There was a particular smell every cadet claimed you caught the first time you clamp-walked the skin of a dead ring, ozone, scorched coolant, vacuum-baked grease. I didn't smell any of it, and I wished I could. This effect of the cancer sucked. My helmet fed me recycled air while Mac, and I shuffled along the curved outer hull, boots snapping to the pitted titanium-like magnets on an old fridge.

"Whoever left this place to rot deserves a lecture in asset management," Mac muttered, voice crisp in my comms.

The left boot clamp misfired on my next step, magnetic contact failing against a patch of micrometeorite scoring. For a heart-stopping moment, I tumbled backward, tether line singing taut across my chest. Mac's hand clamped my wrist, steadying me against the hull.

"Careful there, partner," he said, checking my tether attachment. "Hull tensile rating is only 550 MPa. Your tether's rated for 800. Physics works, but let's not test it."

"Residual magnetic field: 0.6 millitesla. Local power grid. Non-existent."

Lia's overlay painted the surface in cold blues. I pinged her a smile icon. "We'll fix that."

The stray magnetism worried me more than the clamp failure. Fluctuating ±0.6 millitesla fields at 20 Hz would scramble surgical nanites once we got medical operations running and turn precision instruments into chaotic noise, another problem for the growing list.

Fun, I discovered, was walking on nothing but starlight and chipping rust off someone else's dream so you could weld your own name on it.

"Entry point ahead," Mac said, gesturing toward a maintenance airlock. Its manual override gleamed dully in the station lights reflected off our suits. "Want me to do the honors?"

"Be my guest." I braced myself against the hull as he worked the mechanism. My arms felt steadier than they had in weeks, and the servo-feedback in the suit compensated for the lingering tremor in my left hand. Another small victory.

The airlock cycled slowly.

My nerves were shot. "Come on."

"You really that desperate to get inside?" Mac asked.

"Just not a lover of being out here," I waved into the dark.

<<I thought you wanted to be out here?>> Lia asked.

<<I did. I do. It's just different than I imagined.>>

<<Bad?>>

<<No, it's exhilarating but scary.>>

The ancient machinery protested with a groan and several pops. After months of no one here, it finally had to work. But it didn't work fast. When the inner door finally crawled open, we were greeted by a cavernous darkness punctuated only by the feeble glow of emergency strips that still held a charge.

"Home sweet home," Mac quipped, pushing from the threshold to float into the space beyond.

I followed him, feeling equal parts apprehension and exhilaration.

This wasn't just a forgotten ring anymore; it was the first physical manifestation of Frost Enterprises, a tangible asset that couldn't be erased with a few keystrokes.

Mac turned to face me.

"This is ours," he said. "Really ours."

I glided in beside him. "Yes, it is."

"Structural integrity at 94%. Life support systems are offline. Temperature: -42°C. Detecting residual atmosphere at 0.21 bar." Lia's directions scrolled across my HUD as we drifted through what was once a medical research facility.

"Surgical bays," I noted, my helmet lamp illuminating abandoned equipment. Empty treatment pods hung like cocoons from ceiling tracks, their polymer shells dulled by vacuum-hardened dust.

"Needs some good cleaner drones in here. Will be cleaned up in no time."

"How much do they cost?"

"I'm sure Dr. Chen has that allocated."

"Hope so," I replied. But I stopped and gawped.

"This really is perfect for us, right?" Mac asked.

"It is," I couldn't help but grin at him. "First, we need to wake her up."

***

The micro-fusion sphere sat inside Bay C like a dragon's egg: carbon-scored, coolant-scarred, but intact. Getting it here without being noticed had required all of Lev's security expertise and a cargo container marked as "waste processing equipment."

Mac circled the sphere slowly, checking the tritium sight glass for fuel integrity. "Containment coils are niobium-tin superconductors," he murmured, running a scanner over the housing. "Twelve-tesla field strength, residual beta emission at three millisieverts per hour. Beautiful engineering."

"And stolen," I reminded him, though I couldn't keep the admiration out of my voice.

My hands shook slightly as I prepared the power couplings, and the tremor was worse at zero-g. The first connector slipped from my fingers, floating away until Mac caught it.

"Here," he positioned himself to steady my wrist. "I'll hold the wrench. You handle the fine work."

Within minutes, we jacked power couplings and almost had everything fixed. I recited Stefan-Boltzmann under my breath, "σT⁴A—to size the radiator arrays."

Numbers clipped neatly together in my HUD.

Mac whistled. "Show-off," he said, but he was grinning.Mac's visor lamp swung onto me. "Ready for restart?"

I thumbed the hardware interlock, feeling the tiny tremor in my thumb. "Born ready."

"Ignition pulse in three, two, one."

For twenty seconds, nothing happened. The sphere sat dormant, mocking our efforts. My HUD showed neutron flux at baseline—barely detectable background radiation.

"Initiator circuit shows no response," I muttered, checking the ignition leads. "Something's wrong."

Mac's voice carried a note of concern. "Fuel cells?"

"Reading thirty-nine percent should be more than enough." I ran diagnostics, watching error codes cascade across my display. "Lia, what am I missing?"

<<Analyzing core telemetry. Detecting magnetic field instability in containment coils. Possible superconductor quench.>>

"The coils lost superconductivity," I explained to Mac. "Temperature spike broke the niobium-tin matrix."

<<Recommend helium recool sequence,>> Nyx's voice joined the analysis. <<Thermal cycle should restore superconducting properties.>>

"How long?" Mac asked.

<<Eighteen minutes for complete thermal equilibrium,>> Lia calculated. <<Though the previous owners left a pre-chilled helium loop. That cuts it to four minutes.>>

"We don't have four minutes," I said, watching our power reserves dwindle. "There has to be another way."

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

<<Emergency bootstrap protocol available,>> Nyx suggested. <<Hundred-kiloamp crowbar pulse from station capacitors to force initial plasma confinement, then transition to self-sustaining fusion.>>

"That's risky," Mac warned. "If the transition fails, we could lose containment entirely."

"Or we could have the only dead ring with a working fusion core that won't start." I made the decision. "Lia, route emergency power through the bootstrap sequence."

The next ninety seconds felt like hours. My hands moved across the control interface, guided by overlapping instructions from both AIs. Reroute power here, adjust magnetic bottle geometry and fine-tune the tritium injection rate.

"Plasma temperature climbing," Mac reported. "One million Kelvin... five million... eight million... ten million..."

"Magnetic confinement stable," I added, watching the field strength indicators.

Then neutron flux spiked on my HUD—1.2 × 10¹⁰ n/cm²/s, climbing toward the operational threshold.

The sphere bloomed white-hot and settled to a serene violet heartbeat. Emergency strips blinked from red to amber to steady green. In the darkness of the habitat torus, tiny work lights sparked on like a constellation acknowledging new gravity.

"Yes!" Lev's voice crackled over comms, his usual composure cracking. "I can see the heat signature from here!"

"Power grid shows nominal across all sectors," Sorrel added, her excitement obvious. "You actually did it!"

Even Dr. Chen's voice carried a note of satisfaction: "Acceptable performance parameters."

"Radiator surface area optimized. Heat dissipation capacity is sufficient for a 3.2-megawatt output with 87% efficiency." Lia confirmed my calculations, adding her own refinements to the power management system.

For three glorious minutes, there was nothing but the beating thud of fresh power and the giddy certainty we just stole a future back from the junkmen.

"We did it," Mac breathed, watching the master status board as systems flickered to life one by one. "Ring-14 lives again."

Trait Unlocked: Infrastructure Command Protocol – 78%

Trigger: Successfully activating and controlling major industrial facility

Function: Managing complex technical operations and facility systems

Risk: Over-reliance on technical solutions; industrial-scale responsibility burden

I allowed myself a moment of pure satisfaction. This was what I was born for, to bring dead things back to life, breathe purpose into abandoned technology. Except now we were doing it for ourselves, not for someone else.

"Power distribution at 17% and climbing," Lia reported as I studied the readouts.

"Life support will take another twelve hours," I said. "But we've got basic grid functionality."

"Let's get the comms array online," Mac suggested.

I nodded, already moving toward the communications bay. That's when the proximity alarm chirped, a sound that shouldn't have been possible in a supposedly abandoned facility.

"Three approaching vessels," Lia warned. "Transponder signals indicate Clean-Energy Safety Board inspection craft. ETA: eleven minutes."

"Eleven minutes?" Mac's voice jumped. "They moved fast."

"Registry status updated seventeen minutes ago," Lia continued. "Ring-14 flagged as 'reactivation in progress.' Mandatory safety inspection triggered automatically."

"Someone's watching the power grid," I realized. "They saw us light up."

"Dirty laundry protocol," Mac said, already moving toward the environmental controls. "We need to make this look routine."

I started the nitrogen vent sequence, super-chilled gas blooming across the chamber at 77 Kelvin. The expanding cloud frosted conduits instantly, and Mac's visor began icing over.

"I can't see," he said, voice tight with alarm.

"Three meters left, then down," I guided him by voice. "Feel for the pump-down valve—should be a red handle."

His gloved hand searched blindly until he found it. "Got it!"

The coolant mist cleared just as the inspection shuttle's docking clamps engaged with a resounding clang.

It seemed the universe hated unqualified joy. Two figures drifted through the newly powered hatch wearing Clean-Energy Safety Board white, a third in charcoal-grey business attire following half a body length behind.

The lead inspector's environmental scanner was already active, sampling the atmosphere. My HUD showed what he was seeing—CO₂ scrubbers still offline, oxygen at minimal safe levels.

"Ambitious project," the inspector said, his helmet lamp sweeping across the abandoned surgical bays. "Not the first group to try reviving Ring-14."

"Previous attempts?" Mac asked.

The grey-suited minder checked his wristpad. "Three failures. The last group liquidated at nine cents on the credit." He gestured dismissively at the empty surgical bay. "Neural regeneration lab—thought they'd revolutionize brain trauma treatment."

The casual cruelty hit harder than any direct threat. Mac and I exchanged glances, both realizing how thin the line was between success and becoming another cautionary tale.

"Different business model this time," Mac said carefully.

"They all say that."

As we moved deeper into the facility, the inspector's radiation badge began clicking more rapidly. "Three millisieverts per hour at one meter," he noted professionally. "Post a 180-minute max-stay sign for compliance."

<<RFID tag detected. Cali contract code SB-438. Security clearance: mid-level.>> Lia confirmed for me.

"We have a tip that this core was stolen," the inspector said

"Paperwork?" the second inspector asked, holding out a tablet.

"We filed it with Port Logistics," Mac replied, his slate already connecting to Lev planetside.

<<Working on partial purchase order,>> Lev said. <<Need ninety seconds.>>

I needed to stall. "Let me show you the radiation monitoring setup," I offered, leading them toward the shielded control room. "Safety protocols require a full perimeter sweep."

The lead inspector's dosimeter began clicking more rapidly as we approached the fusion housing. "Containment appears stable," he noted professionally.

"Three millisieverts per hour at one meter," I confirmed. "Well within operational parameters."

<<Purchase order complete and uploaded,>> Lev announced just as the inspector's tablet chimed with the new filing.

The residual nitrogen vent still hissed from the earlier emergency, fogging the inspector's faceplate slightly.

"Coolant line adjustment," I explained. "Thermal expansion issues during startup."

<<Structural monitoring nominal,>> Lia said. <<All systems stable.>>

"We can complete this inspection from the shuttle," the lead inspector decided, his professionalism overriding curiosity as his dosimeter continued its steady clicking.

I bought us some more time, explaining imaginary safety certifications, walking them carefully toward the exit before their atmospheric warnings became critical.

They left trailing crystals of frozen vapor. As their shuttle undocked, the lead inspector's final transmission crackled through: "Pending subpoena for provenance verification. Standard procedure."

The comms panel immediately began printing, steady mechanical rhythm that made my stomach clench. A black envelope emerged with official seals intact.

SUBPOENA — ILLEGAL POWER-SOURCE PROCUREMENT — RESPONSE DUE 48 HRS

"Get the team on comms," I ordered.

"Here," Lev said.

"Also here," Sorrel replied.

My hands were shaking as I reached for the envelope—not just the tremor, but an actual adrenaline crash. Mac caught it before I could fumble it.

"I've got it," he said. "We knew this was coming."

Behind my reflection, Ring-14's status board shifted from yellow to a single line of angry crimson text:

MICRO-FUSION ORIGIN UNVERIFIED. LEGAL BREACH AUTO-FILED.

His face was grim as he read the legal text aloud. "Three to five years impound of all assets," he said coldly. "Fourteen million credit fines. Criminal prosecution for theft of regulated technology."

My stomach flipped at the words "criminal prosecution." This wasn't just business risk anymore, it was personal freedom on the line.

"We could wipe the logs," Lev suggested. "Make it look like a clerical error."

"No," Sorrel interjected firmly. "That would expose our Ghost mesh connections. We can't risk the broader network."

I studied the subpoena, calculating odds with Lia's help. "We answer it," I decided finally. "Full cooperation, complete transparency on the fusion core."

Mac looked at me like I'd lost my mind. "You want to confess?"

"I want them focused on provenance while we hide the neural surgery equipment behind Faraday shielding," I explained. "Let them chase the obvious crime while we commit the real one."

"Probability of successful misdirection: 64%," Lia calculated. "Risk of catastrophic asset seizure: 27%."

I thought it was better than the Academy drop rates. "I'll take those odds."

Lev's expression shifted from frustration to grudging appreciation. "Clever. But risky."

"Everything worth doing is," I replied.

He nodded, and waved a hand around the room. "You know what our combined net worth is now?"

"One stolen star," I replied.

He laughed, but it faded quickly. "Think you'll live to see this place fully operational?"

The question hung between us, honest and brutal. I made to move. "We should check the gravity generator initialization," I said. "If we're impressing your parents, we need more than lights and heat."

But I wobbled on my feet.

"When did you last eat?" he asked.

Yesterday? The day before? "We've been busy."

"You've been stupid." He said, matter-of-fact, not unkind. "Cancer treatments, zero sleep, adrenaline overload—you're running on empty." I knew he hooked into Chen directly. "How bad is it really? Don't lie."

"He has years, not decades." Chen answered. "We need Ring-14 running, we need lots of things...He needs a small miracle."

Mac processed this like any tactical parameter. "Then we build this fast."

"Mac—"

"No." There was an odd steel in his voice. "I've seen what you can do when motivated, well, so can we. We'll get Ring-14 operational, find your revenge, and buy you enough time for the medical breakthrough you need."

Trait Enhanced: Distributed Family Network – 98% ↑

New Component: Life-and-death commitment bonding when Mac learns of terminal diagnosis

Status: Team unified by shared mortality and mutual protection instincts

The simple confidence was more reassuring than any false comfort. This was why partnerships worked: a shared burden, a shared determination.

<<Unknown data bleed detected on internal subnet,>> Lia announced suddenly.

"Tell Sorrel and Lev to suit up,| I said, feeling the familiar weight of paranoia settle back on my shoulders. "We're not done tonight."

"But after this, you eat a real meal and sleep for eight hours. That's an order."

"Since when have you given me orders?"

"Since I became your business partner." His expression grew serious. "And since I don't want to explain to the others why you collapsed from exhaustion."

Fair point. I nodded in agreement, already feeling the weight of the day settling into my bones. But beneath the fatigue was something else, satisfaction. We'd taken a dead ring and given it a heartbeat. Tomorrow, we'd give it a soul.

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