Blaze walked with a slow, deliberate pace through the dripping underbelly of a Crimson Velvet service alley, the sound of his boots on wet stone keeping time with the low, tuneless whistle on his lips.
In his hand, he turned the conduit over and over, his fingers tracing the familiar contours of the sleek, black-and-crimson device.
It wasn't just a tool anymore—it was an extension of him.
For the last few months, between jobs and the tense, quiet hours in the hideout with Ash and Cinder, he had done nothing but learn it.
He'd taken it apart mentally, mapped its aetheric pathways, tested its limits in abandoned lots under the cover of night.
He knew its weight, its hum, the way it warmed in his palm when drawing power.
He'd even pieced together what it was.
This wasn't black-market junk.
This was a Nimbrix Securities Prototype—Model Ignis-7.
A flagship combat conduit slated for release later this year, meant to go head-to-head with whatever Myriad Labs and WhiteRoot were cooking up.
High-output aether regulation, multi-glyph threading capability, adaptive resonance tuning.
The kind of tech that would sell for six figures on the legitimate market—if it ever hit the shelves.
So why was it on some mid-level exec's nightstand?
Blaze mused, still turning the device in his hand.
Smuggled out for a private buyer?
Corporate espionage?
Or just a stupid rich man playing with toys he didn't understand?
Didn't matter.
The idiot's mistake was Blaze's miracle.
That exec had signed his own death warrant the moment he decided to walk out of Nimbrix R&D with a million-credit weapon in his briefcase.
Blaze grinned to himself, a sharp, private thing in the dark.
Thanks for the upgrade.
Tonight's destination was a place called The Gilded Cage.
Ash had given him the tip with a dismissive shrug. "Pay's small. Intel's shaky. Probably a dead end. Not worth the walk, if you ask me."
But Ash was back at the hideout, sulking over the low-spec utility conduit he'd finally scraped together credits for—a device that could, at best, warm a cup of water or dust a shelf.
The disappointment had been palpable, and Ash had been nursing a quiet, simmering resentment ever since.
Cinder, meanwhile, was out on a longer stakeout—gathering intel for what Ash kept calling the next big job.
Something about a high-value corporate convoy passing through the border zones.
She'd been gone for two days, silent as a ghost, which meant she was onto something real.
Which left Blaze with an empty evening, a restless itch in his hands, and a shiny new weapon that begged to be used.
Might as well stretch out, he thought. See what more this thing can really do.
The Gilded Cage wasn't in the slums.
It was deep in the heart of the Crimson Velvet District proper—a zone of garish neon, polished chrome, and desperate, expensive pleasures.
A cabaret club, according to Ash's notes.
A place where the wealthy went to see pretty things dance, and where prettier things went to disappear.
The pay might be small, but the opportunity… Blaze could smell it.
A place like that was a nexus.
Information, connections, weaknesses—all wrapped in velvet and sold at a premium.
He stepped out of the alley and into the electric glow of the main thoroughfare.
The air changed instantly—thick with synth-perfume, spilled liquor, and the low thrum of bass from a dozen competing clubs.
Holo-signs flickered overhead, advertising pleasures he couldn't afford and didn't want.
People moved in clusters, some laughing too loud, others staring with hollow eyes.
Blaze didn't belong here.
Not in the way that mattered.
He wasn't a patron.
He wasn't even staff.
He was a wolf in a glittering henhouse.
He tucked the conduit into the inner pocket of his coat, where it rested warm against his ribs.
His hands found his pockets, and he fell into the crowd, moving with the current, his eyes sharp behind a carefully casual mask.
Up ahead, the sign glowed in tasteful, golden script: THE GILDED CAGE.
It was less flashy than its neighbors.
Subtler.
The door was polished dark wood, flanked by two large, silent men in tailored suits who scanned the crowd with flat, professional eyes.
Bouncers.
Private security.
Not street muscle—it is corporate.
Blaze slowed, letting the crowd carry him past the entrance.
He took it in with a single, sweeping glance.
WhiteRoot, he thought, recognizing the subtle, angular styling in the architecture, the too-clean lines.
This wasn't just a club.
It was a front.
His grin widened.
Now this, he thought, the Ignis-7 warm against his side, might actually be fun.
The host's eyes—sharp, practiced, and the color of expensive whiskey—locked onto Blaze the moment he stepped through the polished doors.
They swept over him, not with the dismissive judgment most Velvet staff reserved for Junkyard interlopers, but with a flicker of recognition.
A professional assessment.
A smile spread across the host's face—a masterpiece of cultivated charm, worn smooth by years of welcoming dangerous men and desperate women.
It didn't reach his eyes.
"May I assume," the host said, his voice a low, cultured baritone that carried perfectly over the murmur of the lounge, "you are Mr. Blaze?"
Blaze's eyebrows knotted slightly.
He was braced for suspicion, for a blocked entry, for a demand for credentials he didn't have.
This… smooth recognition threw him.
He wasn't mister anything here.
He was a ghost with a stolen name and a hotter reputation.
"Yeah," Blaze replied, his own voice rougher, cutting through the polished air. "That's me."
The host's smile didn't waver.
He gave a shallow, precise nod, as if a ledger had just been balanced.
With a fluid motion, he lifted a small, silver bell from the mahogany podium and gave it a single, clear ting.
The sound was barely audible, but it acted as a silent summons.
From behind a curtain of deep crimson velvet, a servant appeared—a young man in an immaculate black uniform, his face a blank slate, his eyes downcast.
He moved without sound, stopping exactly three paces from the host, awaiting instruction.
"Please escort Mr. Blaze to the Jade Suite," the host said, his gaze returning to Blaze. "Room 39."
The servant bowed his head fractionally.
But Blaze was no longer looking at the servant.
His focus was on the host's face, on the subtle, almost imperceptible shift in his demeanor when he said the number.
Room 39.
It wasn't just a directive.
It was a passphrase.
A code.
The host's professional warmth cooled by a single degree.
His eyes held Blaze's for a heartbeat too long—not with hospitality, but with a silent, measured caution.
The smile remained, but it now looked like something carved from ice.
Jade Suite.
A fancy name.
But the number… the way it was delivered… it carried a weight.
A secrecy.
This wasn't a standard meeting room.
This was a place for conversations that didn't happen.
For deals that left no paper trail.
For people who needed to be seen, but not heard.
Blaze felt the Ignis-7 conduit warm against his ribs, a quiet pulse of readiness.
So, he thought, the corner of his mouth tilting up in a smirk that matched the host's for coldness.
The small-paying job just got a lot more interesting.
Blaze followed the servant across the plush, sound-deadening carpet of the lounge, past low-lit tables where patrons spoke in murmurs over crystal glasses.
The air smelled of aged whiskey, synth-humidor smoke, and a faint, expensive floral perfume that did nothing to mask the sharper scent of covert business.
They reached a bank of elevators paneled in dark, lacquered wood.
The servant produced a slim keycard, swiped it against a nearly invisible reader, and the central doors slid open with a whisper.
The elevator interior was all muted gold and deep burgundy velvet, lit by a single, low-hanging crystal fixture.
It felt less like a lift and more like a jewelry box.
Blaze stepped in, his eyes immediately going to the control panel.
No numbers.
Just a smooth, blank sheet of black glass.
The servant entered behind him, the doors sealing shut with a soft thump.
Without a word, the young man raised a hand and pressed his thumb against the center of the panel.
It glowed faintly beneath his touch.
Then, with deliberate, unerring precision, he tapped two locations on the glass in quick succession: lower left, then upper right.
3. 9.
No buttons lit up.
No floor indicator appeared.
But Blaze felt it—a deep, silent shudder through the floor of the cab, followed by a subtle sinking sensation in his gut.
They weren't going up.
They were going down.
The descent was smooth, utterly silent, and far longer than any trip to a third or ninth floor should have been.
The air in the cab grew cooler, drier.
The faint scent of perfume and smoke vanished, replaced by the sterile smell of climate-controlled ventilation and old concrete.
Blaze kept his face neutral, but his mind was racing.
A private hidden floor.
Room 39 wasn't a just suite.
A bunker.
A black-site meeting room buried beneath the glitter and sin of the Gilded Cage.
He glanced at the servant, who stood motionless, hands folded, eyes fixed on the seamless doors.
The boy gave nothing away.
He was part of the furniture—a living, breathing component of the club's secret architecture.
The elevator slowed to a perfect, vibrationless stop.
The doors slid open.
Revealing not a hallway, but a small, antechamber of raw, polished concrete.
A single door of reinforced alloy stood opposite, marked only with a small, backlit numeral:
39.
The servant finally moved, stepping out and turning to hold the elevator door open.
He didn't speak.
Didn't gesture.
Just waited, his blank eyes offering no hint of what lay beyond.
Blaze took a slow breath, the cool underground air filling his lungs.
Then he stepped out of the velvet box and into the concrete silence, the elevator doors whispering shut behind him, sealing him in.
Blaze took a slow step forward, his boots silent on the polished concrete.
Before he'd even made it halfway across the antechamber, the heavy alloy door of Room 39 gave a soft, hydraulic hiss and slid seamlessly into the wall.
Warm, amber light spilled out, along with the rich scent of aged whiskey, fine cigar smoke, and a cloying, floral perfume.
"Come in."
The voice from within was calm, cultured, and utterly relaxed.
An invitation, not a command.
Blaze stepped through the threshold, and his eyes swept the room in one swift, assessing glance.
It wasn't just a room.
It was a vault of opulence buried under a mountain of sin.
The sheer magnitude of wealth on display was almost vulgar.
The floor was covered in thick, white fur rugs that looked imported from overseas.
The walls were paneled in a dark, iridescent wood that seemed to drink the light from the crystal chandelier overhead.
A full bar of glittering glass and cut crystal occupied one corner, and a massive, abstract painting that probably cost more than the entire Junkyard dominated another wall.
At the center, on a low, extravagant glass coffee table that looked like a frozen river, a man was pouring a deep amber liquid into two crystal tumblers.
He was middle-aged, handsome in a carefully maintained way, his silver hair swept back from a sharp brow.
He wore a tailored suit of charcoal grey that cost more than most people's lives.
"Care for a drink?" the man offered without looking up, his focus on the perfect pour.
But Blaze's gaze had already moved past him, past the table, to the far side of the suite.
There, on a vast, circular bed draped in black silk, were three women.
They were beautiful in the way only the most expensive ornaments could be—flawless skin, artfully styled hair, dressed in gossamer lingerie that left little to the imagination.
But their movements were slow, languid, and unfocused.
Their eyes were glassy, their smiles vague and dreamlike.
Soft, breathy moans escaped them as they traced meaningless patterns on the silk sheets, lost in a chemical haze.
The man finally glanced up, following Blaze's look.
A mild, reassuring smile touched his lips.
"Ah. Don't worry about the entertainment," he said, setting the decanter down with a soft clink. "Whatever they were given won't last. They'll be compliant, quiet, and have no memory of this in a few hours. Standard privacy protocol."
He pushed one of the tumblers toward the empty space on the sofa opposite him.
Blaze didn't move toward the drink.
He wasn't worried about the women.
He'd seen hazed pleasure workers before.
What struck him—what set every instinct on a quiet, razor-sharp edge—was the absence.
There were no guards.
No hulking security in the corners.
No discreet glyph-casters by the door.
No panic buttons on the table.
Just a high-level corporate executive—a man who clearly dealt in secrets worth killing for—alone in a buried room with three drugged companions and a stranger who walked with the smell of fire and Junkyard dust still clinging to his clothes.
It made no sense.
Unless the man was arrogant beyond measure.
Or unless he wasn't as defenseless as he appeared.
Blaze's hand didn't move toward the Ignis-7, but his awareness of it, warm against his ribs, intensified.
He remained standing, just inside the door, his posture loose but ready.
"You invite a stranger to your private vault," Blaze said, his voice low in the perfumed air, "with no one watching your back. Either you're very stupid, or you think I'm not a threat."
The man took a slow sip of his whiskey, his eyes—a cool, calculating grey—holding Blaze's over the rim of the glass.
He smiled again, wider this time.
It didn't reach his eyes.
"Let's call it… professional curiosity, Mr. Blaze. And a calculated risk. Please. Sit. The whiskey is twenty-year-old Velvet Reserve. It would be a shame to let it breathe alone."
Blaze didn't believe a word the man said.
The smile, the reassurance, the fine whiskey—it was all part of a performance, a layer of civilized polish over something much darker.
But he'd come this far into the lion's den.
Walking out now would be more suspicious than staying.
He moved forward, his movements deliberately unhurried, and lowered himself into the plush armchair opposite the executive.
The white fur rug swallowed the sound of his boots.
The man's smile deepened, a flicker of satisfaction in his cool grey eyes.
He watched as Blaze finally reached out and lifted the offered tumbler.
"Let's enjoy the drink for a while," the man said, raising his own glass in a slight, casual toast.
"Business can wait for the second pour." He took a slow, appreciative sip, his gaze steady over the crystal rim. "And don't worry. The whiskey is pure. I'd hate to waste a fine vintage like this on something as crude as poison. A bullet is cheaper and far more honest."
Blaze brought the glass to his lips.
The aroma was rich, complex—oak, smoke, and something like dried dark fruit.
He took a small sip.
It was smooth, almost obscenely so, warming a path down his throat.
It was, without question, the best thing he'd ever tasted.
A drink for kings, poured in a tomb.
He set the glass down on the icy surface of the table with a soft tink.
"Why'd you post a shitty pay for this job," Blaze asked, his voice flat, cutting through the genteel atmosphere, "when you can afford a room that smells like a bank vault and whiskey that costs more than my life?"
The man didn't flinch at the blunt disrespect.
If anything, his smile took on a faint, amused edge.
He swirled the amber liquid in his glass, watching it catch the light.
"The pay was a filter, Mr. Blaze," he said, his tone conversational. "A low number weeds out the mercenaries, the glory-seekers, the small-time operators looking for a quick score. It attracts only two types of people: the desperate… and the curious. You, I suspect, are not desperate."
He took another sip, savoring it. "And as for what I can afford… let's just say the compensation for this meeting isn't measured in credits transferred to a slum account."
He set his glass down and leaned forward slightly, the pleasant facade thinning to reveal the sharp, analytical core beneath.
"We've been watching you, Mr. Blaze. Your recent… exploits… with that weapon you acquired have been most instructive. The data has been fascinating."
The words landed in the quiet room, cold and clear.
Watching you.
Data.
Blaze's fingers tightened minutely around his glass.
The Ignis-7 seemed to pulse once, a silent echo against his ribs.
The mere idea of these corporate gods watching from on high, treating his struggle for power and survival as a data stream for their spreadsheets, made a cold snort of disgust escape Blaze's lips.
It was a raw, unfiltered sound in the perfumed silence.
His grip tightened on the crystal tumbler, not enough to break it, but enough to turn his knuckles pale.
The smooth glass felt suddenly fragile in his hand—a symbol of everything in this room: beautiful, expensive, and utterly disposable.
"Why are you hiding?" Blaze asked, his voice low, scraping away the last pretense of civility. "If you've been watching, you know what I can do. Why the buried room? The cheap front? The middleman? Why not just send a cleaner squad with a contract?"
The man's smile didn't falter.
If anything, Blaze's bluntness seemed to amuse him further.
He placed his own glass down with deliberate care and stood up, smoothing the front of his immaculate suit.
"Direct. I appreciate that." He walked calmly to the iridescent wood-paneled wall behind him.
With a wave of his hand mere inches from the surface, the dark grain shimmered and dissolved, transforming into a vast, matte-black screen.
An image resolved upon it—a surveillance capture, sharp and clinical.
A woman.
Early twenties.
Hair the color of dark rust, pulled back in a severe, practical tail.
Her face was all sharp angles and fierce, guarded eyes.
She wore the dark, tailored uniform of private security, but her posture spoke of a tension that went beyond professional vigilance.
Text scrolled beside the image in clean, white glyphs:
>> SUBJECT: Morrigan, Ember
>> AGE: 21
>> AFFILIATION: The Gilded Cage Security Detail (Former)
>> LAST KNOWN STATUS: TERMINATED (Disputed)
>> CURRENT THREAT PROFILE: ELEVATED
>> PRIORITY: ACQUISITION / NEUTRALIZATION
Blaze's eyes scanned the data, his mind making instant, cold connections.
Former security.
For this very club.
Terminated, but walking around causing trouble.
"So you want me to hunt her," Blaze said, the conclusion forming on his tongue before the man could voice it.
He was fast on the uptake—always had been.
It's how he'd survived the Velvet's alleys.
The executive's smile remained, a permanent fixture of pleasant menace.
"Indeed. She has developed a… disruptive habit. Targeting a select number of our peripheral pharmaceutical processing plants. Nothing critical, but it's become a nuisance. And nuisances, in our business, have a tendency to evolve into problems."
He clasped his hands behind his back, turning partially to regard the image of Ember.
"We thought a man of your particular… caliber… and your newfound familiarity with advanced prototype armaments, would be an elegant solution. More surgical than sending a company squad. More deniable. And, frankly, more interesting to observe."
The man was obviously omitting oceans of information.
Why was a former security guard bombing her old employer's drug labs?
What had they done to earn her wrath?
What was in those plants that was worth this kind of clandestine wetwork?
But Blaze wasn't one to pry into motives that didn't concern his payday.
Morality was a currency he'd never traded in.
Causes were for people who could afford them.
His only priority, his singular focus since the night the Ignis-7 had seared its potential into his soul, was to master it.
To learn its language until he could speak in fire and ruin.
A live-field test against a motivated, dangerous target—funded by a deep-pocketed client who valued discretion over questions—wasn't a job.
It was a gift.
Blaze finally took another sip of the priceless whiskey, the liquid burning a smooth, approving path down his throat.
He set the glass back on the table and looked up, meeting the man's expectant gaze.
"What's the real pay?" he asked, his voice stripped of all pretense. "And don't insult me with another filter number."
The man seemed utterly unaffected by Blaze's insolence.
He didn't bristle at the demand, didn't flash anger at the dismissed low pay.
Instead, a spark of genuine, chilling satisfaction glinted in his cool grey eyes, as if Blaze had just passed another unspoken test.
"The real pay," the man said, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial murmur, "is advancement."
Without another word, he turned and walked to a sleek console embedded almost invisibly into the wall.
He pressed his palm against it.
A compartment slid open with a soft hiss, revealing a small, reinforced metal case.
It was unadorned, gunmetal grey, and cold to the touch.
He carried it back, the weight seeming insignificant in his hands, and placed it on the glass table between them with a solid thud.
"Open it," he urged, his gaze fixed on Blaze's face, watching for the reaction.
Blaze stared at the case, then back at the man.
Bewilderment warred with a sharp, rising curiosity.
This wasn't a cred-stick.
This wasn't a promise.
Slowly, he reached out.
The metal was smooth and chill.
He found the latch—a biometric lock already disengaged—and flipped it.
The lid opened on silent hinges.
Inside, nestled in a bed of black shock-absorbent foam, lay a conduit.
But it was unlike any he'd ever seen. It wasn't the utilitarian grey of his stolen Ignis-7.
This one was a deep, lustrous crimson, the color of arterial blood or banked coals.
Its casing was sleek, predatory, with subtle, angular contours that seemed to draw the light inward rather than reflect it.
Along its length, intricate silver glyphs were inlaid—not etched, but grown into the material, glowing with a faint, dormant pulse.
It was beautiful.
It was terrifying.
It looked less like a tool and more like a piece of excavated alien technology.
Blaze's breath caught in his throat.
He knew, instinctively, what this was.
This wasn't just a payday.
This was the next step.
The upgrade.
The real weapon.
The man watched the hunger dawn in Blaze's eyes, and his permanent smile finally touched his eyes with something akin to warmth.
"Consider it a signing bonus," he said softly. "And a down payment on a… more permanent relationship. Hunt the ghost for us. And we'll equip you to become a legend."
Blaze's hand hovered over the crimson conduit, the air in the buried suite thick with the scent of whiskey, perfume, and the beginning of a bloody partnership.