Season 1 chapter 9
The Fall of the "Hero"
At the Central Police Precinct, the atmosphere was thick with confusion and bitter resentment. Officer Vane, the corrupt cop who had been shot in the leg back in the forest, sat in a wheelchair with his leg heavily bandaged. He was fully expecting a massive metal of valor and a permanent promotion for surviving a "terrorist attack."
Instead, a high-ranking Internal Affairs colonel walked into the room and aggressively tossed a thin manila folder directly onto his lap.
"You're completely done, Vane," the colonel said, his voice flat and profoundly bored. "The official administrative report says you tripped over a tree root and accidentally discharged your own weapon into your leg like an absolute rookie."
"What?!" Vane gasped, grabbing the folder. "No! I was shot by—"
"You are being dishonorably discharged for gross negligence," the colonel interrupted coldly. "If you open your mouth to a single state journalist, you will find out exactly how deep the Naurkov river really is. Pack your shit and get out of my precinct."
Vane sat there, his mouth hanging open in pure shock, as his "hero" narrative was completely incinerated by the very corrupt system he had served.
The Great Retreat
The military lockdown didn't just stop; it violently imploded. Across the city of Seistain, the gears of the military machine ground to a screeching, embarrassing halt. One minute, the city was a heavily fortified cage; the next minute, the guards were frantically fumbling over themselves to disappear into the shadows.
The Iron Bridge, which had been completely choked with armored steam-trucks and soldiers, suddenly echoed with the sound of panicked retreat orders. Sergeants were screaming at their squads—not to hunt the targets, but to pack the wooden crates and get out of the public eye. The massive steam-tanks belched thick plumes of black soot as they awkwardly pivoted on their treads, rumbling in reverse back toward the Naurkov barracks.
"Move it! Move it, you worthless idiots!" a captain barked at a group of soldiers who were frantically scrubbing a brick wall with wire brushes.
They weren't just taking down the wanted posters of Kniya Anderson and Malesh Bulwadi—they were trying to physically erase the memory of them. The charcoal sketches were torn down with such desperate violence that the paper shredded in their hands. The soldiers scrubbed at the posters with buckets of lye until the red brick was raw.
The massive searchlights that had been scarring the clouds were violently flicked off. The sudden silence and darkness that fell over the city was heavy. The citizens of Seistain peeked out from behind their curtains, watching the "mighty" vanguard army retreat in a state of confused panic. They didn't know about the stolen transfer notes. They didn't know about the extortion call. All they knew was that the State had just spent millions of credits to hunt down two children, and by sunrise, the State was running away with its tail securely between its legs.
The Lies at the Doorstep
As the sun began to bleach the smog-filled sky into a pale, sickly grey, two high-end military cruisers—armored, sleek, and painted jet black—glided quietly into the elite residential district.
The first cruiser stopped at the Bulwadi Estate. The massive steel gates slid open with a low hum. Mr. Bulwadi was already standing on the front porch. He wasn't wearing pajamas; he was dressed in a sharp charcoal-grey suit vest, checking his gold pocket watch and looking every bit like the ruthless corporate shark he was.
A colonel stepped out of the armored car, sweating heavily despite the morning chill. "Sir... regarding your son, Malesh. There has been a... grave clerical misunderstanding."
Mr. Bulwadi didn't move a single muscle. He didn't even blink. "A misunderstanding? You turned this entire district into a war zone. You plastered my son's face on every dirty gutter in Seistain. And now you are standing on my imported gravel telling me it was a mistake?"
"It was a... highly classified youth military drill, sir," the colonel stammered nervously, his eyes darting to the estate's security cameras. "A simulation of urban evasion. The posters were part of the realism. The General himself sends his deepest apologies. Your son... he performed admirably."
Mr. Bulwadi let out a cold, sharp breath that sounded exactly like a blade sliding out of a sheath. "Admirable. Tell Knorwin Klove that if a single hair on Malesh's head is out of place, or if a single legal document regarding this 'drill' remains in the public record, I will financially liquidate his entire department's pension fund by noon. Now get off my property."
The colonel scrambled back into the car in sheer terror. The lie had been delivered, but Mr. Bulwadi wasn't buying it—he was just collecting the debt.
A few miles away, the second car reached the Anderson Estate. Kniya's parents didn't meet the officers at the door. They made the high-ranking military couriers wait in the cold marble foyer for ten full minutes—a highly calculated corporate power move.
When the Anderson elders finally appeared, the air in the room seemed to drop ten degrees. They listened to the story of the "clerical error" with a terrifying, hollow silence.
"A clerical error," Kniya's father repeated, his voice smooth and incredibly dangerous. "And the massive city-wide search? The gunfire reported near the Archives?"
"Internal security testing, Lord Anderson," the officer whispered, bowing his head in submission.
"I see," the father replied, his eyes dark with a secret knowledge the officer couldn't comprehend. "My son will be home shortly. You may tell the General that the Anderson family does not forget 'errors.' We simply wait for the mathematically correct time to adjust them."
The Long Walk Home
Kniya and Malesh were walking right down the center of the Grand Boulevard, the absolute most expensive street in the Republic. Their ruined school shoes, caked in sewer slime and dried blood, left highly disrespectful dark stains all over the pristine white pavement.
"Look at this shit," Kniya laughed, gesturing to a crew of soldiers frantically power-washing the base of a statue where a wanted poster had been pasted. "They are scrubbing like their lives depend on it. Klove must be shitting absolute bricks right now."
Malesh adjusted his torn, blood-stained sleeve, trying to maintain some level of professional dignity. "He should be. We didn't just successfully blackmail him, Kniya. We fundamentally embarrassed him. A Military General getting completely outplayed by two kids? That is a stain you cannot wash off with industrial lye."
"Bro," Kniya said, stopping for a second to look at the massive Anderson gates appearing in the distance. "What are we going to do when we walk in there? My parents... they aren't like normal people. They don't scream when they are mad. They just... watch you. It's way creepier."
Malesh wiped a smear of grease from his chin, his face deadpan. "My old man is going to be a fucking statue of ice. He won't ask if I am physically okay. He will ask if I followed the proper corporate protocol during the evasion. He loves that professional bullshit. But hey, at least we have the 80,000 credits coming. We can buy a whole new wardrobe and a private telephone line just to prank-call Klove's office at 3 AM."
Kniya let out a genuine laugh. "School is going to be the real nightmare, though. The posters are gone, but the kids... they saw us. They saw the 'Terrorists.' Every teacher, every student, and every gossip-mongering idiot in that building is going to be staring at us tomorrow."
"Let them stare," Malesh stated flatly, his eyes flashing with a new, highly dangerous edge. "Let them wonder how we successfully acquired our freedom. We aren't the 'perfect students' anymore, bro. We are the guys who pointed military rifles at the General's head and lived to tell the tale. If they want to whisper, let them whisper. They will be entirely too scared to ever get in our way again."
They reached the fork in the road. The morning sun was fully up now, illuminating the two young heirs—covered in the absolute filth of the lower city, but walking with the arrogance of untouchable kings.
"See you at the gates tomorrow, bro," Kniya smirked, popping a fresh piece of gum. "Try to find a suit that doesn't have a dead guy's blood on it."
"Fuck you, Kniya," Malesh grinned, waving a hand over his shoulder without looking back. "I'll see you in class."
The Ultimate Bluff
Kniya and Malesh continued walking down the center of the Grand Boulevard, the morning sun fully illuminating their ruined, blood-stained school uniforms.
Malesh suddenly stopped in the middle of the empty street. He adjusted his torn suit jacket and looked at Kniya with a deeply confused, completely deadpan expression.
"Kniya, I have been running the calculations in my head for the last twenty minutes, and there is a massive chronological inconsistency in your extortion model," Malesh stated flatly.
Kniya stopped and turned around, popping a fresh piece of mint gum into his mouth. "What are you talking about, logic-boy?"
"The clockwork telegraph machine," Malesh said, ticking the events off on his dirty fingers. "We were beaten up on a bench. We were thrown into a steam-powered police vehicle. We crashed in a forest. We broke into a library. Then we crawled through a sewer pipeline filled with chemical sludge. When exactly did you have the time to physically construct a timer-rigged telegraph and program it to broadcast secure bank files we did not even possess until ten minutes ago?"
Kniya stared at Malesh for three seconds in total silence. Then, a massive, arrogant grin broke across Kniya's bruised face, and he started laughing hysterically.
"I didn't build a fucking telegraph, you idiot!" Kniya cackled, holding his ribs. "There is no machine! There is no timer! I literally made the entire thing up on the spot!"
Malesh just stood there, his face an absolute void of emotion.
"Are you serious right now?" Malesh asked mechanically. "You completely fabricated the entire mechanical infrastructure of our primary threat? You extorted a high-ranking military General using a fictional machine?"
"Yes!" Kniya laughed, wiping a tear from his eye. "Bro, you should have seen your face! You actually believed it too! I just threw the words 'clockwork timer' and 'broadcast' together, and Klove completely shit his pants."
Malesh processed this new data, staring blankly at the pavement. "The statistical probability of him calling your bluff was incredibly high. If he had asked to see the physical transmission receipts, he would have realized we had zero leverage."
"But he didn't, bro!" Kniya grinned, walking back over and aggressively bumping Malesh's shoulder. "That is the whole point! Guys like Knorwin Klove are just fat cowards hiding behind heavy iron doors and thousands of troops. When you walk into their safe space holding a loaded military rifle and start shouting confidently about dead-man switches, their brains completely shut down. They panic. They don't use logic. Only you use logic, Malesh."
Malesh straightened his tie, the sheer absurdity of the situation finally hitting him. A rare, dark smirk slowly crept onto his face.
"So, let me finalize the data," Malesh said quietly. "We just forced the entire vanguard army to retreat, cleared our criminal records, and secured a monthly income of one hundred and sixty thousand credits... using a completely imaginary clock."
"Exactly," Kniya smirked, racking the bolt of his empty rifle just to hear the satisfying metallic click. "I told you my Blackmail book idea was superior. It requires zero initial investment. Not even a real telegraph."
Malesh actually chuckled—a short, dark sound of pure disbelief.
"You are an absolute sociopath, Kniya," Malesh stated flatly, starting to walk down the boulevard again. "But from a purely economic standpoint, your business strategy is highly efficient. I will write the foreword for your book."
"You better," Kniya laughed loudly, falling into step beside him. "And you better pay for our breakfast, too. Extorting generals makes me fucking hungry. Let's go home, bro."