Chapter 39 – Pressure Test
The subway spat them out into the night like it wanted them gone.
Jack climbed the cracked stairwell two steps at a time, boots leaving wet prints on the concrete. Victor followed slower, his rifle barrel low but steady, his silence heavier than the tunnels they'd left behind.
The city above was alive again, but in a different way. Neon sputtered in bursts, broken drones sparked in gutters, and fires burned in oil barrels that threw ragged shadows across the walls.
And everywhere Jack looked, people were watching.
Scavengers huddled in doorways. Gang lookouts crouched on fire escapes. Children pressed against shattered windows with wide eyes that didn't blink.
None of them screamed. None of them ran. They just stared.
One whispered loud enough to carry: "The King."
Others picked it up. A ripple moving through the crowd, faster than Jack could move his hand to quiet it.
"The King. The King."
Jack's shoulders squared without meaning to. He didn't smile. He didn't wave. He just let the word hang in the air, thick as smoke.
Victor's jaw clenched. He didn't join the chant.
They pushed through the crowd until the street widened into what used to be a market square. Stalls were overturned, tarps shredded, bullet holes stitched into rusted sheet metal. Someone had painted a crown across the cracked pavement, fresh enough the paint still glistened in the firelight.
Jack stopped on it without looking down. The whispers hushed. For a moment, silence wrapped around him like a cloak.
Victor finally spoke. Quiet. "You hear them, don't you?"
Jack kept his eyes forward. "I hear everything."
"That's not what I meant."
Jack glanced at him. "Say it, then."
Victor's throat worked. His grip on the rifle tightened. "They don't see Jack anymore. They see Marcus in a crown. And you're not correcting them."
Jack let the words settle. He could've argued. Could've denied it. Instead, he tilted his head like he was testing the sound of the chant still echoing faintly in the walls.
"Maybe I don't need to."
Victor's mouth opened, then closed. He looked away, like the sight of Jack standing dead-center on that crown mark was more than he could stomach.
Before he could answer, the crowd shifted. A gang strode forward, weapons strapped across their backs, faces painted with crude crowns. Their leader, a tall man with a scar bisecting his lip, stopped just short of the painted mark.
"King," he said, voice carrying. "The Sprawl's yours. We'll bleed for you. Just point us."
Jack studied him. His blade hand twitched once, then stilled.
Victor broke in before Jack could speak. "We don't need this." His voice cut, sharp and warning. "We don't need them."
The gang leader's eyes flicked to Victor. "You don't speak for him."
Victor raised his rifle without hesitation. "I do if he's not himself."
The words landed like a spark in dry brush. The crowd's murmur rose again, but not in unison this time. Half chanting "King," half muttering about betrayal, about weakness.
Jack's pulse quickened. His hand brushed the hilt at his side.
For a moment, Marcus's grin flashed again—not in his vision this time, but in the painted crown at his feet. The wet paint seemed to ripple, stretching into a smile.
"Take them," Marcus's voice teased, laced with amusement. "They're already yours. Only he stands in the way."
Jack's jaw locked. He wanted to swing, to silence the doubt with steel, to prove that the chant meant something. His fingers curled around the hilt.
Victor saw it. He stepped closer, barrel rising to cover both Jack and the gang in one motion. "Don't." His voice cracked, raw. "Not them. Not me. Don't give him what he wants."
The silence that followed felt endless. The gang leader waited, half-kneeling already, ready to pledge. The crowd held their breath. The paint dripped at Jack's boots like blood.
Jack's blade stayed sheathed. But the tremor in his hand didn't stop.
He finally spoke, low. "Get out of my sight."
The gang hesitated, then obeyed, backing away, muttering confusion but not defiance. The crowd thinned, leaving only the echo of the chant bouncing off walls already scarred by fire.
Victor lowered his rifle but didn't look at Jack. His voice was softer this time, almost breaking. "You wanted to take the crown? You just saw what it costs."
Jack didn't answer. He couldn't. His reflection in a shattered storefront window caught his eye—the firelight bending it until Marcus's grin lingered there, faint but waiting.
He turned away before Victor could see.
But the line between them hadn't blurred tonight. It had sharpened.
And both men knew the next time Jack reached for that blade, Victor might not hesitate.