The hideout in Sector 23 smelled like rust and old wiring.
Lucent sat on the edge of a gutted server rack, his boots kicking up dust that shimmered in the sickly glow of Kai's salvaged Conduit.
The kid was hunched over the device again, fingers dancing across its cracked screen as he scrolled through the news feeds flooding the Aethernet.
"They're calling it a 'containment breach,'" Kai muttered, squinting at the flickering text. "Failed experiment. Casualties 'under investigation.'" He looked up, his face half-lit by the screen's blue glare. "No mention of us. At all."
Lucent grunted, peeling the wrapper off a protein brick that might've been older than Kai. "You sound disappointed."
"Its just sound suspicious." Kai tossed the Conduit onto the makeshift table—a door ripped off its hinges and laid across two crates. "We blew up half the lab, fought an abomination, and somehow nobody knows we were there? That's not luck. That's a cover-up."
Karen tinkering with the prosthetic arm and didn't look up. "You wanted them to put our faces on the news?"
"I wanted it to make sense!" Kai dragged a hand through his hair, leaving it sticking up in frantic spikes. "Those corporations doesn't just ignore breaches. They send Reclamation Units. They make people disappear or they—"
"They're scared."
Lucent's voice cut through the room like a knife.
He took a bite of the protein brick, chewed slowly, and swallowed before continuing. "That lab was working on something they don't want getting out. Something worse than Hollowed or worse than that thing we fought."
Kai went very still. "You think Zero's the reason they're keeping quiet?"
"I think we're alive because something scarier than us is pulling strings." Lucent crumpled the wrapper, tossing it into the dark corner where the rats would find it later. "And I think we should be gone before whoever's left figures out we're still breathing."
The dim glow of light cast long shadows across the hideout's rusted walls as silence settled between them.
Karen tightened the bolts on her prosthetic arm with a practiced twist of her fingers, the metal gleaming dully in the low light.
Silence stretched between them - the kind that came before hard choices.
When she finally spoke, her voice carried the weight of funeral dirt.
"I'll head back to Nex's hideout," she said finally, her voice steady but hollow. "They deserve to know he's dead."
Kai shifted where he sat, his fingers tapping restlessly against his leg. "And after that?"
Karen's jaw tightened. "After that, I don't know. Without Nex and Gristle, the gang's probably done. They'll scatter—go back to scavenging, or get picked off by the next crew that wants the territory."
Kai hesitated, then leaned forward. "You could… work with us. If you want."
Lucent, sharpening his knife against a whetstone, didn't look up. "Don't force her if she doesn't want to."
Karen smirked, though it didn't reach her eyes. "Appreciate the offer, kid. But I don't do pity teams." She stood, stretching the stiffness from her muscles before nodding at them. "Give me your contact. I'll reach out in a day or two."
Kai obliged, tapping his Conduit to hers in a quick data transfer. Lucent did the same, though his movements were slower, deliberate.
"Don't wait too long," he said, meeting her gaze. "This city's not kind to stragglers."
Karen snorted. "Since when has it ever been?"
The door clicked shut behind Karen, sealing the hideout in silence.
With that, she turned and slipped out into the neon-drenched streets, her silhouette swallowed by the haze of smog and artificial light.
Kai exhaled, slumping back against the wall. "You think she'll actually call?"
Lucent sheathed his knife. "If she's alive."
Lucent dropped onto his cot, the rusted springs groaning under his weight.
He draped an arm over his eyes, blocking out the flickering glow of the half-dead neon sign outside their window.
The dull throb of his migraine pulsed in time with the city's distant hum.
Kai stood awkwardly near the workbench, his fingers tracing the edge of his salvaged Conduit.
The silence stretched, thick and suffocating, until he finally cleared his throat.
"Lucent."
A grunt in response.
"Teach me how to rawcast."
Lucent's arm slid away from his face. He turned his head just enough to pin Kai with a glare that could've melted steel. "No."
Kai's grip tightened around the Conduit. "I could've helped more back there. If I knew how to—"
"You'd be dead." Lucent sat up in one sharp motion, the cot screeching in protest. "Or worse. You think that abomination was bad? Try having your own glyphs eat you alive from the inside because you didn't know how to fucking hold them."
Kai flinched but didn't back down. "Then teach me how to hold them."
"It doesn't work like that." Lucent dragged a hand down his face, the stubble rough against his palm. "Rawcasting isn't some Spire-approved training module. There's no safety protocols. No do-overs. One mistake, and your veins light up like fuse wire."
The memory hit him unbidden—the first time he'd rawcast, desperate and stupid and drowning in grief.
The way his blood had boiled.
The way his sister's name had tasted like lightning on his tongue.
Kai opened his mouth, but Lucent cut him off with a sharp gesture.
"You want to help? Get better at not frying your Conduit every five minutes. But rawcasting?" He shook his head, the shadows under his eyes deeper than ever. "That's not survival. That's suicide."
Kai looked down at his hands—still shaking faintly from the backlash of his last failed glyph.
The burns had healed, but the skin was pink and tender.
New scars layered over old ones.
Lucent exhaled through his nose, the tension in his shoulders uncoiling just enough to let him think straight.
He reached for the half-empty bottle of synth-liquor on the crate beside his cot and took a swig, the burn down his throat grounding him.
"Forget rawcasting," he said, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. "What you need is a Conduit that won't try to fry your fingers off every time you cast a basic glyph. We'll scavenge better parts tomorrow. There's a junkyard near Sector 19—less picked over."
Kai hesitated, then nodded. But Lucent could see the gears turning behind his eyes, the Spire-bred curiosity that refused to let go.
"Then where did you learn it?" Kai asked, quieter this time. "Rawcasting."
The question hung in the air like a lit fuse.
Lucent's fingers tightened around the bottle.
In his mind, he saw the flickering text of GhostKey's underground forums, the dim glow of his first stolen Conduit in the dark of his old squat.
The username Cipher blinking in his DMs, their messages a mix of cryptic advice and warnings written in the kind of code that only made sense when you were desperate enough to need it.
He hadn't learned rawcasting.
He'd clawed his way into it, one near-fatal mistake at a time.
"Nice try," Lucent said, tipping the bottle toward Kai in a mock toast. "But I'm not dumb enough to let you bait me into another argument."
Kai opened his mouth—to protest, to push—but Lucent cut him off with a look.
"Bed. Now. We move at dawn."
The neon light outside flickered, casting jagged shadows across the floor.
Somewhere in the distance, a Reclamation Unit's drone whined as it swept the streets.
Kai, for once, didn't argue.
***
The pulsing neon glow of Sector 18 staining the alleyways in hues of toxic green and bruised purple.
Karen's boots crunched over broken glass as she approached the familiar rusted door—Nex's hideout, marked only by a faded tag of an eagle with steel talons.
A hulking figure loomed in the doorway—Rook.
Rook hadn't moved from the doorway.
His augments hissed softly as he shifted his weight, the hydraulics in his elongated arms protesting the tension.
His good eye tracked her, dark and unreadable.
The other, is covered with a black eye patch.
"You look like shit," he said finally.
Karen huffed a laugh, though it came out more like a cough. "Feel like it too."
Echo was the first to break the stillness.
She kicked back from the table, a blade suddenly sprung at the side of her augmented arm and thrusted it at the table like a knife.
The sudden silence it left behind was louder than the noise. "You gonna stand there all night, or you gonna tell us what the hell happened?"
Karen pushed off the wall.
Her boots scuffed against the concrete floor, kicking up dust that glittered in the uneven light.
She didn't sit.
Didn't make herself at home.
Just stood there, her new prosthetic flexing unconsciously at her side.
"Lab job," she said, voice flat. "Went bad. Nex and Gristle didn't make it out."
Vey let out a sound—something between a scoff and a sigh—and dragged a hand down the melted side of his face. "How do we know it wasn't you who put 'em down?"
His voice was a rasp, the words bubbling up from somewhere deep in his damaged throat. "Convenient, ain't it? You walk out. They don't."
Rook's augments hissed as he turned sharply, the glow from his ocular implant flaring. "Shut your damn mouth, Vey. Karen's not that kind of person."
Karen didn't flinch—didn't elaborate.
Didn't tell them about the way the walls had screamed when the abomination tore through them.
Didn't describe the way Nex's Conduit had flared white-hot in his hands, the way his grin had been the last thing she saw before the explosion ripped the room apart.
Some things didn't need to be spoken.
Some memories were better left buried.
Mags hadn't said a word.
She just stared at the shotgun in front of her, her fingers tracing the scratches along its stock—the marks Nex had put there, back when he'd first taught her how to use it.
The silence stretched, thick and suffocating.
Karen caught the bottle but didn't drink.
The amber liquid inside caught the flickering neon from the street outside, casting wavering light across the tense faces around her.
Rook's hydraulic augments hissed as he leaned forward. "This isn't just trouble—it's a fucking avalanche waiting to bury us. Nex gone means the Steel Talons lose their teeth overnight." His fist clenched, metal tendons whining. "You know how many vultures are circling Sector 18 right now?"
Echo's face churned as if she still can't believe what had happened. "Half our contracts were held together by Nex's reputation alone. Without him..." She didn't need to finish. The silence said enough.
Karen rolled the bottle between her palms, feeling the condensation stick to her prosthetic fingers. "We don't announce it," she said quietly. "Buy ourselves time to regroup. Let the rumor mill do the work slowly."
Vey let out a wet chuckle through his ruined mouth, the sound bubbling unpleasantly. "Nex was the face of the group, sure. But the Talons weren't just one man." His melted fingers tapped a erratic rhythm against his glass. "We've still got the routes. The contacts. The—"
"—scraps of what he built," Rook interrupted. His augmented arm slammed down on the table hard enough to make the bottles jump. "Don't kid yourself. Without Nex, we're back to being Junkyard rats fighting over spoiled meat."
His eyes scanning everyone sharply. "You remember what that was like."
A heavy quiet settled over them.
Outside, the distant wail of a mag-lev train echoed through the sector, the sound warped by the layers of rusted infrastructure between them and the surface.
Somewhere in the walls, the ever-present scuttling of glow-rats reminded them how quickly order could decay in Ghost City.
Karen finally uncapped the bottle and took a long pull.
The synth-liquor burned like coolant down her throat. "Then we adapt," she said, wiping her mouth. "Before someone else does it first."
Echo's blade retracted to the side, the sound cutting through the tension like a promise—or a threat. "Starting with whoever comes sniffing around first."
Four years with these people, and she'd never once let herself get comfortable.
Never let herself believe she belonged.
But now, with Nex gone and the hideout feeling too big and too small all at once.
The liquor burned going down, just like always.
Rook's augments whined as he dragged another chair over, the hydraulics protesting as he slumped into it.
The metal groaned under his weight, but held.
He reached for the nearest bottle, cracked the seal with his finger, and took a long pull before wiping his mouth with the back of his hand.
"So," he grunted, the glow from his ocular implant flickering across the table. "What'd you steal?"
Karen exhaled through her nose, staring at the bottle in her hands.
The glass was smudged with fingerprints and something darker—oil, or maybe blood. "Nothing worth dying for."
Echo let out a sharp laugh, perhaps a ridicule to no one but herself. "Nothing ever is."
Silence settled over them again, thick and suffocating.
No toasts.
No speeches.
Just the occasional clink of glass and the creak of old chairs.
The neon from the streets outside painted their faces in jagged streaks of blue and red, making them look like ghosts already half-faded from the world.
Then Echo's fingers tightened around her drink. "…I should've gone with you." Her voice was rough, stripped of its usual edge. "If I wasn't busy selling our shit, maybe—"
"You could blame all of us, then," Vey cut in, his melted lips twisting around the words. "We all had our reasons for not being there."
Rook's fist came down again on the table hard enough to make the bottles jump. "Enough." His augments hissed as he leaned forward. "This isn't the time for that shit."
A beat of quiet.
Then, from the corner—
"…funeral…when?"
Mags' voice was barely a whisper, frayed at the edges like torn cloth.
She hadn't spoken all night, hadn't moved from where she sat hunched over Nex's old shotgun, her fingers tracing the scratches he'd left in the stock.
Echo was at her side in an instant, wrapping an arm around her shoulders. "Hey. You don't gotta force yourself." Her tone softened, just a fraction. "We'll figure it out. Promise."
Mags didn't respond.
Just gripped the shotgun tighter, her knuckles white.
The air in the hideout grew heavier, pressing down on them like the weight of the city above.
Somewhere outside, a Reclamation Unit's siren wailed, distant but getting closer.
Karen took another drink.
She had underestimated their resilience—and now figured she'd stick around for a little while longer.
The liquor burned, but not enough to chase away the taste of ash and regret.
***
The hideout's door hissed shut behind Rook.
The sudden silence pressed against Karen's eardrums, thick and suffocating.
In the corner where the flickering lights didn't quite reach, Mags sat motionless, her slight frame nearly swallowed by the shadows.
The shotgun in her arms—Nex's shotgun, too large for her, the stock worn smooth where his hands had gripped it day after day.
Karen turned toward the exit, her boots scuffing against the concrete floor.
The sound seemed too loud in the quiet.
"Nex."
Mags' voice stopped her cold.
Karen's heart stricken with something she can't fully understand.
Was it guilt?
Was it sadness?
Mags' voice was something stripped raw, the sound of rusted metal grinding against bone.
Karen turned slowly.
Mags hadn't moved, but her grip on the shotgun had tightened, her small hands nearly lost against its bulk.
"Death." Mags' fingers flexed, her knuckles standing out pale and sharp beneath grime-streaked skin. "Full. Story."
When Karen had made the decision to tell the others about Nex's death, one face had risen unbidden in her mind—Mags.
The girl who still wore that oversized Steel Talons jacket like armor, whose boots were always a size too big, who followed at Nex's heels like a shadow.
Mags, who had looked up at Nex like he'd hung the neon lights in the sky.
Karen had seen the way Mags watched him—not with the wary respect the others showed, not with the cautious fear the enemies couldn't hide.
There was something raw in that gaze, something that went deeper than gang loyalty.
When Nex had pulled Mags from the wreckage on the slum years back, he'd unwittingly forged a bond stronger than blood.
The others would mourn.
Mags would break.
Karen's fingers had tightened around the remnants of Nex's augments in her pocket, the edges biting into her palm through the fabric.
How do you tell a girl who'd already lost everything once that the one person holding her world together was gone?
The air between them thickened, heavy with all the things Karen hadn't said, all the details she'd sanded down into something manageable when recounting it to the others.
The way Gristle's body had come apart like wet paper when the abomination touched him, his screams turning liquid in his throat.
The way Nex's augments had sparked and smoked as he stood between her and the thing that had once been human, his grin never faltering even as his Conduit burned white-hot in his fist.
The way he'd looked at her—just once, just for a heartbeat—asking her to run towards the exit.
Karen exhaled, the sound shaky in her own ears.
Her prosthetic hand twitched at her side, the servos whirring softly. "Maybe it was for the best," she said, the words as dry as an ash, "that Nex left you behind."
Mags didn't flinch.
Didn't blink.
Just stared at her with those hollow eyes.
The same way she'd stared at nothing for three days after Nex had dragged her out of that hell.
Then, with a deliberate slowness that made the chair creak beneath her, Mags reached out and slapped the seat beside her.
An invitation.
A demand.
Karen crossed the room, her boots echoing in the silence.
She sat, the chair protesting under her weight, and for a long moment, neither of them spoke.
The hideout's pipes groaned somewhere in the walls, a sound like a dying man's breath.
Mags' legs swung slightly, her toes brushing the floor now.
She still hadn't let go of the shotgun.
So Karen told her.
The words came haltingly at first, sticking in her throat like shards of glass.
She told her about the lab's walls screaming, about the way the shadows had moved wrong, twisting like living things.
About Gristle's last moment, his body coming apart at the seams.
About the moment she'd realized Nex wasn't planning to follow her out.
"Just so I could run," she finished, the words scraping her throat raw.
Silence settled over them like a shroud.
Somewhere in the distance, the Junkyard's ever-present hum seemed to pause, as if holding its breath.
Karen couldn't bring herself to look at Mags.
Instead, she focused on her own hands—one flesh, one steel—and the three fragments of metal she'd fished from her pocket.
The last pieces of Nex's augments—three steel talons, twisted and scorched, still flecked with dust where they'd torn free.
She held them out, the metal glinting dully in the dim light.
Mags didn't move at first.
Then, with a carefulness that seemed at odds with the violence of their world, she reached out.
Her fingers were small against the wreckage of Nex's augments, her touch light as a feather as she took them from Karen's palm.
For a heartbeat, Karen thought she might pocket them and walk away.
Instead, Mags turned the largest talon over in her hands, her thumb tracing the edge where the steel had sheared apart.
Mags' fingers trembled slightly as she reached for Karen's right hand—the living one, the one that could still feel.
Karen's breath caught as the girl's small hands enveloped hers, pressing the twisted metal fragment into her palm with surprising gentleness.
The warmth of Mags' hands seeped into Karen's skin, chasing away the ever-present chill of the hideout.
She could feel every ridge of Mags' knuckles, every callous earned from years of loading shells into Nex's shotgun.
The girl's thumbs pressed down, folding Karen's fingers over the shard with deliberate care, as if performing some sacred rite.
The metal grew warm between them, no longer just a piece of scrap, but something alive with memory.
Karen's throat tightened.
The weight of it—the steel in her palm, Mags' hands refusing to let go—was more intimate than any embrace she'd ever had.
For the first time since the lab, she felt the sting of tears threatening to break free.
Mags didn't speak.
Didn't need to.
Her hands said everything—the slight squeeze of reassurance, the way her pinky finger hooked around Karen's wrist like an anchor.
In that silent exchange, the talon ceased being just wreckage.
It became a covenant.
The remaining two talons disappeared into Mags' sleeve, tucked away like secrets.
Like promises.
Outside, the Junkyard exhaled—a gust of wind rattling the corrugated metal walls, a distant pipe bursting with a sound like gunfire.