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Savvine took the lead, familiar with every plating and corridor.

Moving through darkened walkways and glass-walled chambers, they became shadows, surgical and lethal.

Eugene’s remaining droids, still stalking the halls, were no match.

One good thing about Eugene’s control-freak madness was the fact that the entire civilian population was safe on one deck, leaving most of the lower and upper corridors to the automatons.

These hallways turned into kill zones.

While Savvine provided intel, Kaal, Boaz, and Santi’s weapons razed and cut down at will, felling droids before they got a chance to blast.

Miral’s attacks were devastating. She flung metanoids that fractured into seething rivers of energy that darted like needle-fanged serpents into the army of droids.

Miniature suns flared. Circuits popped and twisted as metal husks collapsed into molten ruin.

Then came the human element.

The Bianchi’s rogue security teams, loyal to the fake Eugene, sprang traps and opened fire.

Kaal met them head-on, fists shattering visors and collapsing rib cages with seismic blows.

Boaz and Santi’s rifles sang death, each shot clean, fast, and lethal. Heads snapped back. Limbs dropped, no wasted motion.

Savvine’s laser blades left trails of smoldering blue across the blackened walls as she fought, motivated by justice incarnate.

By the time they reached the bridge, blood and laser soot smeared her suit and boots.

Her chest rose steadily. Her pulse thrummed with measured violence.

Her eyes fell on the cluster of Bianchi defectors, the last gasp of a failed coup, huddled near the controls, weapons clutched with shaking hands.

Some pleaded. Some ran. None got far.

She disarmed them with brutal efficiency and cuffed them, turning their betrayal into a quiet reckoning.

She tapped her HUD, and the visor lifted, revealing her face to them.

Their faces blanched with fear as she glared at them. ‘Suchfokkin’ cowards. You traded legacy for leverage, and you will answer for it if I’ve anything to do with it.’

‘Savvine?’ Kaal’s voice crackled over her neural channel.

Her rifle lowered an inch. ‘Report.’

‘We’re in the aft ballast compartments, lower decks. You’re gonna want to see this.’

After marching the traitors to the nearest brig, Savvine and Miral descended via an elevator to the darkened stories.

The lift bypassed multiple sealed hatches as they dropped through the skeletal spine of the generational ship. The air grew warmer, humid, and strange.

They followed the reek of chemicals and the flicker of ambient light.

Santi met them at a thick security door, fingers tapping the bypass sequence.

It hissed open.

What lay beyond defied explanation.

Piles of lush cushions in mismatched silk and velvet. String lights strung between rusted bulkheads.