life one by one.

Then came the turrets. Small mechanical arms folded out from the corners, sensors scanning as we passed.

My heart dropped. “Kaito…” I whispered. “Those aren’t normal tunnel systems—”

And then I saw it. Painted right on the concrete wall, half covered by grime and flickering light, 
the Syntrix Umbra logo.

My breath hitched. “Oh, no… no, no, no. The tunnel, It’s one of theirs!”

Kaito’s eyes widened, rage flooding his face. “SINCE WHEN DID THE VIREO TUNNEL GET TAKEN OVER BY THE DAMN COMPANY?!” he bellowed, slamming the steering wheel hard enough to make the car jolt.

Rin cursed under her breath. “Great. Just great. Because this day wasn’t already a damn nightmare.”

I panicked, twisting around in my seat as more lights behind us turned blood-red. “They’re activating every sensor, every camera... what if they’re—”

A loud BEEP cut me off.
The car’s system started flashing warnings across the dashboard.

“Tracking,” Rin muttered grimly, tapping the display. “They’ve got us locked in.”

My pulse hammered. The air felt heavy, mechanical, like the tunnel itself was watching us.

Kaito growled, “Let them watch. We’ll give them a show.”

And just like that, he slammed the accelerator again, and drove deeper into the tunnel to try and find an exit.

But the tunnel eventually split into three paths up ahead, left, right, and middle, each one disappearing into dark steel corridors lit by flickering red lights. Kaito slammed the brakes just enough to keep control.

“Left!” Rin shouted, already half leaning forward in her seat.

“Right’s only right,” Kaito countered, gripping the wheel tighter.

I stared at the tunnels, a strange static buzzing in my head. That familiar prickle, not a full vision, but something close. My pulse spiked. “No… middle. Go middle.”

Kaito hesitated for half a second, long enough for me to see his eyes flick toward me. He didn’t ask why. He didn’t have to. He knew.

Then he gritted his teeth. “Middle it is!”

He swerved into the center tunnel, tires screaming against the metal floor, and the moment we cleared the fork, twin explosions ripped through the air behind us.
The left and right tunnels collapsed inward, filling the air with dust and fire.

If we’d taken either… we’d be gone.

Rin blinked at the debris in the mirrors, her mouth hanging open. “You’ve got to be kidding me.”
Kaito gave me a quick, sharp look, somewhere between impressed and unnerved. “Remind me never to doubt your weird gut again.”

I didn’t even know what to say. My heart was racing, my palms sweaty. It wasn’t a full futuregaze, but it felt like one. Just quicker. Sharper. Instinct.

Rin glanced sideways at me, her tone low but edged. “You keep pulling stuff like that, and I’m gonna start thinking you’re not exactly normal, Yuzuki.”

I didn’t answer. I couldn’t. Because deep down, I was starting to think the same thing.

The car finally slowed.

For the first time since we’d dived into this nightmare, Kaito wasn’t flooring it. The engine hummed low, coughing now and then, and the tunnel lights flickered like dying stars. Condensation dripped down the metal walls, slow, steady. Too quiet.

Rin leaned back with a shaky exhale, her blaster resting across her lap. She tore a piece of fabric from her sleeve and started wrapping her shoulder where one of the earlier fights had grazed her.
Kaito gripped the wheel, knuckles white, blood streaked across his cheek. He muttered something I couldn’t catch, probably another curse.

I just stared at my hands. They were trembling. Again.

The dried streaks of sweat and smoke made them look almost foreign, like they belonged to someone else. Someone colder. Stronger.

The silence pressed down on us. None of us wanted to break it, but it was unbearable.

Rin finally spoke, her voice rough. “You ever get tired of saving our asses, Kaito?”

He gave a short, dry laugh, not even looking at her. “You ever get tired of needing it?”

Rin scoffed and looked away, hiding the hint of a smirk.

I rolled my eyes, pretending I didn’t find it funny. The truth was, that stupid banter was the only thing keeping the fear from eating me alive.

—

The tunnel opened up ahead, straight into another damn blockade.
Armored vehicles lined the road, guards crouched behind them with rifles raised, and a swarm of mini-drones hovered overhead. The exit was right behind them, but so were more guards closing in fast.

We were surrounded.
This time… for real.

One of the guards shouted through a megaphone, voice sharp and cold.

“HANDS IN THE AIR AND STEP OUT OF THE VEHICLE!”

For a second, none of us moved. Then Kaito slowly raised his hands from the wheel, and I followed, my pulse hammering in my ears.

Even he looked defeated, his usual crazy confidence gone. I’d never seen him like that before.

It was over.

Or… it should’ve been.

That’s when I noticed Rin. She wasn’t moving her hands up. 
She was reaching down. Subtle. Slow. Toward her jacket pocket.

I hissed at her under my breath.

“What are you doing!?”

She didn’t answer. Instead, she yanked something small and round from her pocket and chucked it out the side window.

Kaito finally snapped.

“WHAT THE HELL DID YOU JUST—”

And then it went off.

A deafening BANG! exploded through the tunnel, followed by a blinding white flash that washed everything out. The guards screamed, the drones sparked and dropped, and for a second, the world turned into pure noise.

“DON’T THINK!” Rin yelled. “JUST DRIVE!”

Kaito slammed the gearstick forward, flooring it.

Bullets ricocheted off the car’s rear armor as he rammed one of the smaller vehicles blocking the path. Metal screamed, sparks flew, and somehow, by sheer force or luck, the car shoved the obstacle aside.

We burst through the gap.

Smoke filled the tunnel behind us. My ears rang, my head spun, but I was still breathing.
Barely.

“The car’s… it’s dying,” I managed, staring at the warning lights flickering red across the dashboard. Smoke was leaking from under the hood.

Kaito didn’t answer. He just kept driving, jaw locked, eyes burning holes through the road ahead.

After a few seconds, he muttered without looking back, 

“What the hell did you do, Rin?”

Rin let out a shaky laugh. “Hell if I know. I just… found a stun grenade in my pocket.”

Kaito barked something between a laugh and a groan. “You’re insane.”

“Worked, didn’t it?” she shot back.

Before he could argue, another alarm blared, drones reappearing behind us, lights flashing red.

Rin and I scrambled for our blasters again, leaning out to shoot while Kaito steered through the last stretch of the tunnel. The air was thick with dust and echoes of gunfire, until suddenly, sunlight burst through the windshield.

We were out.

The car roared out of the tunnel, back into the chaos of Lysithea City.
Home, or something like it.

Behind us, the road stayed empty. The guard vehicles had stopped following.

Only the last few drones were still on our tail, buzzing like angry hornets.

Rin leaned halfway out the window and blasted one out of the air. I took aim at another, hit it clean. The last one exploded in a flash of sparks and smoke, scattering its pieces across the freeway.

Then… silence.

No guards. No drones. No alarms.

Just peace.

Finally.

Kaito kept driving, gripping the steering wheel tight as if it might fall apart in his hands. The car was rattling, coughing smoke every few seconds, the poor thing barely holding together.

Rin slumped in her seat, rubbing her temples. I leaned my head against the cold window, breathing out shakily. For the first time since this nightmare started, there was nothing chasing us. Nothing trying to kill us.

Kaito tapped at the built-in GPS, setting the route toward home.

“We’re heading back to my place,” he muttered. “We’ll regroup. Figure out who the hell is behind all this.”

Nobody answered. We didn’t have the energy to.

The next few minutes were dead quiet, only the hum of the engine and the sound of the road beneath us.

Until Kaito finally spoke up.

“Yuzuki,” he said, voice low but firm. “The forcefield. How the hell did you do that?”

My stomach dropped.

I froze, gripping my blaster tighter.

“I… I don’t know,” I said quickly. “It just… happened.”

It was a lie. And from the corner of my eye, I could see Rin’s expression shift, annoyance mixed with disbelief.

“You always say that,” Rin snapped, turning to glare at me. “Every damn time something weird happens, you go all ‘I dunno’! Well, maybe you should start knowing!”

I glared back, heat rising in my chest. “Maybe I would if you stopped yelling at me every time something weird happens!”

Kaito slammed his hand against the steering wheel, shouting over both of us.

“ENOUGH!”

The car fell silent again. My pulse was still racing, but I didn’t say another word.

None of us did.

After a long stretch of road, Kaito sighed and muttered something under his breath, too quiet for me to hear. It was almost like he’d already forgotten what he’d asked.

That alone made me exhale in quiet relief.

But Rin… she kept sneaking glances at me, suspicious ones. Like she knew there was something I wasn’t saying.

And Kaito, though he said nothing, kept that same sharp look in the rearview mirror, thoughtful, tired, but still curious. 

The city lights stretched on forever, glowing across the windshield. The company car looked ready to die at any moment, sparks occasionally flickering from under the hood.

Still, Kaito drove.

And I sat there, clutching my hands together, silently praying the car wouldn’t give up before we made it home.