40

Burnt peanut oil and welding ozone hung heavy in the underground artisan district.

Slanted, cracked pavement made the walk toward the shop difficult. Caleb anchored his left hand to the canvas duffel strap, letting his bruised right arm hang stiff against his ribs. Half a step behind him, Kikaru’s heavy carbon-fiber brace clicked a sharp, demanding rhythm against the concrete.

A glowing blue notification chimed on the cracked glass of Caleb’s visor module.

[PUBLIC SPONSOR BID: G-CORP] [OFFER: 15,000 CREDITS FOR CHEST LOGO PLACEMENT]

Lifting a taped thumb to accept the contract, he watched the blue text vanish.

A heavy red stamp slammed across the glass.

[BID DECLINED BY PRIMARY STREAM-RIGHTS HOLDER]

The sudden halt earned him a shoulder-check from a passing scrap-hauler. A dull ache ground into the bruised joint, but Caleb kept his boots planted, locking his eyes on the module. Another sponsor offer from Apex Munitions pushed through the algorithm, only to be crushed by the red stamp a fraction of a second later.

Vibrant purple code rippled across the screen, overwriting the military grid entirely.

[??? : They want to put cheap logos on your chest. You only wear my marks.]

The encrypted text pulsed with a soft, neon glow.

[??? : Buy her best armor. Put it on my tab. Eat a real lunch today.]

Grinding his teeth together, Caleb swiped the screen dead. The purple glow lingered under the scratched glass for a fraction of a second, leaving a stark reminder of his leash.

Pushing through the heavy iron doors of Tali’s workshop revealed a chaotic canyon of dismantled artillery plating and exposed wire. Blue sparks rained down from a suspended chassis. Straddling a massive kinetic drive engine, Tali dragged a heavy blowtorch across a severed joint. Grease smudged her forehead, catching the pink hair escaping her zip-tie knot. A massive pink gum bubble grew between her lips, popping loudly over the screech of the torch.

Killing the flame, Tali flipped her protective mask up. Her dark eyes tracked the fading purple light on Caleb’s wrist module. She tapped her heavy iron wrench against the engine block.

"Your ghost is running a firewall block on your incoming bids," Tali noted, hopping off the engine to wipe her hands on a filthy rag. "I saw G-Corp try to buy your chest plate. Got swatted down in three milliseconds. Must be nice having a billionaire guard dog."

"She is suffocating his revenue stream," Kikaru said, stepping into the shop and folding her arms over her pristine gray academy jacket. "It is a violation of the broadcast contract."

Leaning her hips against a scarred workbench, Tali eyed Kikaru’s tailored uniform before looking at Caleb.

"Who brought the corporate doll into my grease pit?"

Dropping his canvas duffel bag onto the metal floor, Caleb unfastened his combat belt. "She monitors my metrics. Temporary assignment."

He laid the heavy belt on the counter. Kikaru stood near a rack of rusted plasma rifles, maintaining three feet of clearance from the grease-stained displays.

"Are we going to talk about the motel," Caleb asked.

Kikaru’s spine snapped into perfect academy alignment. Blood rushed to her pale cheeks. Glancing at the open doorway of the shop, she lowered her voice to a thin whisper.

"We experienced lethal adrenaline exposure. I inhaled toxic exhaust. Having too much of that cheap synthetic alcohol on an empty stomach created an environmental lapse in judgment." Staring fixedly at a pile of scrap metal, she gripped her own elbows. "It never happened."

Letting the memory of her kneeling on the cheap carpet hang between them, Caleb rested his good shoulder against the workbench.

"Environmental lapse," Caleb repeated, his voice carrying a dry, practical weight. "Understood."

Tali blew another bubble. "If you two are done diagnosing your environmental lapses, I need him to strip."

Spinning around, Kikaru marched toward the far corner of the shop, presenting her back to the fitting platform.

Pulling off the canvas jacket sent a fresh wave of throbbing heat through his collarbone. Unzipping the dark-gray ballistic undersuit released a faint static hiss as the synthetic lining detached from his skin. Dragging the heavy fabric down his arms left him standing in standard-issue compression briefs. Harsh utility lights exposed the jagged scar tracking down his sternum and the deep, mottled bruising wrapped entirely around his neck.

Stepping onto the metal platform, Tali pressed her bare, calloused hands directly against his bruised shoulder. Her fingers traced the edge of the sealed laceration with clinical, tactile confidence.

"You ruined my custom weave," she diagnosed, running her hands down his ribs to press her thumbs into the muscle. "Mimic impact. Acid scoring on the left flank. Complete collar seal failure. The shoulder support is shattered."

Grabbing her diagnostic datapad off the bench, she plugged a thick cable into the port at the base of the discarded suit.

"You know, Rank C is where life gets interesting, Mercer." Stepping closer, she checked a node near his hip before flicking her eyes up to his face. "You get access to the restricted boards. Better payouts. Private rooms with actual locks on the doors. Hit Rank C, hire a personal armorer, and I’ll calibrate your hardware off the clock. Just the two of us."

She tapped her wrench against her palm, offering a quick, lopsided smile.

Caleb held his ground. "Fix the gear first. Then we talk about the private rooms."

The heavy iron doors of the shop shrieked open.

Sweat dripped from Elara’s dark hair in wet strips as the First Division commander marched inside. Carrying a cracked plasma rifle by the barrel, she tossed the ruined weapon onto a metal crate. It hit the steel with a deafening clatter.

"The standard military servos are complete garbage, Tali," Elara barked, stripping off her scarred leather jacket. "The neural feedback looped twice on the firing line. You’re the only mechanic in this sector who knows how to strip the factory limiters without frying my spine."

Spinning around from the corner, Kikaru dropped her arms. Her jaw parted, eyes widening as she stared at the newcomer.

"Captain Elara," Kikaru breathed, taking a hesitant step forward. "That inverted phase-strike during the platform breach... watching the clip six times barely did it justice. It was incredible."

Wiping the sweat from her eyes, Elara looked at the polished recruit, throwing a tired glance at Caleb right after.

"It was messy," Elara said. "Good to see you alive, Mitsurugi. Keep your center of gravity lower next time."

Kikaru nodded frantically, a bright smile breaking across her face.

Grabbing a shop rag, Elara walked over to the fitting platform and tossed the cloth at Caleb’s bare chest. "You look terrible. Put a shirt on before you bleed on the floor."

"I heal fast," Caleb said, catching the rag.

"You haul junk fast," Elara corrected, leaning against the workbench. She looked at Kikaru. "He used to drop engine blocks on his own feet in the scrap yards. I had to drag him to the med-tents twice a week. Don’t let his stoic routine fool you. He’s an idiot."

Kikaru looked back and forth between the commander and the scrubber. "You grew up together."

"Unfortunately," Elara said.

A harsh, dissonant error code chimed from Tali’s datapad.

The mechanic pulled the screen closer, her brow furrowing. "This telemetry is corrupted. The internal heat bloom is off the charts."

A cold cramp twisted behind Caleb’s sternum. Forcing a slow, even breath through his nose kept his posture relaxed.

"Look at this timestamp," Tali said, turning the glass screen toward Elara. "The suit logged the kinetic impact on his shoulder zero-point-two seconds after his bones took the hit. The reactive fibers fire prior to impact. The suit missed the blade. He took it." 𝕗𝗿𝕖𝐞𝐰𝗲𝕓𝐧𝕠𝕧𝗲𝐥.𝚌𝐨𝚖

"Cheap gear," Caleb offered, his tone completely flat. "The sensors lag when the wiring gets smashed. Hard work and a bad connection."

Tali glared at him. "Do not insult my craftsmanship, scrubber. Cheap gear glitches randomly. This is a consistent gap." She blew a pink bubble, letting it pop loudly. "Whatever. It’s your funeral. I’m just telling you, your heart rate flatlined for three full seconds and then spiked to two hundred beats a minute without a stimulant injection."

Stepping closer to the platform, Kikaru studied the scrolling data. "Acting Captain Iris requested an anomaly review for a reason. If biology is misfiring the hardware, he compromises our flank."

Reaching out, Elara grabbed the datapad from Tali’s hands.

Scanning the numbers, she looked at the deep scar on Caleb’s chest. A swift swipe of her thumb across the glass erased the active log.

Tali slammed her wrench onto the workbench. "Hey! That is my diagnostic data, Captain. You don’t just wipe a private terminal because you have a shiny badge. I bill by the gigabyte for that telemetry."

Stepping directly into the mechanic’s space, Elara held the pad out. "It’s a corrupted file. I’m saving you the storage space. Bill it to my tab."

Tali glared her down, chewing her gum aggressively before finally backing off.

"He is not seventeen," Elara said to Kikaru, her voice carrying the cold weight of the firing line. "The military built sync tech around teenagers. His nervous system is adapting late. It forces a feedback loop in the biometric nodes. The lag is a biological misfire, not a conspiracy."

Snatching the pad back, Tali crossed her arms. "Fine. But you need to get better at controlling your sync rate spikes, Mercer. Unless replacing thousands of credits worth of burnt wiring is your favorite hobby."

Letting out a slow breath, Caleb pulled a clean gray undershirt from his duffel bag and shoved it over his head.

"We need to identify the ghost," Caleb said, looking at Elara. "She knows my combat history. She knows the disposal yards. Who do we know with a green streak in her hair?"

Elara leaned her hip against the counter. "Half the scrap-rats in Sector Four dyed their hair. We ran with a hundred different scavengers before the draft. It could be a mechanic. A black-market broker. Someone from the old hauling crew who made enough money to buy a server farm."

"She has access to an SSS-Rank operator," Kikaru pointed out. "A street scavenger does not command black-ops ghosts."

"She does," Caleb said.

Walking over to a heavy steel storage locker, Tali punched a code into the keypad and swung the doors open. Hauling out a dark canvas harness lined with thick, white ceramic plates, she dropped the heavy rig onto the counter.

"A Break-Tab Harness," Tali explained. "I pulled the design from heavy demolition crews. The ceramic plates sit directly over your collarbone and ribs. They take the kinetic shear of a massive strike and shatter, redirecting the force away from your joints. Break a tab, buy a replacement."

Running a taped thumb over the thick ceramic, Caleb assessed the crude angles. It lacked the sleek mobility of elite assault armor, built instead for raw, blunt survival.

"How much," Caleb asked.

The blue module on his wrist chimed loudly. Vibrant purple text overwrote the glass.

[FUNDS TRANSFERRED: 12,000 CREDITS. TRANSACTION COMPLETE.]

His thumb hammered the manual override button on his gauntlet, fighting to cancel the routing order. The screen locked, a tiny padlock icon blinking in the corner of the glass.

[??? : I told you to put it on my tab. Do not fight me when I take care of you.]

Checking her own terminal, Tali raised an eyebrow. "Payment cleared. Your billionaire works fast."

Twelve thousand credits settled like lead in his stomach. His taped fingers closed around the thick canvas of the harness, hauling it off the steel counter.

Leaning over her workbench, Tali stared at a secondary monitor buried under a pile of rusted tools. The screen displayed the deep-encrypted raw data pulled from Caleb’s suit before Elara erased the surface log.

"Mercer," Tali murmured. Her eyes remained locked on the monitor, completely ignoring the gum in her mouth. Tapping a line of code buried in the heat bloom metrics, she lowered her voice. "Your suit experienced more than a lag. Something inside your chest tried to eat the lithium battery."