The air on the dock vibrated.
It wasn't the wind. It was the hum of twelve optimized throats preparing to emit a frequency designed to paralyze the human nervous system.
The Siblings stood in a phalanx at the bottom of the ramp. They were beautiful, terrifying mannequins with violet-glowing irises. They opened their mouths in perfect synchronization.
"Cover your ears!" Yoo-jin shouted.
HUMMMMM.
The sound hit them like a physical wall. It was a low C, perfectly resonant. It bypassed the eardrums and vibrated the skull.
Sol buckled, clutching her head. Luna stumbled, retching. Even Min-ji dropped her guitar case, her hands trembling uncontrollably.
It was the Siren Frequency. The command to submit.
"Stay down," Yoo-jin gritted his teeth, forcing his legs to move against the pressure. "Sae-ri! The camera!"
Sae-ri was on her knees, gasping. But she looked up. She saw a Zenith cameraman—one of the press crew—cowering behind a crate.
She didn't crawl away. She crawled toward him.
She grabbed the man's collar. She slapped him.
"Focus!" Sae-ri screamed over the hum. "Do you call yourself a professional?"
The cameraman blinked, stunned. "What?"
"The lighting is terrible, but the drama is gold!" Sae-ri yanked the heavy 8K camera from his shoulder. "If you won't shoot it, I will."
She hoisted the camera. The red REC light blinked on.
Sae-ri didn't feel the fear anymore. She felt the framing. She adjusted the ISO. She zoomed in on Sol, who was trying to stand up against the sound wave.
"Scene Four," Sae-ri narrated into the onboard mic, her voice fierce. "The Underdogs fight back."
She turned to Yoo-jin. "Director! Action!"
Yoo-jin saw the red light. He understood. This wasn't a fight; it was a pilot episode.
"Min-ji!" Yoo-jin roared. "Break the audio!"
Min-ji looked at the expensive press conference soundboard ten feet away. She couldn't walk. The vibration was too strong.
She looked at her wrench. She threw it.
It spun through the air, end over end.
CRUNCH.
The wrench embedded itself in the main mixing console. Sparks showered the dock.
The pristine, paralyzed silence shattered. The speakers popped.
The Siblings faltered. Their perfect harmony glitched into a discordant screech.
The pressure lifted.
"Now!" Sol gasped, inhaling a lungful of sea air.
She didn't sing a note. She grabbed Luna's hand. They ran at the Siblings.
"They're just trainees with fancy contacts!" Luna yelled.
It was a brawl. Sol tackled the lead Sibling, a girl with silver hair. They rolled onto the wet concrete.
The Sibling tried to sing a pacification note. Sol put her hand over the girl's mouth.
"Shut up!" Sol screamed. "This is a rock show!"
Sae-ri circled the fight, filming everything. She kept the camera steady, moving with the fluid grace of a veteran operator.
"Get the struggle," Sae-ri muttered to herself. "Don't hide the dirt. The audience needs to see the sweat."
A Zenith tactical guard lunged at her, baton raised.
"Cut!" Sae-ri yelled, swinging the heavy camera body around.
THWACK.
She smashed the lens hood into the guard's helmet. He went down.
"Bad blocking," Sae-ri stepped over him, refocusing the lens. "You were blocking my key light."
She was rewriting the genre in real-time. This wasn't a sleek K-Pop music video. This was a gritty, handheld survival drama.
Online, the view count on the hijacked feed exploded.
Yoo-jin saw the chaos. It was beautiful. It was messy. It was exactly what he wanted.
He looked up at the ship. The ramp was clear.
"Eden," Yoo-jin said.
Eden was standing still, staring at the Siblings. His "family."
"Go," Eden said, his eyes gray and sad. "I will hold the line. I need to teach them how to dance off-beat."
Yoo-jin nodded. He started running up the ramp.
The Leviathan was massive. As Yoo-jin crossed the threshold, the air changed. The humidity of the port vanished, replaced by sterile, recycled oxygen.
The interior wasn't a ship. It was a temple to technology. The walls were seamless white panels. The floor was glass. Violet light pulsed in the ceiling like a heartbeat.
"Welcome, Manager Han," the synthesized voice of Mother echoed. "You are trespassing on a sovereign vessel."
"I'm visiting a competitor," Yoo-jin said, walking fast.
"Your heart rate is 140," Mother noted. "Cortisol levels critical. You are inefficient."
"I'm angry," Yoo-jin corrected. "Where is he?"
"Mr. Gold is on the Bridge. He is waiting for the ratings to stabilize."
Yoo-jin reached a sleek elevator. There were no buttons.
"Bridge," he ordered.
"Access denied."
Yoo-jin pulled the USB drive from his pocket—the one with the stolen source code. He jammed it into the panel gap between the doors.
"So-young," Yoo-jin tapped his headset. "Override."
"On it," So-young's voice was breathless. "Give me three seconds. I'm brute-forcing the elevator logic."
One.
Two.
Three.
The violet lights turned red. The doors slid open.
Yoo-jin stepped in. The elevator shot upward.
Back on the dock, the production was escalating.
Sae-ri had climbed onto a stack of crates to get a high angle. Below her, the battle was turning.
The Siblings were physically stronger, but they were confused. They were programmed for synchronized performance, not a street fight.
Min-ji was using her guitar case as a shield. Luna was using a microphone stand as a spear.
"Keep the frame tight!" Sae-ri shouted at herself. "Capture the emotion!"
She saw David Kim hiding behind a speaker stack.
"David!" she yelled. "Get in the frame! You're the comic relief!"
"I'm the CFO!" David shouted back, dodging a flying cymbal.
"Same thing!"
Sae-ri panned the camera to the VIP section. The investors were frozen, watching the brawl with morbid fascination. They weren't looking at their phones. They were watching the reality unfolding in front of them.
Sae-ri zoomed in on a famous tech CEO in the front row. His mouth was open. He looked terrified.
"That's the money shot," Sae-ri whispered. "The elites realizing they aren't safe."
She wasn't just filming. She was constructing a narrative. The Revolution will be Televised.
Suddenly, the elevator chimed.
Yoo-jin stepped out onto the Bridge.
It was a glass dome at the top of the ship. A panoramic view of the dark ocean on one side and the chaotic, flashing lights of the Incheon docks on the other.
Mason Gold sat in a captain's chair that looked more like a throne. He was watching a wall of monitors.
He didn't turn around.
"You have a good eye for casting," Mason said. He pointed to a screen showing Sae-ri on the crate. "Turning an actress into a war correspondent. It's brilliant. The engagement numbers are higher than the Super Bowl."
Yoo-jin walked closer. He felt the phantom itch in his eyes. He wanted to see Mason's fear.
But Mason wasn't scared. He was smiling.
"Turn it off," Yoo-jin said. "The Violet Signal. The Siblings. All of it."
"Why?" Mason swiveled his chair. "Look at them, Yoo-jin."
He gestured to the monitors.
"The audience loves it. They love the violence. They love the struggle. I tried to give them peace, and they rejected it. So now, I'm giving them war."
Mason tapped a console.
"I'm not blocking your broadcast," Mason revealed. "I'm boosting it."
Yoo-jin froze.
"What?"
"You think you hijacked my signal?" Mason laughed softly. "I let you in. Because this..." He pointed to the brawl on the dock. "...This is better content than a choreographed dance."
Mason stood up. He walked to the glass wall.
"You want to be a producer, Han Yoo-jin? Then realize the truth. The conflict isn't the problem. The conflict is the product."
He looked at Yoo-jin with cold, dead eyes.
"I'm going to buy Starforce," Mason said. "Not to destroy it. But to make it the villain of my next season. The world needs a bad guy to fight against my perfect angels. You just auditioned for the role."
Yoo-jin clenched his fist. The realization hit him like a punch.
Mason wasn't trying to win the fight. He was trying to monetize it.
"We're not your villains," Yoo-jin said quietly.
"You are whatever the edit says you are," Mason shrugged. "And I own the editing room."
Yoo-jin looked at the screens. He saw Sae-ri filming. He saw Sol fighting.
He realized Mason was right. As long as they played by the rules of media—heroes, villains, ratings—Mason won.
Yoo-jin needed to break the format.
"You own the edit," Yoo-jin admitted. He walked to the main console.
"But you forgot something," Yoo-jin said.
"What?"
"We're not shooting a drama anymore," Yoo-jin grabbed the ship's PA microphone. "We're shooting a documentary."
He keyed the mic. His voice boomed across the entire ship, the docks, and the live broadcast.
"Sae-ri!" Yoo-jin shouted. "Cut!"
On the dock, Sae-ri heard him. She lowered the camera.
"Cut?" she whispered.
"Turn the camera around," Yoo-jin commanded. "Don't film the fight. Film the audience."
Sae-ri understood instantly.
She swung the camera away from the idols. She pointed it directly at the VIP section. At the investors. At the politicians sipping champagne while teenagers beat each other up.
She zoomed in.
The 8K feed projected onto the massive Jumbotron.
Suddenly, the violence wasn't the show. The indifference was the show.
The faces of the elites—bored, amused, safe—were plastered across the sky.
"Look at them," Yoo-jin's voice echoed. "They aren't watching a tragedy. They're watching a portfolio adjustment."
The crowd on the docks—the fans, the locals—turned. They stopped looking at the stage. They looked at the VIP tent.
The mood shifted instantly. The excitement turned into rage.
A bottle was thrown from the crowd. It smashed on a VIP table.
Mason's smile vanished.
"What are you doing?" Mason hissed.
"Changing the genre," Yoo-jin said, dropping the mic. "It's not a war movie anymore, Mason. It's a revolution."
Below, the barrier broke. The fans didn't rush the stage. They rushed the VIP tent.
The investors screamed. The perfect, curated event dissolved into genuine, unscripted chaos.
"Now," Yoo-jin looked at the panicked billionaire. "Let's talk about that contract."