A grip on Ivy’s neck closed tight before the sea could tear any sound from the world above. As it did, no more shouting, no more gunfire, no more of the gecko’s hoarse threats or annoying laughs: only the bubbling of water and the muffled clangs through the Adamant’s steel flank.

  Billy’s arm, refusing to let go, twisted. His other arm came into view, holding a dagger. He stabbed blindly across her chest. Her jaw twisted under the pressure. As the pain in her neck rose, she stopped trust after another, a cut after another. Her arm bled.. But she held; her brain blurred. But no matter how hard he squeezed; no matter how many times he stroked, she'd not give her consciousness, nor a target to his iron. Instead, she waited. Letting them both hover with the tide, the weight of their struggle pulling them down.

  Time played in her favour. At first, Billy seemed to mind as little as she, oblivious to one truth: men need to breathe. Maybe he was blinded by rage, maybe he was just plain stupid. But in that gamble, she was definitely a winner.

  The sea darkened around them. Billy's legs scissored over her waist when his arm released the neck. Then, with both hands on the knife, he pressed in a final, desperate attempt to reach her heart. Her eyes narrowed at the increased force of his push. The man was powerful. Even for her, a creature born with inhuman strength.

  She held.

  The dagger reached her skin and sank its tip. Not much, yet enough to sting. Then, Billy released her. Suddenly, and in disarray. His elbow smashed twice into her head to break the distance. Frustration, maybe. She didn't know, nor did she care.

  Panic seized him, driving a desperate surge toward the light. He thrashed upwards, limbs flailing against the crushing weight of the deep. Ivy gazed at him from below, a smirk popping as the dagger passed down into a fall towards the abyss.

  Before he could reach any further up, she sliced through the distance with a grace only sea creatures possess. She reached his calf and with a sudden surge she yanked him down, reaching in an instant a greater depth than they'd been before. He turned. He tried stabbing her away with an empty hand. A sparkle of change came to his eyes: from the gaze of a man who believes to be in control, to the pitiful look of one who has realized he has never been: the certainty of having made a great, deadly mistake.

  She let her body sway sideways and watched the man return to his struggle. Billy let out a burst of bubbles; his arms and legs turned frantic. His ascent was futile. She rushed up, as fast as she had done before, and dragged him down once more. He thrashed, punching and kicking the water. His limbs flailed with blind ferocity and reached for her with hands like claws. She smiled, ducked him, and grabbed the back of his shirt. Another pull to the abyss.

  His back arched. More bubbles escaped from a clenched jaw. His kicks lost their strength, his eyes widened even more at the sight of death. Strength waned. Seconds. More seconds. A last spasm rolled through him. Then, he went slack.

  Ivy let him float away. For a heartbeat she hovered there, suspended in the cold, watching the man sink until his shadow blurred into the deeper blue.

  She kicked upward.

  Her head burst through the surface with a roar of breath. Smoke curled from the Adamant’s deck, metal shrieks cutting through the chaos. Men shouted. Muskets cracked. Of all the soldiers who had taken them prisoner, no man stood alive anymore. Some lay on the boats; others floated on the water. AhLong appeared from the boat's edge and extended a hand, as bloodied as his face. His smile, usually yellowish by nature, came white as the moon.

  Long let out a chuckle as he pulled her into the boat. The vessel was now secured to the Adamant’s hull and a net of ropes hung from the deck down to the water. “Let's go up! We missing the fun!” he said.

  Ivy gave another look at the surrounding bodies. Before she could sign an answer, a bullet hit the wood at her feet. Above, a musket pointed down, its muzzle blowing out smoke. The soldier cursed and prepared to reload, but before his hand reached for the ramrod, the rounded head of Rob popped at his side. The soldier shrieked as the long fingers of the machine reached his leg and raised him. He screamed even louder when he felt.

  “What are you waiting for, scallywags!” The Machine said. “Ain’t put those ropes for nothing!”

  The Adamant’s cannons blasted.

  “Go destroy those cannons, ye idiot!” AhLong said.

  Rob’s light eyes blinked. One turning off and on, the other releasing sparkles from its broken glass. “Oh, right! Forgot about that!”

  “That thing make old Long so crazy…,” AhLong pointed up. “He always doing crazy things. We go up now or he explode whole ship.”

  Ivy turned and smiled. Riko's fleet was reaching. Boarding was imminent and the fight even.

  —------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

  From the front of the bow, Macha looked as smoke piled over the Adamant’s deck.

  The cannons had stopped. Not slowed. Not turning wider. They had simply gone still, like the dry branches of a dead tree.

  Somewhere around him, someone laughed. A sharp, disbelieving sound, quickly swallowed by the wind. Macha didn’t turn to check on the crew; instead, ?he scouted in ?slow motion over the surrounding waters. Riko’s fleet was still there. Fewer ships than before. Too few. But alive. Scattered, battered but all ready, all converging toward the same point. A herd of rabbits rushing to take down a wolf.

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  Riko’s shout broke Macha from a kind of spell. One of dreams of hope and fears of the unknown. The captain moved across the deck with aggressive purpose, voice cutting through the chaos, hands signaling without hesitation. He didn’t celebrate the Adamant’s silence.

  Macha realized, with a twinge of something uncomfortable, that he had never really liked the man. Riko was too sharp, too stiff, too cold, maybe. Yet, watching him now, watching his crew respond like a single body, put a truth into his mind: Riko was spotless in what he did, and so were his men. And they were definitely the perfect people to be around during such a crazy attack.

  “Boarding positions!” Timo shouted. “Hooks ready! Ropes out!”

  The ships reached the Adamant in waves. The faster cutters struck first, dragging their sides against steel with a sound like gritting teeth. Ropes flew. Hooks bit.

  Soon there was no clear shape to the battle: just a bulk of tangled ships pressed against each other, masts leaning, rigging snarled together, men jumping across gaps no wider than a man’s stride.

  Above them, on the steel deck, soldiers lined up. Macha saw them clearly now. Not monsters of steel. Not the nightmares he witnessed in Tampra. Just men in dark coats, faces smeared with soot and blood, muskets shaking as they aimed down.

  “Up!” Timo yelled. “Up, you dogs!”

  Men climbed; shots cracked. Bodies fell.

  A man two places ahead of Macha took a bullet in the shoulder and pitched backward into the sea without a sound. Another lost his grip and screamed all the way down. Blood streaked the ropes.

  Sharpshooters from Riko’s ships answered, picking targets with brutal efficiency. Soldiers on the Adamant staggered and dropped, some tumbling over the rail, others collapsing where they stood.

  Macha swallowed hard, then he climbed.

  His real hand burned as he pulled himself up the net. His stomach tightened with each step, a twisting knot that made him feel sick. Bullets snapped past him. One punched through the rope beside his head, spraying fibers into his face.

  He didn’t look down; he only climbed. Eyes open but sight blinded by focus and fear. Reaching the rail, he hauled himself over and rolled onto the deck.

  The Adamant’s surface was chaos. Dead bodies lay twisted between darkened pools of what could be oil or blood. Smoke poured from ruptured vents. Men fought. Steel hit flesh, wood hit bone. Screams cut through the air.

  Two soldiers rushed him, swords raised. Macha didn’t hesitate. His revolver raised and fired. Almost as if the tool of killing was too anxious to finally be used for its purpose.

  Both men fell.

  He stared at them for half a second, surprised not by their deaths but by himself. He had expected revulsion. Shock. Something.Instead, his thoughts felt oddly distant. As if they belonged to someone else.

  Another man lunged at him from the side. Macha barely saw him; only the flash of steel and a blur of motion. He raised the revolver, but there was no time.

  Before either could kill, the man crumpled mid-step and fell. His chest reddened: a shoot with no blast had ended his intent.

  Macha turned. Far away, high in the ship’s mast he had just left, Ced was waving.

  “Not bad, Mon’lad,” Macha whispered.

  Timo, chest heaving, teeth grinning, roared in his ear and pulled his shirt. “Eyes here, Count,” he snapped. “This isn’t a fancy duel.”

  Timo rushed forward toward Riko’s voice, not waiting for any answer. Macha followed.

  The fight pressed inward, toward the center of the deck. He fired each time someone came too close. He reloaded without thinking. His hands moved on instinct now. The revolver drum emptied once more. Another reload. More shots. More reloads.

  For some reason, he smiled.He didn't know why. But whatever it was, the feeling vanished when Timo pulled his shirt again. “For the sake of what's mighty, Count… Shoot at the ones with firepower. Leave the ones with blades to us!”

  Macha pushed Timo's hand out but nodded, embarrassed.

  “Range with range…” Timo pressed.”The rest can be…”

  Macha snapped his teeth. “I know! Shut up already!”

  Soon he found himself surrounded by more of their men. A tight crowd shielding him, and seeking the speed of his shots as protection.

  When they reached the middle of the deck, he saw Rob.

  The machine was sitting, legs crossed, body slightly bent. Unmoving. Frozen. His entire frame smoked from every joint, every hole. His head hung low, one eye dark, the other flickering weakly. Sparks blasted from the top side of his torso.

  Macha stared, dread tightening his chest. It was just a machine, yet the feeling was equal to seeing a friend go.

  Ahead, Ivy appeared. She was fighting like something born of violence itself. Two men circled her, blades flashing. She moved between them with grace, turning strikes aside, countering without pause.

  A third man rushed her from behind.

  Macha raised his revolver, but before he could fire, a blur crossed his vision. AhLong moved like a coiled spring, dagger flashing. He struck once, fast and precise like a viper's bite. The attacker fell without a sound. The old man yelled something incomprehensible and turned back into the fray with a smile.

  Ivy got rid of her two opponents right after, and the last enemy soldier dropped moments later.

  Silence crept across the deck, slow and uncertain. Weapons lowered, but hands still tensed to the unforeseeable. Men took breaths of recovery, yet the tension required air to be held.

  Macha let out a shaking exhale, afraid to make any noise. His hand trembled as he stopped his revolver midway to its holster. “Not yet,” he mumbled.

  A hand reached for his shirt again. But it didn't yank this time. The touch was firm and gentle. Riko brought him to his side. The captain’s eyes burned with something fierce and hungry. His was a gaze as intense as Ivy’s, but stripped of any warmth. Yet, it didn’t seem as hollow or dead as AhLong’s.

  “Come on, boy,” Riko said. “This has just begun.”