Ash didn't sleep that night. Couldn't.
Every time he closed his eyes, the docks came back—the floodlight dying, the hiss of bullets through mist, the wet weight of a man's throat collapsing under his knife. He'd killed before. Too many times to keep score. But this was different. This one reeked of setup.
Salvo had sent them into a trap.
Ash sat on the rooftop ledge, rain pooling at his boots, lighter rolling across his knuckles. He flicked it open, flame biting against the dark, then snapped it shut. Over and over, the ritual was almost enough to keep his thoughts from circling.
Cass was sprawled on the opposite side of the roof, jacket peeled off, steam rising from her shirt. She'd stretched out like a cat after a hunt, eyes closed, lips curled in a grin that hadn't faded since the fight.
"Still wound up?" she murmured without opening her eyes.
Ash's jaw tightened. "You should be too. Salvo knew."
Cass cracked one eye. "Maybe. Or maybe he didn't care enough to check who else had their hands in the cookie jar. Either way—we're breathing. I call that a win."
Ash stared at her. "You call being sold out a win?"
Cass shrugged. "Breathing's better than not. You've gotta stop thinking the city owes you anything but that."
Her grin lingered, but her eyes were sharp. Cass lived for the edge, thrived on danger the way other people thrived on air. Ash couldn't decide if it made her strong or doomed. Maybe both.
Mina sat cross-legged between them, sketchbook balanced on her lap. The stub of a pencil scraped faintly across the page. She hadn't spoken a word since the docks. Not when Ash dragged her under the dolly, not when the blood hit his hands, not even when Cass stepped over bodies with a laugh. Silent through all of it, but her eyes caught everything.
Ash leaned over. She tilted the book without prompting.
Three figures. Two tall, one small. Their faces smeared into shadow, unrecognisable. Behind them, the container burned, fire curling out of it like wings.
Ash's stomach twisted.
"See?" Cass drawled. "Kid gets it. Fire and blood, just another night in Breakwater."
Ash snapped the book shut and handed it back. Mina flinched but hugged it close.
Cass raised an eyebrow. "Easy, Moreno. She's not the enemy."
"She's a kid," Ash said flatly. "She shouldn't have to draw this."
Cass's grin faded. She leaned back on her elbows. "Shouldn't and is don't line up much here. She'll be fine. Tougher than she looks."
Ash didn't answer. He knew better than to argue with Cass's brand of optimism—the kind that was half denial, half bloodlust.
By dawn, the rain eased into drizzle. Breakwater's skyline glowed faint and washed out, towers uptown gleaming like teeth, slums sagging like gums around them.
Ash pulled his hood up. "I'm seeing Salvo."
Cass sat up, swinging her boots under her. "Alone?"
"Safer that way."
"Or dumber. He already sold us once, what makes you think he won't finish the job?"
Ash's lighter clicked open, flame wavering. "Because I've got something he wants."
Cass tilted her head. "The crates?"
Ash killed the flame, pocketed the lighter. "Information. He'll want to know what went wrong. And I'll know what he's hiding."
Mina hugged her sketchbook tighter, eyes locked on him. Watching. Always watching.
Cass pushed herself up, brushing water off her jacket. "Fine. Go. But don't expect me to clean up your corpse if he gets cute."
Ash almost smiled. "You'd just loot my pockets."
Cass grinned again. "Exactly."
She turned to Mina, crouching low. "Keep him honest, yeah?"
Mina blinked once, then bent back to her page.
Cass straightened, satisfied. "Good enough."
Ash left them on the rooftop. He moved through alleys slick with dawn, past noodle stalls setting up for the day, past men hosing blood off last night's pavement. Breakwater didn't sleep—it just shifted masks between storms.
Salvo's shop was lit early, a yellow bulb buzzing over the mesh-covered window. Ash pushed through the door, lighter rolling in his hand, and found the fixer at his desk, coffee steaming, ledger open.
Salvo looked up with a thin smile. "Moreno. On time. That's new."
Ash didn't sit. "The truck wasn't there."
Salvo's brow arched, just a twitch. "No?"
"No. And we weren't the only ones looking for that container."
Salvo sipped his coffee, unbothered. "Rivals happen. You handled it?"
Ash's hand tightened around the lighter. "You set us up."
Salvo's smile thinned further, not vanishing, just stretching taut. "If I had, you'd be floating in the harbour."
Ash took a step closer. "You sent me into that with Cass, with the kid, without telling me what was inside. Weapons, Salvo. Corps don't lose crates like that. Not by accident."
Salvo's eyes flicked sharply. "And yet here you are. Alive. Paid. Complaining."
Ash leaned forward, voice low. "I don't work blind."
Salvo studied him for a long moment, the silence heavier than the rain outside. Finally, he set the coffee down.
"You'll work how I say," Salvo murmured. "Or you won't work at all."
Ash stood at the desk, hood dripping, lighter hot in his palm. Salvo's words hung in the stale air: work how I say, or don't work at all.
Ash's jaw clenched. "You think you can just burn me?"
Salvo leaned back in his chair, steepling his fingers. "Burn you? Please. If I wanted that, you'd be cinders in a boiler by now. You're not that hard to lose, Moreno."
The lighter clicked open in Ash's hand, flame flickering. He snapped it shut again, the sound sharp as a gunshot. "Then why am I still here?"
Salvo's eyes narrowed, glinting sharp as glass. "Because you still turn a profit."
The fixer's calm grated worse than the threat. Ash's blood ran hot. He wanted to slam the blade into Salvo's ledger, watch the man flinch, but he didn't. He forced his voice low, steady.
"You sent me blind into corps' munitions. You didn't mention rivals. Didn't mention bait."
Salvo smiled thin, cruel. "Details slow people down. You don't need details, Moreno—you need outcomes. You're alive. Cass is alive. Even the kid's alive, gods know why you dragged her along. So where's the problem?"
Ash took a half step closer, flame clicking again in his hand. "The problem is, you turned me into collateral. Again."
Salvo's smile dropped. He leaned forward across the desk, voice razor sharp now. "Don't confuse yourself with principle. You're a rat I feed scraps to because you know when to keep your head down. You want clean? You want fair? Wrong city, Moreno."
The words cut sharper than the threats. Ash's chest tightened. He hated how much of it was true.
"Don't mistake survival for loyalty," Ash said flatly. "I walk if you pull this again."
Salvo's laugh was low, humourless. "Walk? Where? To another fixer who'll slit your throat the second a corp waves a contract? To the COA? To the streets with that little soot rat you picked up?"
Ash's knuckles whitened around the lighter, pulse hammering against bone.
Salvo leaned in, voice dripping. "Word travels fast. Little soot rat clinging to you like a habit you can't kick. Play daddy if you want. Doesn't change the math. Orphans don't survive this city—they break, they sell, they burn."
Something snapped in Ash's chest. He slammed the lighter onto the desk, flame bursting tall. Paper curled black at its edges before he snapped it shut again.
Salvo didn't flinch. Just smiled.
"There's the Moreno I know," he said softly. "Fire in his hand, no idea where to aim it."
Ash leaned in, voice barely more than a rasp. "Touch the kid and I open your throat before you stand."
For the first time, Salvo's eyes chilled, smile vanishing. The mask slipped, just a fraction. Enough.
The silence stretched. Rain ticked against the mesh-covered windows like fingers drumming.
Finally, Salvo exhaled, long and slow. "We're done here. You've got your cut. Take it, keep your head low, and pray the corps don't ask questions. Next job, you show up or you don't. Either way, Breakwater keeps spinning."
Ash stared at him for another beat, then scooped the envelope off the desk without looking inside. He turned for the door.
"Moreno," Salvo called after him.
Ash stopped, hand on the knob.
The fixer's voice was calm again, smooth as oil. "You want to play hero? That's fine. But this city doesn't care who you save. It only counts who's left standing. Don't forget which one you are."
Ash walked out into the rain before the words could sink their hooks.
The street outside was grey, with drizzle, and neon smeared across the wet pavement. Ash shoved the envelope deep in his jacket, lighter still burning cold in his hand.
He'd faced down Salvo before, but this was different. This was open. Bare. A line drawn across the city, and he knew sooner or later one of them would bleed over it.
The thought didn't scare him. What scared him was Mina's wide eyes waiting on that rooftop, sketchbook ready to draw whatever came next.
The rain came harder when Ash stepped out of Salvo's shop, like the sky was trying to scrub him clean and failing. Water streaked down his hood, down his collar, dripping off his knuckles. He shoved the envelope deeper into his jacket, but it still felt too thin, too light for the weight of the night.
Breakwater's streets pulsed awake around him. Vendors rolled carts into the grey morning, tarps snapping in the wind. Noodle stalls lit propane stoves, steam rising fragrant through exhaust. Somewhere across the block, a siren wailed short and sharp—nothing unusual, just another alarm swallowed by the storm.
Ash walked, lighter hot against his palm, thoughts grinding like broken gears.
Salvo knew. He'd known about the container, known about the rivals, maybe even about the missing truck. Sending Ash and Cass in had been less about the job, more about seeing what survived when the smoke cleared.
And Mina. Salvo knew about her, too. That cut deeper than the knives and bullets. A fixer could use money, guns, and contacts. But a child? That wasn't leverage—it was a death sentence waiting for delivery.
Ash's boots splashed through puddles, reflections shattering into neon shards. He passed a wall plastered with campaign posters—same plastic smile on every sheet, eyes too polished, hands folded like prayer. Vote Renewal. Vote Safety. Someone had spray-painted a coffin over the smile; the red paint ran in the rain.
He kept walking.
His head throbbed with every step. Cass had laughed through the fight, enjoyed it in a way he couldn't. She thrived on chaos. He just endured it. But Mina—Mina had sat silent, watching, her pencil scratching death into paper before it happened. Like she'd already learned Breakwater's rhythm: nothing survived clean.
He flicked his lighter open. Flame hissed against the rain, fragile but stubborn. He let it live a moment before snapping it shut.
"Fire in his hand, no idea where to aim it." Salvo's voice replayed sharp as broken glass.
Ash ground his teeth. He had an idea where to aim it. Straight at Salvo. Straight at the corps fattening off the slums. Straight at every fixer who sold lives like cheap cigarettes. But he also knew what fire did—burned out of control. Ate fuel fast. Left nothing but ash.
And Mina wasn't fuel.
He cut down an alley, where steam poured from dryer vents and rats scrambled over trash bags. A man slept under a tarp, bottle clutched like a prayer bead. Further down, two kids argued over a broken umbrella, their voices sharp until one swung a fist. The other swung back. No one stopped them. No one ever did.
Ash slowed, watching them. One was maybe Mina's age. Nine, ten. Both hungry, clothes soaked through, fists more bone than muscle. They fought like it didn't matter who won—because it didn't. The city would eventually consume both of them.
His chest tightened.
He tossed his lighter once, caught it, and kept walking.
The drizzle turned to mist as he neared the docks again—not Pier 17, but close enough that the air still stank of diesel and fish. Floodlights hummed faintly overhead, buzzing against the grey. He could almost hear last night's shots, Cass's laugh, the scream of the man with a pipe in his hand.
He stopped at the edge of the water. Black waves slapped the pier, oily sheen catching slivers of neon. Somewhere out there, a gull cried, ragged and thin.
Ash pulled the envelope from his jacket. Peeled it open. Bills damp from the rain, a handful of crumpled notes. Not even close to worth the blood spilt. Not close to worth the risk to Mina.
He wanted to throw it into the water, watch the bills soak and sink. He didn't. Survival wasn't cheap, and Mina needed food, clothes, maybe even medicine if the smoke had scarred her lungs. Rage didn't pay. Rage didn't feed.
He stuffed the envelope back into his jacket, fists tight.
The city stretched behind him, towers gleaming faintly beyond the mist, slums rotting in the shadow. He didn't belong to either. Just the cracks in between, the places people forgot until fire drove them out.
He flicked the lighter open one more time, flame shivering in the wind. He stared at it until his eyes burned, until the sting made the edges blur. Then he snapped it shut and turned away from the water.
Back to Mina. Back to Cass. Back to the rooftop where the only thing holding him upright was the fact that—for now—they were still breathing.
Ash threaded back through the alleys, boots splashing, shoulders tight. The drizzle softened, but Breakwater never felt lighter. The city pressed down from every angle—neon, rot, noise, silence.
He passed a mural painted across a cracked brick wall: a child's face, haloed in yellow. Someone had scrawled beneath it in white spray: Remember the fires.
Ash stopped. The paint was fresh. Still wet. Rain streaked it like tears.
He stared a long time, lighter heavy in his hand, before finally moving again.
The climb back to the rooftop felt longer than usual. His legs dragged. His lungs burned with the memory of smoke.
At the top, he paused with his hand on the rusted railing. He didn't look yet—couldn't. He already knew what he'd see: Mina sketching flames, Cass grinning, Salvo's words gnawing through his skull.
Breakwater never let him breathe.
And Salvo's words would still be waiting, crawling under his skin.
Ash pulled his hood lower, forcing his legs to climb the last steps.
Whatever was coming, he knew one thing. Breakwater had marked him, just as it had marked them all. And fire—always fire—was still waiting to finish the job.