Vance could not hear anything but the shrill echo of the weapon's blast, its force filling his skull so completely that Silas's bleeding went unnoticed on the smooth floor beneath them. From the entryway came a sudden sting of scorched fuel - a biting odor that drove out every trace of the ship's clean, artificial atmosphere. The moment hung there, thick with smoke and silence instead of alarms.[/final].
Frozen in place, Lieutenant Corvus tucked away his gun, smoke curling from the barrel. His light gaze stayed fixed on Vance, unblinking. Not a word came from the Argent Cartel man just then - no need. The body at their feet spoke louder than questions ever could.
His arms stayed lifted, fixed just above the shoulders. Pain shot through him, begging every part to give way. Inside the bones of his foot, an old price echoed - years burned away so machines could rebuild him wrong - a slow rot now spreading like frost under skin [cite: 649-650, 658-659]. That leg held nothing inside anymore, only something sharp and broken where strength used to be. Each tremor from below, each groan of engine deep in the ship's frame, sent a wave climbing up his bone. Moving slightly to steady himself tugged at rough wire sutures across his upper arm - the kind made when tools patch flesh in haste [cite: 360-362, 394-395]. It sparked a burn that cut deeper than any blade, live current tearing through exposed tissue.
[cite_start]"I am a scavenger from Sector Four," Vance finally said, his voice flat and perfectly modulated to hide his exhaustion[cite: 101]. [cite_start]"I was hunting Copper-Maw Jackals in the Weeping Canyons when the ground collapsed[cite: 128, 144]. That Cartel spy found me in the wreckage. He needed someone small to bypass a jammed maintenance hatch on this transport while the Vanguard automated defenses were distracted."
Truth hid behind real details, arranged wrong. From the logs, anyone might spot the override - Corvus did. What met the eye mattered just as much: soil tracked inside, a torn coat ripped apart near the hatch. The officer took in Vance's injuries without needing proof beyond what stood visible.
Into the widening red stain moved Corvus, one deliberate footfall at a time. His steel-capped boots crushed nothing beneath them but kept walking anyway. On the left, where scars pulled tight, his lip curled - no joy there, just something cold wearing a grin.
"A Sector Four rat," Corvus murmured, stopping just an arm's length away. "You expect me to believe an Obsidian operative held you at gunpoint, forced you to hotwire a Vanguard transport, and just let you bring a mutated feline along for the ride?"
The creature is not some tame animal, Vance said, gaze steady on the officer's metal trim. Not owned. Just wandering. Came after the scent of blood
A single flicker of movement came from the shadow-lynx, frozen just above the grid floor, every pulse of its electric presence held back. A thin, broken sound slipped out - more reflex than voice - as both tails pressed hard into its sides. Vance felt the pressure like a blade behind his eyes, wrestling something wild into silence. Making a creature that once lunged at a Tier-2 Behemoth tremble beneath a soldier wasn't about strength - it was about control, raw and unrelenting, threaded through the bond they shared.
With a slow wave of his left hand, Corvus set things in motion. From the outer line, two thickly plated guards stepped forward, rifles shifted across their backs on the move.
"Search him," the lieutenant ordered. "Run a deep-tissue biometric scan. If he has Syndicate tech wired into his bones, cut it out of him."
Vance held his breath as thin as he could manage. Survival now hinged entirely on cold numbers ticking behind silence. Buried under bone, woven into the pulse of his chest, turned a small gold cog - the last shard of the old Aethelgard Watcher[cite: 308]. Scanners from the Cartel needed only a whisper of time-energy to trigger Corvus's knives. One flicker meant the slab, then slicing.
A sharp grip clamped onto Vance's right shoulder, one guard yanking him off balance while driving a boot between his knees. Pain exploded in his rebuilt foot, white-hot and unrelenting. His teeth sank into the soft flesh inside his mouth, holding back a sound that would betray how much he was breaking. Blood filled the silence where noise almost escaped.
A hulking rectangle came loose from the second guard's harness. Power surged into it as he dragged the whirring strip along Vance's torso.
Inside his ribs, the relic pulsed, cold against bone. Silence held - no siren split the air. Vance stood still, expecting noise. A warning should've ripped through the halls by now. Nothing came. The thing beneath his skin stayed hidden. Time stretched without sound.
A sudden movement brought the wand right across his chest. Hidden under layers of stained cloth, the golden mechanism etched into his skin stayed still.[cite_start]97[cite_end].
A crackling noise came from the scanner instead of its usual beep. That sound made the guard squint in annoyance. His fingers knocked against the machine's edge. Upward it moved, climbing close to Vance's throat.
When the sensor moved over Vance's skull, the scanner suddenly failed. White sparks burst from its shell, searing the guard's glove. The pain made him swear, then let go - the broken tool clattered on the shiny floor.
A shadow passed over Corvus's face as he stared, fingers edging closer to the grip of his gun. Speak now
"Interference, sir," the guard muttered, inspecting his scorched glove. "Massive localized radiation spike. Vanguard must have irradiated the lower levels of the black-site with sub-atomic scrubbers before we breached the hangar. The kid is completely soaked in background interference. It just fried the motherboard."
Not a flicker crossed Vance's face, yet inside, everything went sharp and still. It wasn't that the scanner failed - it never stood a chance. From the brand on his neck, pressed there by Elena Rostova's command, came a silence so deep it pulled heat from thought itself. This mark - a sigil shaped like wings no creature should wear - hummed at the edge of nothing. Its pulse drowned out the delicate gears turning behind his ribs, gold catching no light. Blind spots aren't always weaknesses. Sometimes they breathe for you.
A gruff soldier tugged at Vance's pants, fingers jamming into the fabric near his hip. Out came a glassy orb, dim and stained like old tea, caught in thick fingers. The thing pulsed once, dull under the gray light.
A small metal piece landed in Corvus's palm - "Tier-1 Scavenger Core," came the voice of the guard standing stiff at attention[cite: 177].
Out of the air, the lieutenant plucked the core without effort. A sneer crossed his face as he turned the flimsy genetic scrap over - junk-grade, barely worth carrying - then tucked it inside his reinforced jacket.
Out came the words like he didn't care. Spoils of war, Corvus said, eyes fixed on Vance. A twisted grin tugged at his damaged mouth - cold, unimpressed. Lucky you made it through Vanguard's cleanup, only to be grabbed anyway. One grunt turned to another. Move him below. Sub-deck four. The cages wait. Fresh bodies go first - toss the dog in there beside him. Once we reach the Citadel's edge, someone's got to step on those outer-mine triggers. That job needs doing now
Vance felt hands clamp down hard on his shoulders, pulling him back from the ship he had taken plus the body lying still nearby. Behind him, moving without a sound despite its size, came Axiom - each step absorbed by the floor like breath vanishing into air.
Marching onward, they wound through thick-walled tunnels that twisted without warning. Flying like some grim factory cursed with wings, the Argent Dreadnought loomed above thought. Burnt oil hung sharp, mixed with sweat and the tang of loaded shells in every breath taken. Underfoot, smooth metal cracked into rough mesh, stained red and worn by unseen forces below deck.
One step. That's all Vance cared about right then. A sharp chill dug into the back of his head, constant, like ice rooted deep. Not pain exactly - more like being gripped from far off. Something out there held him by that frozen thread. Breath came because of it, not in spite of it.
Out here, after ten long minutes down below, the guards stopped at a huge iron door that slid sideways. Locked in behind thick bars, many young faces - beaten, hungry - hunched together against the cold blackness. Taken without warning, these kids were raw recruits from distant zones, gathered up by the Cartel to stand first when bullets fly.
Into the keypad went the guard's fingers, tapping out numbers. Opened slowly came the thick metal gate, creaking under its own weight. Forward he was pushed - Vance - his feet catching on the cold grating below. Before the closing could finish, Axiom darted through, barely clear. Shut tight it fell, the lock snapping loud in the hollow air.
Footsteps dwindled down the hall, those armored figures moving off as engine hum swallowed each step. Quiet took over once the last clomp disappeared beneath the ship's deep growl.
Not right away did Vance rise. On the cold ground he stayed, hunched amid murmurs of fear from those trapped around him. Out came a deep, uneven breath, slow and deliberate. Tight control over his face finally gave way. Gone was the frightened obedient persona, dropped without warning.
Axiom let go of its crouched stance. Up rose the shadow-lynx, huge and unyielding, both tails flickering while jagged arcs of void-born energy cracked through its pelt. Fear took hold of the rest - prisoners lunged away, backs slamming into distant bars, desperate to vanish from the beast's awakening presence.
Falling backward, Vance let the cold metal press into his skull. A piece of time had slipped from him, gone forever. Something divine watched each step he took. Behind thick bars, on a ship that wasn't his, he stayed still.
A shudder ran through the ship, deep in its bones, as it turned. His mouth curled, slow and red at the edges. Not joy. Something older. The Cartel believed they held trash, worth nothing. Instead, their metal cage carried him forward - fast, thick-walled, unseen past the frontier lines. Their mistake burned behind his teeth.
Frozen light etched into the captive's throat pulsed without warning. Worse yet, none of them saw what crept behind it through
the ice. The thing chasing that signal carried silence like a weapon.