Neon-lit rain refracted the billboard's glitches into shattered kaleidoscopes. Ayla stepped over crushed Wolf in the Thorns fragments, her soles sticky with Selene's fluorescent sabotage. Max jammed an EMP device into a hydrant port, plunging the block into darkness—except the billboard's malfunctioning half-face ad winking eerily.
"Psycho aesthetes." He bit off an EMP grenade's pin. "Even vandalism needs Monet palette precision."
Ayla wiped fluorescence from her lashes, suddenly yanked backward by a metal arm. Lucas' prosthetic eye glinted copper in shadows, gear whirring syncing with his rasp: "Step where my shadow moves—thermal sensors still 37% functional."
They slid along walls into the glitch zone, hologram remnants exploding into pixel fireworks behind. When trackers swept past, Lucas' spinal implant overheated, searing Ayla's palm against his chest. Two heartbeats clashed—his mechanical pump at 120 bpm, hers threatening to burst through ribs.
"Down!" Lucas shoved her into the billboard's alcove. The rebooted projector engulfed them in neon data streams, his eye projecting holograms: fifteen-year-old him chained in Odile's lab, charcoal scratching wolves and girls fleeing storms onto walls.
"Didn't know then..." His Adam's apple brushed her ear, coolant-scented breath warming her neck. "...gypsum dust on lashes outshines diamonds."
Footsteps closed in. Ayla gripped his decaying left wrist—oozing cerulean mucus from implant cracks. When their blood hit the billboard's circuits, the glitch switched to live feed: Selene polishing her wedding ring, its inner laser scorching coordinates into Ayla's sculptures.
"Eyes shut." Lucas pressed her palm to his spinal port. Metal vibrations synced with her pulse as the billboard detonated light. Pursuers collapsed as they spun through data streams like dying stardust tango.
In a convenience store restroom, Ayla rinsed wounds. The mirror revealed micro engravings from Lucas' metal fingernail: "You eclipse all my programming errors." UV light exposed bioluminescent ink below—underground network sigils.
At 3:07 AM, Max found them at the recycling plant. He tossed hologram tickets with licorice-stained fingers: "Underground synth concert. Vocalist wants you fixing his vocal coils." The back bore Lucas' charcoal sketches, wolf ears hiding nano-scale biocodes matching every slum sculpture.