The Queen Takes the Bait

Silence.

The air in Sector 28 was thick with it.

It was a cold, metallic silence, tasting of rust and ozone and the patient, predatory stillness of a trap waiting for its prey.

For thirty agonizing hours, we waited.

My true elite force, my 'Dagger' team, was hidden amongst the labyrinthine tangle of rusting, behemoth-sized pipes and shadowy metal catwalks of the industrial cavern.

Chloe was a phantom, perched on a high, dark beam, her form melting into the gloom until she was nothing more than a whisper of deeper blackness.

Fenris, my loyal Werewolf, lay coiled in the darkness, a low, barely audible growl the only sign he was even there.

Grunt, the Kobold Warlord, stood as still as a stone gargoyle in the mouth of a dark service tunnel, his new war maul, Earthshaker, resting on his shoulder.