Heat built in Jakk's chest, straining against ribs, looking for somewhere to go. His vision wavered at the edges. The Brinefurnace reef howled for fuel and release. Every instinct screamed at him to either run or burn this room to slag.
He did neither.
Instead, Jakk exhaled, long and slow, like he was about to walk into a fight in a dockside pit instead of a sanctioned execution.
His shoulders slouched. His knees loosened. His stance… fell apart.
To anyone who didn't know him, it looked like he was about to fall over.
Gin knew better.
"Oh," Gin said under his breath. "Here it comes."
Jakk let the heat slip sideways, not blasting out, but soaking into muscle and bone, making his limbs loose and dangerous. His pupils blew wide. The tiny, pale lines of old salt-crystal growth along his forearms glowed ember-deep under the Brinefurnace's blaze.
Drunken stance.
Except he'd never looked more awake.
"Alright," he told Venn. "You want to see the part of me I tried to drown? Fine."
He flexed his hands, fingers loose, wrists rolling.
Jakk tilted his head, listening to some private rhythm. Then, absurdly, he said, "Ninefold Inferno."
Venn blinked. "You named it?"
"Feels right," Jakk said. "Marren never liked theatrics."
He stepped in.
He didn't move like a trained soldier. He moved like a drunk in a storm, weight sloshing from foot to foot in ways that made no sense—until you realized that every stagger put him exactly where it was worst for Venn.
The first strike was a knee, snapping up into Venn's thigh with enough force to lift the smaller man half an inch off the floor. Heat flared at the point of contact, searing through cloth.
One.
Jakk's elbow crashed into Venn's ribs, right over bruises Gin had already carved there, heat punching through bone.
Two.
Venn wheezed, hand grabbing for Jakk's shoulder. Jakk rolled with it, letting the fingers skid off sweat-slick, overheated skin. His shoulder slammed up into Venn's chin.
Three.
He twisted, foot hooking behind Venn's ankle.
Needles bit, but this time Jakk was already flooding heat down his leg, skin too hot for the tiny glass points to bite deep. The smell of scorched skin—his and Venn's—hit the air.
Four, five, six—
Knees, elbows, fists, every hard point on Jakk's body suddenly a hammer wrapped in boiling air. The jellyfin strain trying to answer and being smothered at the same time.
Seven, eight—
Venn's guard broke. His spine arched, jellyfin glow stuttering.
Nine.
Jakk smashed his forehead into Venn's.
The crack echoed.
For a heartbeat, the world narrowed to ringing ears and sparks behind his eyes. Jakk staggered—he always took some of his own impact—but Venn went down to one knee, blinking like the room kept changing shape.
"That," Jakk panted, "was Ninefold Inferno."
Venn spat blood, swaying, half-conscious.
"Stupid name," he slurred.
He could have left it there.
But Venn was Venn.
His hand shot out, faster than it had any right to after that beating, and clamped around Jakk's side, fingers digging into the soft flesh just under his ribs.
The needles in his palm punched through scorched shirt, seeking nerve-rich skin.
Jakk's first instinct was to jerk away.
He didn't quite make it.
Lightning tore through him.
His back arched, a raw sound ripping out of him. His muscles seized, every old scar along his arms lighting up like molten wire. The Brinefurnace reef reacted on reflex, superheating the flesh where Venn touched him.
Venn screamed as his palm sizzled, the smell of cooking meat sharp and nauseating.
He didn't let go.
"See?" Venn gasped, teeth bared. "This is what it always comes down to. Not monsters. Not pirates. Not your heroic dives into jaws. It's me. The people need me. Need me to keep the balance, to work toward the common good!"
Jakk tasted copper and ozone. His legs buckled. He dropped to one knee, then the other, his weight hanging from Venn's burning hand.
"You think… this is balance?" he ground out. "This… is the common good?"
Venn's grip tightened. "I think we both crawled out of the same water," he hissed. "And only one of us accepted that burden. The other ran. Who do you think kept your Hull funded while you chased beasts and bar tabs? Who signed the requisitions that paid for your barrels, your boat, your medical patch-ups?"
Jakk wheezed, vision going gray at the edges.
His gaze flicked sideways.
Tamsin, watching with wide, terrified eyes. Rell, jaw clenched so hard a muscle ticked in his cheek, hands still raw from the shockmetal bands. Gin, slumped but stubbornly upright, bones humming under his skin.
The dead boy's face flashed up behind them—salt-slick hair, eyes open and empty. The pirates' weapons. The Hydrarchy cutter. Marren's outstretched hand.
You owe me.
Jakk had spent his whole life trying to repay that sentence.
He'd paid in blood. In burns. In beasts he'd dragged up dead and men he'd dragged back alive so they could be ground down in dry-works instead. He'd paid in years and in drinks and in the quiet hope that if he followed the rules, no other kids would be left clinging to corpses while the ocean decided who got to keep breathing.
Maybe he'd been wrong.
"I don't owe you," he rasped.
Venn snarled. "You owe all of us. Marren. The Hydrarchy. Me. We kept you alive."
Jakk forced his numb arms to move.
He'd used this choke years ago, when they'd all been smaller and the bruises hadn't gone as deep. He'd wrapped it around Venn's neck in practice until the other boy tapped out, laughing breathless and smug.
He'd never used it at full heat.