The silence of the basin after the young scavenger fell was heavy, thick with the smell of scorched pine and the copper tang of blood.
Georgia stood over the unconscious man, her chest rising and falling in shallow, even breaths. She didn't look at his face. To her, he was no longer a person; he was simply a source of resources. Her gaze shifted immediately to the broken white-and-gold plates of the fallen Western Coalition vanguard soldier lying near the edge of the clearing.
"Corin," she said, her voice cutting through the dark like a blade. "Help me."
Corin dragged himself away from the mossy boulder, his hands still trembling so violently he nearly dropped the heavy iron crossbow. He knelt in the dirt beside her, his breath coming in ragged gasps. "Georgia... this is crazy. We can't just put on their skin. The Coalition... their gear isn't just metal and leather. It’s tuned. It’s locked."
He was right. As Georgia reached down to unbuckle the heavy, gold-trimmed breastplate from the dead soldier, her fingers brushed against a small, glowing blue seam along the collar. A soft, rhythmic hum pulsed beneath the cold metal.
"Biometrics," Corin whispered, his mechanical instincts momentarily overriding his terror. He leaned closer, squinting in the dim amber glow of the dying fire. "The Coalition seals their vanguard armor to the wearer's heartbeat. If the seal detects a dead pulse—or no pulse at all—the internal locking pins engage. It turns the whole suit into a rigid, unyielding cage. You won't even be able to bend your knees."
"Then unlock it," Georgia said, her voice flat, her violet eyes locking onto his. "You're a sky-pilot. You've repaired complex gravity regulators under fire. This is just a set of brass pins and a copper wire."
"It's not just copper, it's—" Corin stopped, swallowing his protest as Georgia simply held his gaze. He reached into his coat, pulling out a small, thin set of brass tension wrenches he had salvaged from the skiff's toolkit. "If I mess this up, the armor's emergency purge might trigger. It will release a pressurized blast of cold steam to freeze the wearer's joints. It’ll break your ribs."
"Then don't mess it up," she murmured.
From the deep, pitch-black woods to the south, a sudden, echoing shout shattered the quiet of the night.
"Tyler! Marcus!"
The voice was distant, but it carried clearly over the freezing wind. The other two scavengers were already searching the riverbank. They would realize the deception soon. They would realize Tyler was cold, and they would come back to the camp with their weapons drawn and their eyes bloodthirsty.
"Corin," Georgia warned, her hand drifting to the hilt of her hunting knife. "We have less than five minutes."
Corin’s forehead beaded with sweat despite the freezing mountain draft. He slid the thin brass wrench into the small, glowing seam at the collar of the breastplate. He closed his eyes, listening, his fingers feeling for the subtle, mechanical vibrations of the internal locking pins.
Click.
The soft blue glow along the collar flickered, then turned a dull, inert amber. The heavy plates suddenly loosened, the rigid joints of the pauldrons and gauntlets relaxing as the pressurized lock released with a soft, dying sigh of steam.
"I did it," Corin breathed, wiping his brow with a trembling sleeve. "The biometrics are bypassed. But it's only temporary. The internal battery is depleted—you'll have to manually force the joint gears to move. It’s going to be heavy. It’s going to bruise."
"I don't care about bruises," Georgia said.
She stood up, shedding her dark, soot-stained cloak. In the cold starlight, her ruined silk gown looked like a tattered shroud. She stepped into the heavy, gold-trimmed leg guards, letting Corin tighten the cold leather straps around her thighs. When she hoisted the heavy breastplate over her shoulders, the sheer weight of the steel threatened to pull her to her knees.
It was freezing, smelling of old sweat, metal polish, and the phantom chill of the dead man who had worn it.
Georgia gritted her teeth, forcing her muscles to adjust to the crushing weight. She flexed her fingers inside the heavy white-and-gold gauntlets, the gears groaning softly in protest.
"How does it feel?" Corin asked, watching her with a mix of awe and dread.
Georgia reached down, picking up the silver helmet of the weeping saint. The metallic tears carved into the visor caught the last, dying spark of the campfire.
"It feels like a cage," Georgia whispered, her voice tightening as she looked toward the dark forest trail. "But for once, I am the one holding the key."