The outpost lights flickered once, sighed, and gave up.
Hana stood from the power node, wiping grime on her sleeve. "Dead. I can't do more without a real grid."
"Good enough," I said. "If it's not exploding, it's fixed."
Jax stretched his knee and made the kind of sound that says I'm fine when it actually means I might fall apart. "Still attached," he muttered. "Barely."
The canal still smoked where the Butcher went down, the water bubbling around what was left of him. Across the river, the cathedral towers caught what sunlight they could through the ash—dull gold bleeding through gray, like the sky was trying to remember its job.
The not-music was still there. Quiet. Waiting.
Hana stared at the water. "He is close. You can feel it in the air—like the city's holding its breath."
"Then we go make it exhale," Jax said, already looking toward the bridge.
"Bridge route's fastest," I said. "And probably suicidal."
He grinned without humor. "So, normal day."
