Page 64 of Cold Ignition

“I’ll track movement patterns once he’s back inside. If they’re running networked routes, I’ll find the overlap.”

Keanu felt something settle in his chest at that. This. This was what they did. Not chaos. Not reaction. Just a controlled response to an issue.

Kael looked back at him.

“You go in as Ahi,” he said. “You don’t break character.”

Keanu nodded once. “I never do.”

Rangi huffed softly. “That’s what I’m worried about.”

Alexios’s voice cut through, calm but firm. “He won’t be alone.”

Keanu glanced at him. Alexios met and held his gaze.

“We will be watching,” he said. “Anything happens, we go in.”

Not optional. Not negotiable.

Keanu held his eyes for a second.

Then nodded. “Good.”

Kael let the moment sit for half a beat longer.

Then—“Move.”

And just like that, the room came alive. Keanu pushed to his feet, the familiar pull of purpose settling into his bones. Rangi followed, clapping a hand briefly against his shoulder as he passed. Alexios rose more slowly—but when he did, he was steady.

Keanu watched him for half a second longer than he should have. Then turned back toward the work ahead. Because whatever Crucible had started—they were about to walk straight into it. And this time—they weren’t walking in blind.

Chapter Eleven

The car gleamed under the fractured glow of streetlights and neon spill.

Liquid black that seemed to flow over the body of the car. Not just painted—engineered that way. Matte in some angles, gloss in others, the surface shifting like it absorbed light rather than reflected it. Along the lower panels, flames curled in a deep metallic red, licking upward just enough to catch attention without screaming for it.

It was a predator’s coat. And Keanu sat inside it like he’d never left. Visor down. Voice mod engaged.

Ahi.

The shift wasn’t just external—it settled into his bones, into his posture, into the way his hands rested loose but ready on the wheel. Everything about him changed in the space of a breath.

“Comms check,” Luca’s voice came through, clean and precise in his ear.

“Reading you,” Keanu replied, the modulator flattening his tone into something colder. Sharper.

“Visual is live,” Drew added. “You’ve got eyes on you already.”

Of course he did.

The circuit pulsed around him.

Engines snarled and revved in uneven rhythm, the sound bouncing between concrete walls and half-collapsed structures. Floodlights had been rigged in harsh clusters, casting long shadows across cracked asphalt. Crowds gathered at the edges—some there for the adrenaline, others watching with a different kind of interest.

Keanu’s gaze tracked them through the tinted visor. He could see it now. Men stationed at intervals. Not racers. Not spectators. These were enforcers.

Watching. Cataloguing.