Dallas brings his revolver down on the exposed transmitter, hammering the sparking housing again. The red pulse jerks, stutters, then surges brighter through the cracked monument.

Professor Dayton bolts toward the trees, his coat snapping behind him. Murderbone lunges one way, then the other, caught between the fleeing man and the sizzling wreck in Dallas's hands.

A sharp click answers from inside the stone. The hidden mechanism shudders loose, and a narrow service door springs open at the monument base, vomiting dust and red light.

Dallas drives the barrel into the wiring cluster and snaps the last visible lead. The pulse collapses to a weak blink, and smoke curls out across the battlefield grass.

Dayton keeps running, but his escape path is no longer clean. Murderbone plants himself at Dallas's side, snarling toward the tree line while the monument coughs and clicks like a wounded machine.

Dallas bursts past the shattered monument, coat snapping behind him as he cuts straight for the tree line. Dayton is still in the open, and the distance between them shrinks with every stride.

Murderbone surges up on Dallas’s flank, angling to box the professor in. The hillside grass whips around their boots, and the weak red blink from the monument flashes at their backs.

Dallas closes the gap and reaches the edge of the brush first, forcing Dayton to skid sideways instead of vanishing into cover.

Dayton stumbles to a stop under the bare branches, breathing hard, his escape cut off by Dallas in front and the dog at his heel.

Behind them, the monument gives one sharp mechanical click, like a latch setting somewhere deep under the hill, and Dayton flinches toward the sound.