Ned tried thrashing his elbows, but the more he moved, the more pressure he released on his body, the more the threads dug deeper into his skin. It was painful—the threads on his arms, legs, and torso. But he did not show it. Instead, he focused and listened.
Hunters and the naked invaders were fighting on the stage, the hole overhead them was as wide as a lake. Gears—some rusty, others new—stopped grating each other's surface. The cave itself was a massive mechanical room, Ned assumed.
Although outnumbered, in his display (now blue, in idle mode), the fight was even. The naked figures' faces too severed and bloodied for anyone to recognize them were giving the hunters a good fight.
