"We're running on fumes," Jax rumbled, checking the *Rusty Nail*'s diagnostics. "And we're out of protein packs. I can't work on an empty stomach."

  "Orion-Nex," Zero said, pulling up a **Nav-Grid**. "It's a Tier-2 Corporate supply depot. Automated. Minimal security."

  Jax nodded. "I know it. Weak foundations in the loading bay. I welded those beams myself back in the day."

  "I can get us in through a vent," Zero said. "Simple in-and-out."

  ***

  The approach was a silent glide. Val killed the *Rusty Nail's* running lights, letting the ship drift like just another piece of space junk until they were in the depot's blind spot. Zero and Jax cycled the airlock, stepping out into the vacuum.

  Magnetic boots clicked silently against the hull of the depot. The station was a brutalist block of concrete and steel, scarred by micrometeoroids. Zero led the way, his breath loud in his helmet, guiding them to an exhaust port that vented recycled atmosphere in rhythmic, crystallized puffs.

  Zero crawled through the tight maintenance shaft, the air stale and **recycled**. He reached the grate overlooking the warehouse floor and popped it. "I'm in," he whispered over the **Link**. "Opening bay doors."

  Jax moved onto the loading floor, his "Dread-Plate" armor whining under the strain. The massive exoskeleton, with its hazard-striped pauldrons and hydraulic pistons, allowed him to lift pallets that would have crushed a standard **Cargo-Lifter**. He worked with the rhythmic efficiency of a machine, stacking crates of supplies near the airlock.

  Suddenly, the warehouse went black.

  *// INTRUDER ALERT. LOCKDOWN INITIATED. //*

  Red emergency lights bathed the room in blood.

  "Company," Zero hissed, dropping into a combat stance.

  **Viper Squad.**

  Four figures emerged from the shadows. They moved with an unnatural, frictionless grace—like oil sliding over glass. No mechanical stiffness, no servo-whine. They wore sleek, kinetic-dampening armor over bodies honed by synthetic hemoglobin and reinforced myelin sheaths. They didn't walk; they flowed, their movements too perfect, too efficient—the uncanny valley weaponized.

  "The Human Trigger," the leader's voice boomed, amplified. "Your contract has been terminated. Please submit for liquidation."

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  "Jax, load the ship," Zero commanded. "I'll buy you time."

  "They're Corporate Aces," Jax warned, not stopping his work. "Gen-Mods. Be careful."

  Zero ignited the Lobotomizer. "Let's see if your nervous system has a firewall."

  He focused, pushing the logic packet at the leader, trying to crash his motor cortex. *Breathe. Sync. Crash.*

  Nothing happened. The leader didn't stumble. His armor didn't freeze.

  "Cyber-Pure," Zero realized, a cold knot forming in his stomach. "No neural jacks. No handshakes."

  The Ace fired a plasma bolt. Zero deflected it with the flat of his blade, the magnetic field shoving the superheated gas aside, but the impact jarred his shoulder. He slashed at the leader’s leg, but the refined durasteel armor held, sparks showering the floor.

  "Refined durasteel," the Ace laughed, backhanding Zero with a gauntleted fist.

  Zero hit a crate, his ribs screaming in protest. He rolled, barely dodging a follow-up stomp that cracked the concrete floor.

  "Zero!" Val yelled over the comms. "We're clear, but you're pinned!"

  "Cas! Drop the Titan!" Zero screamed, spitting blood.

  "You'll depressurize the station!" Cas argued.

  "DO IT!"

  The ceiling tore open with a deafening screech of rending metal. **The atmosphere screamed as it vented into the void, a hurricane of loose crates and debris sucked upward before the emergency shutters slammed down.** Debris rained onto the deck, followed by forty tons of fusion-powered consequences. **Hades dropped.**

  The impact shook the entire station. Zero scrambled up the gantry and vaulted into the open cockpit.

  *// HELLO, ZERO. //*

  "Time to go," Zero growled.

  The Titan moved. Zero punched the Ace leader. Forty tons of hydraulic force met two hundred pounds of biological perfection. The Ace didn't fly; he detonated. A hydrostatic explosion of red mist and armor fragments coated the far wall as the leader was liquefied on impact. "Get out of my way."

  He grabbed the pallet of supplies Jax had prepped and fired the jump-jets, blasting out through the hole in the roof.

  "You reckless idiot," Val snapped as they docked. "But good catch on the drop."