The Steam Core was dying. The high-pitched scream of the cooling towers had faded into a low, mournful groan as the mercury vapor began to settle, coating the brass walkways in a layer of toxic silver frost. In the center of the junction, Captain Kaelen remained fused to the metal of the primary tower. His armor, once the pristine pride of the Third Division, was now a jagged, blackened husk melded to the industrial piping. Steam hissed through the hole in his chest, the sound indistinguishable from the labored, wet whistle of his failing lungs.
Vane stood three paces away, the star-metal spear held low. His left arm hung uselessly at his side, the bone shattered by Varkas's final strike, but his grip on the shaft remained iron-tight. He didn't look like a victor. He looked like a man who had survived a collapse, covered in the grey dust of the refinery and the dark, cooling blood of the elite.
