Chapter 14
LONARI
Gur doesn’t whisper when it decides to bleed.
It screams.
It screams in sirens and gunfire and comm-chatter clipping into panic, in the hot stink of exhaust and fear sweat rising off streets packed too tight, in neon lights flickering like they’re blinking against the ugliness they’re forced to illuminate.
Even from the Defrocked Nun’s upper levels, I can feel the city’s pulse turn arrhythmic—like the whole planet just took a hit to the ribs and now it’s deciding whether to stand back up or choke on its own blood.
My encrypted channel detonates with reports before I even finish tightening the strap on my shoulder holster.
Renn’s voice hits first, sharp and controlled. “Boss—armory three is seized. Loyalists. They locked the biometric gates and they’re arming civilians on the perimeter.”
Another voice—Captain Jessa—cuts through, breathless. “Tribute accountant—Kovren—executed in the street outside Depot Twelve. Body left displayed. Nine mark.”
Then a third voice—one of my street watchers—comes in distorted, half-screaming. “Rival syndicate moving on Kaijen east—Sable Knives. They got Nine blessing, Boss. They’re rolling heavy, like they own the damn air.”
Three fires.
All at once.
Classic Nine. They don’t just stab you. They make sure you’re looking the wrong way when the knife goes in.
I close my eyes for half a second and inhale.
The air in the war room tastes like hot electronics and stale coffee and the faint metallic tang of blood that never fully leaves this building anymore.
My men are watching me—captains, lieutenants, old killers and newer ones—waiting for the first decision because the first decision tells everyone whether we’re panicking or winning.
I open my eyes.
“Alright,” I say, voice low and even. “We do phase one.”
Renn’s shoulders drop a fraction—relief. Plans are comfort. Plans are control.
“Seize the financial nodes,” I continue. “Now. We lock transaction authority so the Nine can’t drain us mid-conflict. I want the ledger vault sealed and every routing key rotated. No exceptions.”
A captain hesitates. “Boss, if we lock—”
“If we don’t lock,” I cut in, “we’re fighting a war with our pockets turned inside out.”
Renn nods. “I can get you a convoy to the vault.”
“I don’t want a parade,” I say. “I want a knife.”
I turn to Fyr.
He’s been hovering at the edge of the room, face drawn tight, jaw set. His suit is immaculate but his eyes keep flicking like he’s listening to ghosts. He looks like a man who’s tasted betrayal and is still deciding whether it’s poison or fuel.
“Fyr,” I say.
His gaze snaps to mine. “Boss.”
“You run secondary strikes,” I tell him. “Armory two and the weapons shipments. Secure them before rival captains distribute anything. You know the routes.”
His mouth tightens. “And if I meet resistance?”
“You used to love resistance,” I say flatly.
A flicker of something crosses his face—old pride, old muscle memory.
“Yeah,” he mutters. “I did.”
“Then coordinate like we used to,” I say. “Clean. Efficient. Brutal.”
Fyr nods once, decisive. “Understood.”
I step closer and lower my voice, just for him. “No civilian collateral.”
He meets my gaze. “I know the rule.”
“Say it,” I demand.
His jaw flexes. Then, through clenched teeth, he says, “No civilian collateral.”
“Good,” I murmur. “Because I’ll execute my own men before I let fear turn us into predators.”
Fyr’s eyes hold mine for a beat. Then he nods and turns, barking orders into his comm as he storms out.
Renn watches him go, wary. “You trust him?”
I don’t look away from the map. “I trust his ego. It’s predictable. That’s better than trust.”
Renn exhales like he hates that answer but can’t argue.
I slap a palm on the holo map, expanding the financial node overlay. Three bright points glow—the same ones from last night’s planning. The ledger vault is the heart. The freight hub is the lungs. The League bank interface is the artery.
“Convoy,” Renn says. “You sure you want to be out there?”
I glance at him. “You sure you want me hiding while my house burns?”
His expression hardens. “No.”
“Then move.”
My convoy isn’t flashy.
Two armored transports, one decoy runner, and four bikes running perimeter like sharks.
We keep lights low. We keep comms tight.
The streets of Gur are already choked with tension—shops shuttering, civilians pulling kids indoors, syndicate crews posturing on corners like they’re waiting for someone else to blink first.
The air tastes like exhaust and ozone. I can smell smoke somewhere distant, curling through the city like a rumor.
Renn rides in the lead transport with me, eyes fixed on the forward cam. The vehicle hums under my boots, suspension rattling softly as we hit patched pavement.
A comm ping.
Fyr’s voice, clipped. “Armory two secured. Shipments rerouted to lockdown storage. Two captains tried to argue.”
“And?” I ask.
Fyr’s tone goes flat. “They’re sleeping.”
I snort. “Good.”
“Boss,” he adds, and there’s a note in his voice I don’t like—something like warning. “This is bigger than the Nine squeezing tribute. They’re not just stirring us. They’re coordinating rivals.”
“I know,” I say.
“Then you know they’ll hit you at the choke,” Fyr replies.
I glance at Renn. Renn’s jaw tightens.
“Copy,” I tell Fyr. “Stay alive.”
Fyr laughs once, humorless. “Try to stop me.”
The channel cuts.
We approach the transit choke—an elevated artery where three streets funnel into one under a skeletal bridge of rusted metal and old advertisements. It’s the kind of place you avoid at night unless you want an ambush.
And I want one thing more than I want safety right now.
I want the Nine’s loyalists to show their teeth.
They don’t disappoint.
The first barricade appears like it rises out of the road itself—burned-out cargo haulers shoved sideways, stacked scrap plates bolted into a jagged wall. Lights flicker behind it, red and angry. Silhouettes move.
Renn swears. “Contact.”
Then the automated fire kicks in.
Turrets—hidden in the bridge supports—snap to life with a mechanical whine and open up in disciplined bursts. Not wild. Not panicked. Controlled. The kind of fire that tries to force you into a kill lane like you’re cattle.
Our lead bike explodes into sparks, rider tumbling into the street.
“DOWN!” someone screams over comms.
The transport shudders as rounds chew into armor. The sound is a deep, ugly hammering that vibrates up through my bones.
“Reverse!” Renn barks.
“Can’t!” the driver yells. “Rear’s blocked!”
Of course it is. The Nine don’t trap you with one wall. They trap you with a cage.
I look at the forward cam and see movement—loyalists in Kaijen suits, wearing our colors like a insult. Their weapons flash in the dark. Behind them, I catch the faint shape of a rival crew—Sable Knives—watching like vultures waiting to feed.
Heat surges through my chest.
“Alright,” I murmur. “You want cattle. You get wolves.”
I slam my palm on the internal map console. “Maintenance tunnel access—right side. Ten meters.”
Renn’s eyes widen. “Boss, that tunnel’s—”
“A sewer with a ceiling,” I finish. “Yeah. That’s why they won’t cover it.”
Renn snaps his comm open. “All units—pivot right. On my mark. Smoke, then push.”
My driver grunts. “You sure?”
I lean forward, voice low. “Do it.”
Renn counts. “Three… two… one—MARK!”
Smoke canisters launch from our side ports, bursting into thick gray clouds that flood the kill lane.
The turret fire stutters as sensors lose clean line-of-sight.
Our transport lurches hard right, tires screaming, suspension groaning as we mount the curb and slam through a maintenance gate that wasn’t designed for vehicles this size.
Metal shrieks. Sparks spray. The world tilts.
Then we drop into the tunnel.
The sound changes instantly—gunfire muffled, echoing, replaced by the wet, hollow roar of tires on grated concrete. The air is damp, smelling of mold and coolant runoff, and the ceiling is low enough that my shoulders feel too big.
Our convoy surges forward in darkness lit only by emergency strips and our internal displays.
“Flank,” I growl. “We flank.”
Renn’s grin is feral in the dim light. “Classic.”
We push through the tunnel, engines thunderous, and I feel that old prison-wilderness instinct rise—the asymmetric thinking that says you don’t meet force head-on if you can crawl under it and bite its Achilles.
The tunnel forks.
I choose left.
We burst out through a service hatch behind the barricade like a nightmare crawling up from underneath.
The loyalists don’t even have time to pivot.
My men pour out, weapons up, disciplined bursts. No spray. No civilian targets. Just clean violence.
I slam out of the transport and hit the pavement running, boots splashing through puddles that smell like oil and rot. I grab the nearest loyalist by his collar, yank him off balance, and smash him into the barricade hard enough to crack his teeth.
He gurgles.
“Who sent you?” I snarl.
He spits blood and laughs. “The Nine own you!”
I break his wrist and let him scream.
Then the breach charge goes off.
A sharp white flash.
A concussive slam that hits my chest like a battering ram.
The world blurs.
I stagger, ears ringing, and the smell of burning plastic floods my nose. The barricade’s scrap plates buckle, flinging shrapnel like angry confetti.
I feel something slam into my shoulder—pain hot and immediate.
Then I hear Fyr’s voice in my ear, distant and wrong.
“Lonari—DOWN!”
Fyr isn’t supposed to be here.
And yet—
He’s there, suddenly, throwing himself between me and the next burst of turret fire as it reactivates, optics recalibrating, trying to regain the kill lane. He moves like old training, like muscle memory dragged out of storage and polished with desperation.
He shoves me backward.
The turret rounds slam into the barricade where my head would’ve been.
Fyr grunts.
Then a second explosive pops—smaller, closer—and Fyr goes down hard.