The copper-wire line went dead with a hiss of static that sounded like a scream cut short.
"Rowan?" Ivy shouted into the brass mouthpiece of her field-telegraph. "Luca? Answer me!"
Silence. Only the faint, rhythmic ticking of the relay gears answered her.
Ivy sat hunched inside a cramped, soot-stained coal chute overlooking the Syndicate outpost. Her hands flew across the keys of her portable difference-engine, desperately trying to re-establish the connection, but every access point was walled off by heavy mechanical encryption.
"They're gone," Ivy whispered, panic rising like bile in her throat. "They took them."
She didn't freeze. She did the only thing she could. She patched her transmitter into the emergency frequency—a highly illegal radio wave reserved for catastrophic failures.
"Dorothy," Ivy's voice shook. "Jack. Pick up. Please pick up."
Three miles away, in the gritty backroom of the Leviathan Pub, Jack was in the middle of a delicate negotiation. The pub was built into the petrified ribs of some ancient beast, smelling of stale ale and pipe weed. Jack sat across from a heavy-set smuggler, haggling over the price of clean water filters.
"Forty sovereigns per unit is highway robbery," Jack leaned back, flashing an easy, roguish smile. He adjusted his charcoal waistcoat. "I can get them for twenty down in the Mud-Flats."
"Then go to the Mud-Flats," the smuggler sneered, revealing a mouth full of gold teeth.
Dorothy sat in the corner, cleaning the flint of a heavy iron dagger. She looked bored, but her golden-flecked eyes were constantly scanning the exits. She wore a heavy mechanic's apron made of boiled leather, her face smeared with engine grease to mask her fine features.
Jack's earpiece chirped.
He tapped the brass receiver. "Not a good time, Ivy. I'm trying to—"
"They took the kids, Jack! Finch set them up! The Syndicate has them in Sector 4!"
Jack's smile vanished so fast it was like a gas-lamp blowing out in a gale. The easy-going charm completely evaporated, replaced by a cold, deadly seriousness that made the smuggler shift uncomfortably.
"Where?" Jack asked, his voice dropping an octave.
The smuggler blinked. "Hey, mate, are we dealing or—"
Jack ignored him entirely. He looked at Dorothy. He didn't need to say a single word. Dorothy had heard the tone of his voice. She sheathed her dagger with a sharp click and stood up. The boredom was gone.
"Sector 4 Outpost," Jack said to her, standing up so abruptly his chair tipped over. "It was a trap."
Dorothy didn't ask questions. She didn't panic. She just walked to the door, reaching under the floorboards behind the bar to retrieve a heavy, brass-barreled repeating rifle.
"Let's go," she said.
They took Jack's steam-carriage. It looked like a rusted, battered junk heap from the outside, but beneath the hood beat an over-pressurized boiler stolen from a military interceptor.
Jack drove like a madman, weaving through the dense, fog-choked traffic of the Gaslight District. He mounted cobblestone sidewalks, shattered glass streetlamps, and drifted around sharp brick corners with inches to spare, the steam whistle shrieking continuously.
"Ivy says they're in the holding cells," Jack said, his knuckles white on the wooden steering wheel. "Processing for the Indentured Mines usually takes an hour. We have twenty minutes before the armored transport arrives."
"We'll make it," Dorothy said calmly. She was checking the firing mechanism on her rifle, ensuring the aether-infused powder was dry.
They screeched to a halt in the narrow alley behind the outpost. Ivy dropped from the coal chute to meet them, her clothes covered in black dust.
"The perimeter is locked down," Ivy reported breathlessly, checking her ticking brass compass-tracker. "Reinforced deadbolts on the rear entrance. The lock is mechanical, but it's shielded. I can't pick it fast enough."
"I can," Jack grabbed a small, clay vial from his coat pocket—an alchemical breaching charge. "Cover me."
They ran to the heavy iron door. Jack slapped the clay putty onto the lock mechanism and shoved a short fuse into it. He struck a match.
"Back up!" Jack muttered.
BANG.
The explosion blew the lock entirely out of the door frame, sending a shower of sparks and iron shrapnel into the corridor.
Jack kicked the door open. They stormed inside.
The brick hallway was empty, but the sound of heavy, metallic footsteps echoed from the far end.
"Automatons," Dorothy signaled, raising her hand. "Centurions."
Two massive, ironclad machines rounded the corner. Their glowing red glass eyes locked onto the intruders. Steam hissed from the joints in their armor as they raised heavy, crackling shock-batons.
"Hostiles detected," one hissed through its vocal-bellows.
Jack raised his revolver, but his hands were shaking slightly. He was a thief and a driver, not a soldier.
Dorothy stepped firmly in front of him. She raised the repeating rifle, but her finger didn't go to the trigger. She rested her hand flat against the brass barrel.
She reached out with her mind. She felt the refined aether flowing through the automatons—the artificial, caged magic that powered their clockwork hearts. It felt cold, rigid, and deeply unnatural compared to the warm, ancient blood in her own veins.
Just a nudge, she thought. Don't break them. Just... confuse them.
She focused entirely on the mainspring power couplings in the automatons' iron knee joints. She sent a tiny, invisible pulse of Ancient Magic—disguised perfectly as a random static discharge—straight into the mechanism.
Pop.
The lead machine's leg seized up violently. The gears ground against each other with a horrific screech. It stumbled, its heavy momentum sending it crashing face-first into the brick wall. The second machine turned its head to look at its partner, momentarily confused by the malfunction.
"Now!" Dorothy shouted.
Jack fired. Two deafening shots rang out in the enclosed space. The bullets shattered the glass optical sensors of the machines while they were distracted. The automatons slumped to the floor, blind, sparking, and venting steam.
"Nice shooting," Jack breathed, lowering his smoking gun. "Their servos must be rusting. Cheap Syndicate junk."
"Yeah," Dorothy said, lowering her rifle, hiding the faint golden glow fading from her fingertips. "Lucky break."
They sprinted to the holding cells. Through the reinforced iron bars, they saw Rowan, Luca, and Luna slumped on the cold stone floor, unconscious.
"The kids," Jack's voice cracked. He jammed a crowbar into the cell lock and put his entire weight onto it, snapping the bolt.
The iron gate swung open.
Dorothy rushed in, immediately checking Luna's pulse. "They're alive. Just stunned by a galvanic coil."
"We have to carry them," Jack grabbed the heavy frame of Luca, throwing the boy's arm over his shoulder. "Ivy, take Luna. Dorothy, get Rowan."
They dragged the unconscious teenagers out of the cell, their boots slipping on the slick floor.
"Transport inbound!" Ivy warned, checking her tracker. "Two minutes!"
They burst out the back door just as a massive, armored Syndicate carriage—drawn by terrifying, mechanical iron-horses—turned the corner at the end of the alley.
"Go! Go! Go!" Jack yelled, throwing Luca into the back seat of his steam-carriage.
They piled in. It was a brutally tight squeeze—bodies draped on top of bodies. Jack slammed the carriage into its highest gear, throwing the boiler valve wide open.
The Syndicate transport opened fire. Heavy, mounted Gatling guns chewed up the cobblestone pavement right behind them, the bullets sparking against the brick walls.
"Hold on!" Jack screamed.
He slammed the throttle. The carriage shot forward, fishtailing wildly out of the alley and merging into the chaotic traffic of the Gaslight District, disappearing into the sea of horse-drawn cabs and thick, yellow fog.
Dorothy looked back through the rear window. The armored transport was stuck behind a massive merchant's cart, unable to pursue.
She let out a long, ragged breath. She looked down at Rowan, whose head was resting heavily on her lap. He groaned softly, shifting in his sleep, a dark bruise forming on his temple.
"You're safe," Dorothy whispered, gently brushing the soot-stained hair out of his face.
She looked at her own hand. It was trembling. Using the magic, even that tiny, invisible amount, always left a cold, terrifying residue in her veins. A harsh reminder of what she truly was. A reminder of the price on her head if the Syndicate ever found out.
"That was too close," Jack said, his eyes constantly checking the rear-view mirrors. "Finch. That little rat."
"He's dead," Dorothy said. Her voice wasn't angry or hysterical. It was a simple, icy statement of fact. "When the kids are safe... I'm going back to that office."
Jack looked at her in the mirror. He saw the look in her golden-flecked eyes—the exact same look she had when she found little Asher starving in the gutter years ago. The look of a mother wolf whose den had been threatened.
"We'll both go back," Jack agreed darkly.
They drove into the deep shadows of the Ash-Dregs, leaving the bright, mocking lights of the upper tiers behind, carrying their broken family home.