The maintenance mech should not have been running.
That was the first problem.
The second was that it already was.
The cockpit lit up in layered warnings the second Ryven forced the override sequence through. Red text stacked over cracked interface glass and flickering system panels until half the display looked like it had given up and chosen panic as a design philosophy.
NON-COMBAT UNIT.
STRUCTURAL LIMIT EXCEEDED.
LOAD CAPACITY UNSAFE.
PILOT DECISIONS QUESTIONABLE.
Kael barked out a laugh the moment he saw that last one. "Even the machine thinks you're dramatic."
Ryven did not laugh. He cut three warning channels at once, rerouted the left stabilizer, and shoved power into systems the unit had absolutely not been designed to use simultaneously.
"…this machine is not rated for combat."
Kael dropped into the second harness with the ease of someone who considered impossible circumstances a personal hobby. "It walks."
"It barely walks."
"It will do."
Outside the cockpit, the district had ceased being a district. Sirens screamed from every direction at once, their pitch warping against the buildings as smoke rolled through the streets in thick, greasy bands. Emergency barriers tried to rise and kept failing because the blasts were landing too fast. Civilians ran in broken streams, some being redirected by local security, others simply following the instinct to get away from fire.
Above them, the pirate mechs descended through the smoke.
Three of them.
Black armor. No registration. Weapons already charged.
One fired.
The blast struck the street ahead of them with enough force to tear reinforced plating apart in a spray of molten debris. The shockwave hit the maintenance unit full-on, rattling every joint and slamming Kael's shoulder against the harness.
"…that looks expensive," he muttered.
Ryven's hands were already flying across failing controls. "…that is now our problem."
Three combat mechs.
One improvised maintenance unit.
Kael leaned forward, eyes bright.
"I like the odds."
Ryven turned his head just enough to level him with a look. "…you cannot be serious."
"Confidence."
"That is insanity."
"Same thing."
The pirate comm channel cracked open in a burst of static.
"Well now," a voice drawled, thick with amused contempt. "The academy sends children."
Kael keyed into the channel before Ryven could stop him.
"You're interrupting our date."
A beat of silence followed.
Then Ryven, without any visible change in expression, added, "…I apologize for him."
Kael shot him a look. "I'm charming."
"You are a problem."
The pirate on comm laughed once, then opened fire.
Ryven moved on instinct. The maintenance mech lurched sideways with all the grace of a collapsing warehouse, but it moved just enough. Plasma tore past them close enough to flood the cockpit with white light. The shot hit a transport rack behind them instead, and the secondary explosion kicked up a wall of sparks and burning fragments.
The unit landed hard. Something in the right leg shrieked in protest.
Kael's grin widened.
"Oh, this is terrible."
"You sound pleased."
"I am pleased."
"That is concerning."
"It should be."
They ducked behind the wreck of a loading carrier as another shot carved through the street, close enough that the metal beside them glowed dull orange at the edges. Inside the cockpit, everything smelled hot—burned circuitry, stale hydraulic fluid, old dust shaken loose by impact.
Ryven scanned the field in clipped, efficient sweeps.
Three targets.
Now two in front, one circling wider.
Weapons advantage: overwhelming.
Durability advantage: laughable.
Their advantage—
Kael.
Ryven exhaled once, slow, steadying his own irritation into focus.
"We separate them."
Kael glanced sideways. "…that was almost a plan."
Ryven didn't look at him. "You are not helping."
"I'm helping emotionally."
"That is not a category."
"It is now."
Ryven shoved power to the rear thrusters. The maintenance unit burst from behind cover, every joint complaining as it moved far faster than it had any right to. Fire followed them instantly. One blast clipped the outer shoulder assembly, showering the cockpit with another round of warnings.
Kael tracked the leftmost pirate unit. Watched the angle of its turn. Waited for the one mistake that always came when someone assumed a weaker target would stay weak.
There.
"…now."
Ryven didn't ask.
The mech pivoted. Kael fired the plasma cutter.
The beam was unstable, ugly, and nothing like a proper combat weapon. It still tore straight through the pirate mech's exposed midsection. The unit froze for half a beat as if insulted by the idea, then went up in a rolling explosion that lit the entire block in orange-white fire.
Across Helius Prime, the reaction hit like a shockwave of its own.
"FIRST ONE DOWN—!"
Torres' voice rose above every other sound in the cafeteria where cadets, staff, and whoever else had been nearby had already started clustering around live feeds.
"UPDATE THE BOARD!"
Little Bean, beside him, raised both hands with absolute conviction.
"UPDATE!"
Back in the district, the remaining two pirate mechs changed immediately. The mockery vanished. Their spacing tightened. They started moving like people who had recognized a threat too late and were now trying to recover dignity while armed.
Ryven's jaw tightened.
"…this will be difficult."
Kael stretched his fingers across the firing controls. "Relax."
"How."
"I have an idea."
Ryven turned to look at him fully for the first time since the fight began.
"…no."
"Yes."
"No."
"Yes."
Ahead of them, a construction crane towered over the street, its base already damaged from the earlier blasts. Kael pointed. Ryven saw the line instantly.
"…we drop it."
Kael smiled like a man hearing his favorite language spoken back to him. "Exactly."
They charged.
Missile fire streaked after them, one detonation clipping the maintenance unit's side hard enough to kick the whole machine sideways. Ryven corrected through sheer refusal. Kael fired at the crane supports.
Metal screamed.
Then the entire structure folded.
The crane crashed down between the two pirate mechs in a thunder of collapsing steel and sparks, forcing the formation apart exactly as intended. One pirate unit stumbled back, line of fire broken.
"Now," Ryven said.
Kael fired again.
The second mech went up so fast it almost looked clean.
The last pirate unit hesitated.
That was the mistake.
Then it turned.
Retreat.
Kael leaned forward, grin becoming all teeth. "Oh no you don't."
Ryven shoved power past every safe limit the maintenance unit possessed. Warning text flooded the screen so densely it became unreadable. The entire frame shook around them like it might break apart through sheer protest.
"Structural failure imminent," Ryven read flatly.
"Then be quick."
The pirate mech rose, trying to clear the district.
Ryven locked the targeting vector.
Fired.
The shot struck the engine housing dead center.
For one terrible, beautiful second, the pirate unit hung in the air with all forward motion gone.
Then it dropped.
The crash shook the street hard enough to send loose debris raining from above.
Silence followed.
Not complete silence—sirens still wailed, fires still snapped, somewhere glass continued falling in delicate little bursts—but battle silence. The kind that came after everything trying to kill you had abruptly failed.
Smoke climbed upward in black, twisting columns.
Kael leaned back against the harness and let out a breath that sounded suspiciously delighted. "Great date."
Ryven stared ahead through the cracked cockpit glass, expression torn somewhere between relief, disbelief, and the sort of exhaustion that came from repeatedly surviving Kael Ardent's decision-making.
"…we nearly died."
"But we didn't."
"That is not the point."
"It is a very good point."
Before Ryven could answer, something spun through the smoke above them.
A skillet.
Dented. Spinning. Flung from the explosion of some destroyed civilian supply crate high overhead.
It struck a surveillance drone with a loud metallic crack.
The drone jolted violently.
Its stabilizers failed for half a second.
Then, instead of returning to a safe hover, the machine glitched.
The targeting array flashed. Reoriented.
And suddenly the feed went live.
At Helius, every screen that mattered lit up.
"They're live!" someone shouted.
Torres nearly stood on his chair. "They're live!"
Little Bean pointed at the screen like he had personally invented history.
"Live!"
Across academies, cadets stopped walking.
Across fleet stations, officers looked up from reports.
Across the capital, a dozen different systems caught the unauthorized feed before anyone in authority could even begin to contain it.
Inside the cockpit, Kael blinked up at the hovering drone.
"…Ryven."
"Yes."
"Why is there cookware in the sky."
Ryven followed the trajectory of the fallen skillet, then the drone, then the way its recording light flashed steady and merciless.
"…that is a civilian cooking implement."
"…did we just become famous because of kitchenware."
Ryven's eyes narrowed as the full meaning of the active feed settled in.
"…we are broadcasting."
Kael stared at the drone for one beat.
Then he grinned.
Of course he did.
He unlatched, stepped forward into the cracked light spilling through the cockpit, and waved like he was greeting old friends across a training hall instead of addressing half the Federation from the site of a pirate attack.
"HELLO ACADEMY."
The reaction was immediate.
Explosive.
At Helius, the sound that answered him could probably be heard two decks over.
Ryven went very still.
"…we are live."
Kael laughed, bright and completely unrepentant.
"Oh, we absolutely are."
And just like that, the line shifted.
Not just between cadets and spectators.
Not just between a tournament and its aftermath.
Kael Ardent and Ryven Voss stopped being only names at the top of a board.
They became something larger.
Something seen.
Something replayed.
Something the Federation, for better or worse, would not be able to ignore again.