The elevator doors slid open on the Hangar Deck.
The air smelled different today. It didn't smell like grease and ozone. It smelled clean.
The heavy air scrubbers, dormant for years, were humming at full power. The reactor was green.
Marcus stepped out of the Spire lift.
He wasn't covered in soot anymore. The Boatman's physician had washed the radioactive ash from his skin. He wore a heavy, dark blue naval officer's coat over his scavenged armor, its brass buttons polished dull.
He looked like a Captain.
And behind him walked a Dreadnought.
Narcissus stepped out of the elevator.
CLANG. HISS.
His new right leg—built from heavy battleship anchor-chains and hydraulic pistons—whined smoothly. He was wider, heavier, and wrapped in thick, riveted steel plating.
The golden Sentinel was gone. The Iron Dog was born.
They walked toward the barricade of the safe house.
Marcia was waiting. She leaned against a stack of crates, her shotgun resting on her shoulder. Decimus stood beside her, his spear grounded.
Marcia looked at Marcus's clean coat. She looked at the massive, terrifying frame of Narcissus.
"You went upstairs a grease monkey," Marcia said, a slow smile spreading across her scarred face. "And you came down an Admiral."
"The Warlord is dead," Marcus said softly. "The King of Rust gave us the keys."
"The Boatman?" Decimus asked, his eyes wide. "He surrendered the ship?"
"He didn't surrender," Marcus said. "We formed a corporation. We're co-CEOs of a floating fortress."
"Good," Marcia racked her shotgun. "Because your new employees are currently trying to lynch our HR department."
She pointed her chin toward the neon-lit market canal of Hangar 2.
A low, ugly roar was echoing through the massive cavern.
"They found out," Marcia said. "Word spread that the Warlord fixed the reactor. And then word spread that the Warlord is harboring a Board Executive."
Marcus looked at the safe house door.
Lucilla stood there. She was pale, the white bandage stark against her bruised forehead. She was trembling, but she wasn't hiding.
"They want her," Marcia said. "Alistair is whipping them into a frenzy. There are five thousand scavengers on this ship. If they rush us, Narcissus can't kill them all before they tear her apart."
Marcus looked at the neon glow of the market. He listened to the chanting.
Blood! Blood! Blood!
"They don't want blood," Marcus said. "They want justice. And justice is expensive."
He turned to Lucilla.
"Walk with me," Marcus commanded.
Lucilla flinched. "Out there? They'll kill me."
"If you hide, you are prey," Marcus said, his voice hard. "If you walk with me, you are the Legion. Come."
He didn't wait. He started walking toward the roar.
Narcissus fell in behind him.
CLANG. HISS.
Marcia and Decimus flanked them.
Lucilla took a deep breath. She stepped out of the safe house and followed the Warlord into the lion's den.
They entered the market.
It was a sea of angry faces. Thousands of scavengers packed the steel deck, standing on crates, hanging from the rusted scaffolding of old fighter jets.
The flickering neon signs—red, blue, sickly green—cast harsh shadows over their gaunt features.
They held weapons. Rusted pipes, sharpened rebar, scavenged laser-cutters.
In the center of the mob, standing on the wing of a gutted F-35, was Alistair.
The burned merchant raised a heavy, pneumatic harpoon gun. He pointed it directly at Lucilla.
"There she is!" Alistair screamed. His voice cracked with rage. "The Butcher of Sector 4!"
The crowd surged forward. A wave of bodies pressing against the invisible wall of Marcus's presence.
Narcissus stepped up. He didn't raise his massive cannon. He just crossed his arms.
The crowd stopped. They feared the iron giant.
"The Warlord sold us out!" Alistair yelled, pacing the jet wing. "He fixed the heart, but he poisoned the blood! He brings Board scum into our home!"
"Kill her!" a woman screamed from the back. "Throw her in the Styx!"
Marcus walked forward.
He didn't draw a weapon. He didn't activate his energy shield.
He stopped ten feet from Alistair.
He looked up at the harpoon gun. The tip of the spear was jagged and rusty.
"You pull that trigger," Marcus projected his voice, letting it carry over the noise of the hangar, "and my Warlord dies. My giant dies. My General dies."
He pointed to Marcia, Narcissus, and Decimus.
"And then," Marcus said coldly, "the reactor stops. Because I am the only one who can keep the code stable."
The crowd quieted. The threat of the reactor was real. They had all felt the heat of the near-meltdown.
"I lost my family!" Alistair cried, the harpoon shaking in his hands. "She ordered the glassing of New Milan! She owes a blood debt!"
"The Board takes lives," Marcus said, his voice dropping to a dangerous rumble. "The Legion pays its debts."
Marcus tapped his temple.
The gold lines of the Neural Link flared brilliantly, casting a warm light against the harsh neon of the market.
"JARVIS," Marcus thought. "Access the ship's internal logistics grid. Dispenser chutes."
[Accessing, Boss. Security protocols bypassed. What's the payload?]
"Not rations," Marcus thought. "Power."
He looked at Alistair.
"Blood is cheap out here," Marcus said aloud to the crowd. "It spills easily. It washes away. It doesn't build anything. It doesn't heat your homes."
Marcus raised his hand.
"Iron builds," Marcus roared. "And power rules."
He snapped his fingers.
High above the market, built into the ceiling of the massive hangar bay, hundreds of automated supply chutes groaned to life.
Normally, they dropped nutrient paste and boiled water.
Today, they dropped the economy.
CLATTER. PING. CLACK.
Thousands of small, glowing cylinders rained down onto the steel deck.
Blue capacitors. Green capacitors.
Amps.
The currency of the Styx.
They bounced off the rusted jet wings. They splashed into the sludge canal. They rolled to the feet of the angry mob.
The glow was blinding. It was more wealth than the scavengers had seen in five years.
Marcus had tapped into the newly optimized reactor's massive surplus output, charging every dead battery in the ship's armory in minutes, and dumped it on the crowd.
The mob froze.
A man with a sharpened pipe dropped his weapon. It clattered loudly on the deck.
He fell to his knees and scrambled for a glowing blue capacitor.
Then, chaos.
Not a riot of violence, but a riot of greed.
The scavengers dove for the deck. They shoved each other, scooping up handfuls of the glowing cylinders, stuffing them into their pockets, their mouths, their shirts.
The hatred evaporated, replaced by the desperate scramble for survival and heat.
Alistair didn't move. He stood on the jet wing, the harpoon gun still trembling in his hands. He looked at the fortune raining down around him, but he didn't reach for it.
He looked at Lucilla. The tears on his burned face were shiny in the neon light.
Marcus walked up to the jet wing.
He reached inside his heavy naval coat.
He pulled out a single, heavy object.
It was a Board-issue, high-density fusion battery. Solid gold casing. The one he had looted from Executive Vane's destroyed rover weeks ago.
It was worth more than the entire rain of Amps combined. It could power a city block for a year.
Marcus held it out to Alistair.
"This is not an apology," Marcus said quietly, so only Alistair could hear. "She cannot un-burn your city. She cannot bring your daughters back."
Alistair sobbed, the harpoon gun lowering slightly.
"But this," Marcus pushed the heavy gold battery against Alistair's chest, "buys a new life. It buys passage off this rust bucket. It buys a farm in the safe zones. It buys a future."
Alistair looked at the gold battery. His hands released the harpoon gun. It fell to the wing with a clatter.
He took the battery. He clutched it to his chest like a child.
Marcus stepped back.
He raised his voice again, cutting through the noise of the scrambling scavengers.
"The Butcher of Sector 4 is dead!" Marcus proclaimed. "Lucilla of the Legion lives! She is my Warlord's mechanic. She works for the ship now."
Marcus drew his combat knife. The steel flashed.
"Anyone who touches her, answers to my Warlord."
Alistair looked at Lucilla one last time. He turned and climbed down from the jet wing, disappearing into the crowd with his gold.
The mob was broken. They were busy counting their new wealth. The tension bled out of the hangar like air from a punctured tire.
Lucilla let out a breath she had been holding for ten minutes. Her knees buckled slightly.
Decimus caught her arm, steadying her.
"You bought a city with batteries," Marcia said, shaking her head. "You really are an Emperor."
Marcus sheathed his knife.
"I bought an army," Marcus corrected. "We're going to need them to fight Nero."
He turned to Decimus.
"Start mingling the Legion with the scavengers. We share rations. We share tech. We are one crew now."
Before Decimus could answer, the steel deck beneath their boots pitched violently sideways.
It wasn't a gentle roll. It was a massive, sickening lurch.
A towering stack of shipping crates near the canal toppled over, crushing a market stall. Sparks showered as the neon signs shattered simultaneously.
The crowd screamed.
A massive, deafening klaxon began to echo through the hull. Not the shift-change horn. Not the fire alarm.
BZZZZT. BZZZZT. BZZZZT.
General Quarters.
Marcus grabbed a railing to stay on his feet.
"JARVIS!" Marcus yelled, his Gold UI flaring instantly. "What hit us?!"
[Boss.] JARVIS's voice was tight with alarm.
[We didn't get hit. We just drove into a minefield.]