The neon-drenched Underbelly of Sector 4 felt significantly heavier than usual that afternoon. The dense chemical smog was thicker, stinging the eyes and leaving a bitter, metallic taste in the back of the throat. The usually bustling, chaotic energy of the open-air market was muted, replaced by a tense, suffocating atmosphere of pure fear.
Rian walked briskly through the crowded, muddy streets, the collar of his dark jacket pulled high against the biting acid rain that hissed as it hit the pavement.
The Triumvirate was bleeding from the PR disaster of the Iron Bastion, and as always, they were making the lower tiers pay for the wound. In direct retaliation for IV's humiliating display on global television, High General Darius Sol had ordered punitive rolling blackouts across all outer sectors. Synthetic food and water rations had been drastically slashed by forty percent under the guise of "heightened security measures." The Empire was squeezing the throat of the working class until they choked.
As Rian turned down a narrow, trash-strewn alleyway toward his destination, he witnessed the horrific, human cost of his grand theatrics firsthand.
Three Aegis Wardens, their visors pulled down to hide their faces, were violently dragging a terrified, weeping man out of the stairwell of a crumbling apartment complex. A woman, her clothes ragged and soaked in the toxic rain, was screaming hysterically, clinging desperately to the man's arm as two crying children watched in pure horror from the doorway.
"He didn't do anything! He just complained about the water rations at the factory! Please!" the woman sobbed, her knees slamming into the mud as a Warden dragged her husband forward. "He's a good man! Please!"
"Public dissent against the Triumvirate during a Level 1 military lockdown is classified as high treason," the lead Warden barked, his voice amplified and devoid of empathy. He violently shoved the woman back into the mud with the heavy butt of his thermal rifle, sending her sprawling. He clamped heavy, glowing magnetic cuffs onto the man's wrists, ignoring his pleas. "He's going to the dark. He's going to The Abyss."
Rian froze perfectly still in the deep shadows of the alley. The monster inside him, the terrifying, ancient galvanic power of the Rule, surged violently against his ribs. The air around Rian's fists began to warp with heat, tiny blue arcs of electricity dancing invisibly between his knuckles. He could drop all three Wardens in a fraction of a second. He could fry their neural-syncs, shatter their armor, and save the man right now.
If I save him now, the Wardens will fail to check in. They will call for heavy backup, the Inquisition will lock down this entire sector, and my carefully constructed plan to breach the Tartarus Dam falls apart, Rian's genius, agonizingly cold intellect calculated, fighting a brutal war against his own morality. If I let him go now, I can save him, and three thousand others, in four days.
It was the cruel, unforgiving mathematics of war. To be a savior on a grand scale, he had to be an absolute coward in the moment.
Rian forced his fists to un-clench, the sharp pain grounding him. He swallowed the bile rising in his throat, turned his back on the screaming, broken family, and walked deeper into the shadows, hating himself with every single step.
He eventually reached the hidden, subterranean shop of the elderly cybernetics merchant—the same man he had saved from the corrupt Enforcers weeks ago. The shop was hidden behind a false wall in a decommissioned subway tunnel. It smelled of hot soldering iron, old grease, and rusted metal.
"I need the components I ordered," Rian said quietly, sliding a heavy, encrypted Imperial cred-stick across the scratched glass counter. It held a fraction of the Vault credits he had discreetly skimmed from Octavia Vane's accounts during his agonizing "date."
The old man nodded silently, his clouded eyes wide with lingering fear from the riots above. He pulled a heavy, lead-lined box from a hidden safe beneath the floorboards and hoisted it onto the counter. He popped the latches, revealing rows of highly volatile shaped explosive charges, compact EMP detonators, and dense, raw kinetic-absorption mesh.
"This is heavy-duty Imperial military ordinance, boy," the old man croaked, looking at Rian's youthful face, his hands trembling slightly as he pushed the box forward. "If the Wardens catch you with this, they won't even bother with a trial. They'll just shoot you in the street. What are you planning to do with this much firepower?"
"I'm going to fix a leak," Rian replied softly, snapping the heavy box shut and securing it in his duffel bag.
Later that night, in the absolute, silent solitude of his dorm room, Rian spread the Tartarus Dam blueprints Aurelian had given him across his desk. The massive holographic blue lines illuminated his tired, pale face in the dark room.
The plan was hitting a massive, mathematically insurmountable wall.
The automated anti-aircraft turrets, the thermal-optic sensors, and the heavy Legionnaire patrols on the outer ridge of the dam were far too dense. The facility was an impenetrable fortress. Rian could easily slip past the human guards using the Rule to blind their neural optics, but he couldn't do that and exert the immense power required to breach the foot-thick, magnetically sealed steel doors of The Abyss simultaneously. The galvanic energy drain would literally stop his heart before he even reached the first block of prisoners.
He needed a massive, chaotic, undeniable distraction. He needed a small army to assault the outer ridge and draw the heavy, concentrated fire of the First House. That distraction would allow IV to slip inside the facility undetected, free the innocent prisoners from the dark, and then step out onto the ledge to take the sniper's bullet.
Rian leaned back heavily in his leather chair, staring blankly into the dark ceiling.
He couldn't use Nox. She was a chaotic wildcard, and despite their massive argument, she cared about him. If she even suspected he was planning to orchestrate his own death, she would ruin the entire plan to physically drag him away from the dam to save his life.
He looked down at the glowing blueprints. I need an army that actively hates the Empire, an army desperate for a high-profile victory, and an army that desperately wants to ally with the symbol of IV.
Rian closed his eyes, rubbing his face. The realization was sickening. The only army that fit the criteria was the Ember. He was going to have to use his friends again. He was going to have to manipulate Sia into leading her people into a bloodbath.