The lever, smooth and cold against her palm, clicked free. Bexari’s fingers flexed, then slammed it down. A guttural groan ripped through the skiff’s frame as the spark-core disengaged, plunging them into an abrupt void. No hum of propulsion, no thrum of repulsor-lifts. Just the whine of dying hydraulics and the shriek of metal-on-metal as the skiff slid on its remaining momentum, a dead weight hurtling toward the rapidly sealing blast door. Then, a roar. Not from the engine, but from the core itself. Dumped into the forward injector chute, the unstable sphere of pure energy began to oscillate wildly, a contained sun threatening to burst. Taze screamed, a high, thin sound lost beneath the rising crescendo of volatile plasma. “Brace!” Bexari yelled, her voice raw, as Raxen’s bloody hand gripped the edge of the cockpit with white-knuckled desperation. He didn't look at her, his gaze locked on the closing maw of the blast door, now less than a foot wide. A blinding flash of white light consumed everything. The skiff shuddered, a bone-rattling tremor that vibrated through her ribs. A concussive wave slammed into them, flat-lining her ears, stealing her breath. She tasted copper and ozone. Her head snapped back against the rest, vision blurring with a kaleidoscope of green and orange. Then, darkness. She was flying. Tumbling. The world spun, a dizzying blur of corroded steel beams and fractured concrete. The skiff, now a twisted wreck, was propelled by the raw force of the explosion. It wasn’t a controlled flight; it was a projectile. She heard the distant, muffled *CRUMP* of the pursuing ships being vaporized behind them, an afterthought in the maelstrom. The skiff slammed into something unyielding, a deafening screech of ripping metal. Bexari’s world went black again, briefly, before jolting back into a chaotic, spinning mess. Airbags deployed, smelling of acrid dust. The skiff bounced, skittered, and then finally ground to a halt with a final, shuddering groan. Dead air hung in the cabin, save for the rush of blood through her temples. “Taze?” she rasped, her voice thick with dust and fear. She tried to move, but her limbs felt like lead. The cockpit was a mess of sparking wires and pulverized composites. The air was thick with smoke. “Bexari…” Taze’s voice, small and tremulous, came from behind her, barely a whisper. “We’re… we’re out.” Bexari forced her eyes open, blinking away the dust and grit. She tore at her safety harness, her movements clumsy and stiff. Bile scalded her throat as she finally freed herself, her gaze sweeping over the wreckage. The front of the skiff was obliterated, a jagged maw of twisted metal. The under-vents were gone, replaced by a vast, open space. She crawled over the ruined console, peering through the fractured viewscreen. The view pinned her breath to her ribs. They hadn’t just escaped. They had crashed. Right into the Kymari Paddock’s main arena. During the season finale broadcast. Blinding holo-lights washed over the skiff’s twisted remains. The roar of a stadium crowd, once a distant echo in the under-vents, hammered down like falling girders. Thousands of faces, rendered in perfect, high-definition clarity on the giant display screens above, stared down at their mangled vessel. And then, a close-up. Her face, grimy and streaked with blood and oil, staring back from the colossal screens, next to Raxen’s pale, sweat-soaked profile. His eyes were closed, his head lolling against the broken headrest, a jagged shard of composite embedded just above his collarbone. Taze, still huddled in the rear, looked like a frightened rabbit caught in a predator’s glare. “We’re on every channel,” Taze whimpered, his voice barely audible above the rising murmur of the crowd. “The whole sector… they’re watching.” Bexari didn’t need him to tell her. The cameras, dozens of them, were swiveling, zooming in, capturing every angle of their raw, exposed vulnerability. Their battered, bloodied forms, emerging from a skiff that looked like it had been through a shredder. The feral glint in her eyes, the under-city grime clinging to her skin. There was no hiding now. No more acting. No more lies. A figure, tall and imposing, strode purposefully onto the track, his expensive cerulean robes stark against the pristine white of the arena floor. Lord Vorian, patriarch of the syndicate, carried a face of cold, unbridled fury. He moved with the predatory grace of a man who commanded legions, his gaze fixed solely on Bexari. He stopped a few yards from their wrecked skiff, his voice amplified by the arena’s broadcast system, cutting through the hush that had fallen over the crowd. “You, girl. You thought you could make a mockery of my house? Of my son? You thought you could steal a Vaylor’s name and walk among the elite?” His voice dripped with pure disdain. “You are a worthless street-rat. A gutter-scab who defiled what little honor the Vaylor name had left. You stole elite property, and for that, you will pay the ultimate price.” His hand moved to his hip, drawing a sleek, obsidian energy pistol. The crowd gasped, a collective intake of breath. This wasn’t a threat; it was a sentence, delivered without ceremony, on live holo-cam, for the entire sector to witness. Bexari flinched, not from fear for herself, but from the stark, unvarnished truth of his words. She was a fraud. She had stolen. She had put Taze in danger. This was it. The redline. The end of the line. Just as Lord Vorian raised the pistol, Raxen stirred. With a grunt of pain, he pushed himself upright, his jaw tight, his eyes blazing. He ignored the blood trickling down his neck, ignored the pain that must have been searing through his shrapnel-riddled body. He stumbled out of the ruined skiff, his movements stiff, but his resolve unshakable. He placed himself directly between Bexari and his father, his broad back a shield. Vorian froze, the pistol wavering. “Raxen. Get out of the way. This street-spawn isn’t worth your protection.” “She is,” Raxen said, his voice surprisingly steady, though hoarse from exertion. His gaze, usually so full of careless charm, was now burning with an intensity Bexari had never seen, an untamed, possessive fire. He looked at her, his eyes locking onto hers, blotting out the howling amphitheater. Then, he looked back at Vorian, his voice ringing out, clear and defiant, for all of Zetharis to hear. “As heir of this bloodline, I, Raxen Kordax Ventorx, formally invoke the Rite of Binding. I declare my intent to take this woman, Bexari, as my wedded spouse, under the full protection of syndicate law.” The arena erupted. Gasps, shouts, the sudden, frantic chattering of commentators. A shock wave of disbelief hit Bexari, making her vision swim. A marriage? Now? In front of everyone? This wasn’t just a stunt. This was a direct challenge to the clan leader, a legal maneuver that would render her untouchable by syndicate assassination laws. Lord Vorian’s face contorted, a mask of aristocratic rage. He stared at his son, then at Bexari, his eyes narrowing to slits of pure venom. “A marriage of convenience won’t save her from the final race, boy.”

Heart Rates and Spark-Cores