The knock ca hard enough to cut through sleep.
Xavier surfaced slowly, the room still dim, sheets tangled around his legs. Arlen reacted first, rolling slightly and then freezing as the mory caught up with her all at once. Hotel room. Xavier. No clothes anywhere near where they were supposed to be. Her eyes dropped, confird the obvious, and she sucked in a sharp breath. She didn't say anything. She just gathered whatever she could grab, moved fast, and disappeared into the bathroom, the door shutting a little harder than necessary.
Xavier sat up more slowly, ran a hand through his hair, and reached for the nearest pair of pants without thinking. He pulled them on, still half-asleep, and crossed the room to the door.
Rin's mouth opened, closed, then opened again. "What the hell—"
Xavier frowned. "What."
Rin didn't answer. His eyes dropped.
Xavier followed his gaze and looked down at himself. The pants were too tight at the waist, cut wrong at the hips, and very obviously not his. He looked back up at Rin. Rin looked back at him. Neither of them said anything for a few seconds that felt longer than it was.
From the bathroom, water started running.
Xavier leaned lightly against the doorfra and spoke like nothing about this was worth acknowledging. "What's going on?"
Rin blinked, then looked away, rubbing the back of his neck. "There's sothing you need to see. Co to my room. Quick."
"Now?"
"Yes. Now."
Xavier nodded once. "Alright."
Rin hesitated, then added, eyes still not eting Xavier's, "And… bring her too."
Xavier glanced toward the bathroom door, then back at Rin. "Got it."
Rin turned and walked off down the hallway a little too quickly.
Xavier closed the door, looked down at the pants again, shook his head, and muttered under his breath, "Fantastic timing."
A while later, they gathered in Klatos' room instead of the dining area, the untouched breakfast trays sitting cold on the side table like everyone had collectively agreed food could wait. Xavier leaned against the wall, arms crossed, eyes moving across their faces before settling on Rin.
"So," he said, voice rough from sleep, "why are we standing around like this instead of eating."
Rin didn't answer. He walked over to the screen mounted on the wall and turned it on.
The broadcast was already mid-segnt. A clean, neutral anchor spoke over rolling visuals while ticker text crawled beneath. The headline sat bold at the corner of the screen: HIGH-VALUE RCENARY CONTRACT ISSUED. Images cycled one after another—Lyra first, then Reva, then Viola, then Requiem, then Iria. Faces frozen, profiles tagged, threat ratings scrolling beside them.
Xavier watched without moving. His expression didn't change, but sothing behind his eyes tightened.
After a few seconds, he looked away from the screen and turned to Arlen. "What the hell is this?"
Arlen snapped imdiately. "How would I know?" she hissed. "You think I'm running bounty boards on the side?"
"That's a contract," Xavier replied calmly. "And it's public. Which ans it didn't co out of nowhere."
Klatos stepped in before Arlen could fire back. "That's not a governnt bounty."
Xavier looked at him. "Then what is it?"
"Private," Klatos said. "rcenary-grade. The kind that doesn't need justification."
Xavier frowned. "So what did they do? What cri puts that kind of price on soone?"
Klatos shook his head. "None that were disclosed."
Klatos started speaking before anyone asked him to.
He leaned closer to the screen, claws tapping lightly against the edge of the console as he pointed at the contract header. "See that seal," he said, voice lower now. "That doesn't sit there unless soone very specific signed off."
Arlen's jaw tightened. She didn't argue. She just folded her arms and added, "The board lit up less than ten minutes after it went live. Private channels, closed networks, even so feeds that aren't supposed to exist anymore. People don't pass those around unless they're scared to ignore them."
Klatos nodded. "Most bounties circulate for days before anyone takes them seriously. This one spread before breakfast."
He scrolled through the feed history, lines of acknowledgnts stacking one after another. Guild tags. Fleet marks. rcenary insignias Xavier didn't recognize but could tell mattered by how many there were.
Arlen glanced at one of the tags and exhaled through her nose. "That outfit shut down a whole district on Callix just because his na was attached to a job. No questions asked. No pushback."
Klatos finally said it. "Kylus."
Then, almost without realizing it, he kept talking. He spoke about Kylus the way people spoke about natural disasters or weapons that had already been tested. Arlen backed him up, adding her own pieces, stories she'd heard, operations that went quiet after his na appeared in the margins.
Xavier listened, unimpressed.
"So," he said when they were done, "he's what? A president?"
Arlen scoffed. "No. He doesn't have legal authority."
"Then why does everyone listen?"
"Because no one wants to lose him," she replied. "Cities that ignore him get isolated. Trade dries up. Contractors pull out. Insurance spikes. Ports close. Economies collapse. It doesn't happen fast, but it happens."
Xavier snorted. "So he's a glorified thug with good PR."
Klatos winced. "You shouldn't say that out loud."
Xavier shrugged. "I'm not impressed."
Klatos cleared his throat and gestured vaguely toward the window. "Helior Pri doesn't play that ga. It's independent. Too many corporate blocs, too many competing security interests. No single rcenary can dictate terms here without paying for it."
"And paying for it hurts," Arlen added. "A lot."
Xavier glanced back at the screen, Lyra's face paused there like a mistake the universe hadn't corrected yet. His jaw tightened slightly, just enough for Rin to notice.
"Are they your friends?" Klatos asked curiously. "I rember that Lykaios from the prison. I was curious what happened to her since I didn't see her around after Bull was killed, so I guess you took her with you."
Xavier looked at their picture on the screen, and then answered, "They are more than friends."
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