The signal came not as a sound, but as a taste. Ozone and wet earth, the flavor of a circuit board left out in the rain. It was the taste of the trigger, the high-yield dose of Staticbloom Dr. Hollis Grant had just injected into the Grid’s network, a world away. Julian felt it in his sterile white cell, a sudden lurch in his gut, a pulling sensation behind his eyes. The oppressive hum of the city dissolved into a roar of pure, crackling noise. The walls of his prison became a storm of visual static, a blizzard of black and white pixels that promised a different kind of cage.
He materialized in motion. The world was black, wet, and screaming. Cold water slapped his face. The canoe, a heavy vessel carved from a single dark log, lurched beneath him. In his hands, a paddle felt as natural as a limb, and he dug it into the churning river without a thought. This was Garran’s body, a machine of muscle and instinct he was merely piloting. The swap was complete. He was the first half of the weapon, a ghost in a warrior’s skin, hurtling through the night. His own fear was a small, cold knot in his stomach, but it was drowned out by a phantom echo of Garran’s cold, clean rage. The price of this union was clear: his terror was now fueled by another man’s hate.
A low bird call, sharp and urgent, cut through the rising wind. It was Nia. The signal. The ambush was on.
From the tangled darkness of the mangrove roots to their left, silent shapes detached themselves. Ten War Canoes, low in the water, slid into the main channel. They moved without sound, blacker shapes against the black water. Julian’s canoe was one of them, part of a closing net. Ahead, maybe 200 meters, the three corporate skiffs sat idling, their smooth, featureless hulls like tumors on the riverbank. They were blind to the closing jaws of the trap.
The first skiff’s engine whined as it began to pull away from the shore. It hit the hidden stake with a dull, percussive thump, a sound of metal finding unyielding wood. The craft skewed sideways, its momentum lost. A moment later, a weighted net, thrown from a nearby canoe, arced through the air and slapped across its deck, fouling its sensors. The trap was effective. The enemy’s escape route was being systematically dismantled.
A second skiff powered up, its engines silent. It lifted a few feet above the water, intending to bypass the river-level chaos. But the tribe had planned for this. From the canopy above, two figures dropped, their forms shifting in the darkness. They landed on the skiff with the weight of falling stones, the sound of their impact a sickening crunch of polymer and bone. The skiff wobbled, then crashed back into the water at a broken angle. Two down.
The third skiff reacted. Hatches slid open and a dozen Perimeter Drones lifted into the air, their movements silent and fluid. Thin, needle-like beams of blue laser light sliced through the night, deconstructing everything they touched. A tree branch dissolved into a puff of vapor and the smell of cooked sap. The air filled with the scent of ozone. The drones began a systematic sweep, hunting for targets.
Julian felt the vibration before he saw the threat. It was a faint, rhythmic pulse that traveled through the water, a mechanical heartbeat he could feel in the wood of the paddle. It was the lesson Nia had taught him, the world felt rather than seen. Two drones were vectoring on their position from the right, their blue lights still hidden by the thick foliage.
— Left! — he roared, the voice a low rumble that was Garran’s, but the warning was his. — Drones, left!
The warrior in the bow of his canoe didn't hesitate. He dug his paddle in, and the canoe veered sharply, hugging the mangrove roots. A half-second later, two beams of silent blue energy sliced through the space they had just occupied, turning the water to steam. The heat washed over Julian’s face. He had used his own strange skill, his own memory, and it had worked. He was no longer just a passenger. He was a participant.
The riverbanks exploded into chaos. A great grey wolf, a shifter in their totem form, burst from the undergrowth, a blur of fur and teeth. It leaped onto the shore near the crippled first skiff, a terrifying distraction. From the other side of the river, a massive bear-shape rose onto its hind legs and roared, a sound of pure primal fury that seemed to shake the very air. The drones, programmed for efficiency, split their fire, their targeting logic overwhelmed by the sudden appearance of multiple high-threat biologicals. The full, strange power of the tribe was finally unleashed.
The final skiff, its drones providing cover, began to pull away, making a run for the open water downstream. It was the last one. Nia’s canoe shot out from the shadows, her crew paddling in perfect, powerful synchrony. She was cutting it off. Julian’s canoe followed, flanking from the other side. They were herding it, boxing it in.
— Now! — Nia shouted, her voice clear and sharp above the din.
Julian felt Garran’s body respond before his mind could process the command. He dug the paddle deep, the muscles in his back and shoulders bunching with a power that was not his own. The canoe surged forward. They closed the distance, their canoe’s hardened bow aimed directly at the skiff’s engine housing. They struck it with the force of a battering ram. Metal screamed. A warrior in Nia’s canoe stood, balanced perfectly, and hurled a spear. The obsidian tip punched through the skiff’s thin armor with a sharp crack.
Sparks erupted from the skiff’s engine. The low hum died, replaced by a sputtering cough. The craft drifted, dead in the water.
The whine of the last drone faded into the night. The only sound was the patter of the first drops of rain on the river’s surface.
