"The difference between a protagonist and a background character? The protagonist gets a dramatic death scene. The extra just gets a line in soone else’s flashback."
***
I squeezed through the crack. Felt the rough stone scrape against my already tender ribs. The pain was sharp but clarifying. A physical anchor that kept focused on the task ahead rather than spiraling into anxiety about everything that could go wrong.
On the other side, a narrow maintenance tunnel stretched into darkness. Exactly as I’d expected from my knowledge of the novel.
The passage was maybe four feet wide and barely six feet tall. I had to duck slightly as I moved away from the crack. The air was stale but breathable. It carried the faint scent of old iron and forgotten machinery. Decades of work and sweat soaked into the very stone.
Behind , I could hear my teammates discussing their next move in urgent whispers. Their voices filtered through the narrow gap I’d just traversed.
Marcus was already pulling out his manual again. The pages rustled as he searched for protocols they could follow. So procedure that would make sense of a situation that had long since departed from anything the academy had planned for.
Thomlin was examining the crack. Probably wondering if his broader shoulders could fit through. Probably calculating whether he should follow despite my instructions.
And Seraphina...
Seraphina was silent.
But I could feel her attention like a weight against my back. Even through the stone wall between us. Those perceptive eyes. That analytical mind filing away every discrepancy for later.
She’s going to be a problem. A big problem.
But that’s a problem for future Kaelen.
Present Kaelen has enough on his plate.
I pulled out my own torch and lit it with hands that were steadier than they had any right to be. The fla caught quickly. It illuminated the rough-hewn walls around with a flickering orange glow. Shadows danced across the ancient stone like restless spirits. Retreating and advancing with each subtle movent of my hand.
The maintenance passage sloped steadily downward. The floor was uneven, scattered with small stones and the occasional rusted piece of equipnt left behind when the mine’s operation changed decades ago.
According to my ntal map of the mine’s layout, a map I’d built from scattered novel details and careful deduction, I should reach the collapse zone within fifteen minutes of walking.
Rhys and his team had been assigned to explore the deeper galleries. The areas where the most valuable ore deposits had once been extracted. The sabotage had sealed them in the worst possible location. Far from any easy exit. In passages that were already structurally compromised from years of neglect.
Every muscle in my body tensed at the thought of what I might find.
In the original novel, Rhys had survived the initial collapse but died slowly over the next several hours. Trapped under debris while his team tried desperately to dig him out. Leo had arrived too late. Found only bodies. Learned a valuable lesson about heroism and sacrifice that had absolutely nothing to do with the nobles who had engineered the disaster in the first place.
Not this ti.
Not if I can help it.
I paused about fifty feet into the maintenance tunnel. Pressed my palm against the cool stone wall. The surface was damp under my fingers. Moisture seeping through cracks I couldn’t see.
I counted to sixty in my head. Gave myself ti to think while also building the illusion I needed.
When I reached the final count, I let out a carefully modulated shout. Loud enough that my teammates would hear it through the stone. Pained enough to suggest I’d encountered trouble. But not so desperate that they’d abandon caution and squeeze through the narrow passage after .
The echo of my false cry bounced off walls and faded into the darkness ahead.
A performance for an audience I couldn’t see.
A lie to protect the bigger truth.
"I’m okay!" I called back through the crack. Let the echo distort my voice into sothing that sounded appropriately shaken. "The passage is unstable, but I think I can get through! Just... stay there! Don’t try to follow!"
Marcus’s voice ca back muffled but audible through the narrow opening. "Be careful, Leone! And docunt any structural anomalies you observe! The data could be valuable for future surveys!"
Oh, Marcus.
If only you knew how careful I’m being.
How every step, every word, every pained expression has been mapped out in advance.
How this entire exercise, the team selection, the route choices, the convenient fear that kept us moving toward this exact section of the mine, has been one long manipulation designed to bring to this exact mont.
Would you still want to docunt it? Would that make it into your precious manual?
I turned away from the crack and started down the maintenance tunnel at a faster pace. My torch threw wild shadows on the ancient walls. Each step took further from my team and closer to the mont when I’d have to drop the act entirely.
When pathetic Kaelen Leone would need to beco sothing else.
The passage curved sharply to the left after about a hundred feet. Then again to the right. Following a winding path that seed designed to confuse anyone who didn’t know where they were going.
I navigated it from mory. Counted turns and landmarks that the novel had ntioned only in passing. Until I reached a junction where three tunnels branched off in different directions.
The air here was different.
Fresher. With a faint current that suggested connection to larger chambers. And underneath that freshness, sothing else. The mineral tang of disturbed earth. The subtle vibration of recently shifted stone.
The collapse.
I was close.
Sowhere ahead, Rhys Blackwood was fighting for his life against a fate the original novel had already written for him. Against a death designed to teach Leo von Valerius a lesson about loss and heroism. A death that served no purpose except to fuel soone else’s character developnt.
And I was the only one who could rewrite that ending.
No pressure or anything.
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