Polomik 3D Render, Digital Artwork by emarukk

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Polomik

3D Render by emarukk

The scream wasn't loud, but it sliced through the cacophony of the crowd and ambient corridor noises, a serrated edge of sound that snagged Neha's attention. The pain was palpable; a thin, drawn-out shriek slithered through the recycled, smoky air like molten metal through the isolation of a frayed wire. A woman's voice, drenched in agony, echoed through Avernus Prime. The inevitability of suffering in this place was a predictable symphony. Then, the crack. A violent, explosive crackling that ripped through the air.

Neha spun around before she had even decided to move. Her hand flew to the weapon at her thigh, thumb brushing against the holster, eyes darting with predatory precision. But engaging here, on Avernus, alone, was madness. She knew the fate that awaited those who dared to intervene.

Then she saw the woman.

Collared like an animal, blood oozing from her mouth, she crouched on the deck, a pitiful sight of human wreckage. Her hands were raw and shredded from the fall, yet she didn't cry. Her gaze pierced through the station walls as if she could see beyond the pain, reaching for something far beyond the cold, metal confines. The man looming over her clutched a shock baton with a grip that screamed ownership. He wore civilian clothes, a neat jacket, and boots marred by filth. Costume that spoke of wealth and decay, the uniform of a mid-level 2nd Class exploiter. Enough clout to own, enough depravity to revel in it.

Unbidden, Neha stepped forward. Then another step, and another.

Neha bore the scars of past torments, a history of abuse and cruelty etched into her soul. She was a thrall, a mere possession. But she was different. Not like the woman before her. Neha wore her collar hidden beneath layers of modified salvage gear, her eyes glinting with soft circuitry, her spine an intricate network of ship rigging couplings. Navigator. Salvage tech. She piloted the Ash Talon under Anders Jacobson. Officially property, yet functionally in command. A quiet inferno of paradoxies in this frozen wasteland. Neha had been sold here, years ago, on Avernus. She never sought the auction house, nor the faces of those who sold her. She wanted but didn't want to become one who seeks revenge. But the fire within her burned still, furious and unyielding.

"That's enough," she declared with unwavering authority. Her voice was sweet yet carried an undeniable command that could have made the army follow her until they met Freyar for the last instructions.

The man looked up, his frown deepening. It was a frown typically worn by those unaccustomed to hearing "no" from anyone beneath their station.

"You got business here, spacer?" He sneered, spitting disdainfully.

"I have eyes," Neha answered, her tone as steely as gunmetal. "She's had enough."

The man scoffed dismissively, a short, derisive sound. "Faulty thralls get corrected. You know the rules."

He lifted the baton once more, his intent clear.

Neha shifted subtly, just enough to halt his movement. The sight of power armor and pistols tends to instill caution in support personnel, even those marinated with pride and position.

"You wanna feel what she's feeling? Salvage lady," he challenged, his voice hardening into a threat, referring to the colors Neha carried on her armor. "I got voltage to spare. It goes trough your armor."

"I know how it feels." Neha began, her voice steady as she initiated a ghost talk channel for Ash Talon, ready to act.

Then the atmosphere shifted like a beast awakening, the pressure plummeting in a raw, physical assault. It wasn't a figure of speech or mere dread; it was tactile, a palpable release as if the station itself exhaled a long-forgotten sigh. Lights convulsed in a jittery dance, not shattered but desperate and trembling. A low, menacing hum vibrated through the bulkheads, setting Neha's pulse into a frantic drumbeat as if something monstrous had clawed its way out of Hel's icy prison.

In that charged moment, a figure emerged from the void behind the man, a towering presence cloaked in dark red-black, every inch steeped in ritual and gravitas. His face was a map of circuit scars, and his eyes glowed with a weak silver luminescence, reminiscent of a reactor's fire smoldering behind misted glass.

He was a Shepherd, but not one who merely observed; this one moved with unyielding certainty. His right hand surged forward like a vengeful tide, intent on wrenching the shock rod from the man's grip. Meanwhile, his left hand showcased a coin, crafted from dark metal and forged into the shape of a disc, etched deeply with a single word: Unpaid.

The man, lost in the fog of his own arrogance, ignored the approaching storm. He coiled force to strike until Shepherd's right met with deliberate, synchronized precision his baton mid-swing. The weapon shrieked an electric cry, sparking violently before falling silent.

The man froze, his gaze darting behind him as his arrogance dissolved into stark terror like iceblocks melting in the processing plant's furnace. His voice fractured like brittle, old wiring. "You… you're one of them."

The Shepherd's rasp cut through the alley, grave and laden with foreboding: "I was summoned by screams and pain—so much pain it vibrates through the very fabric of space and time. Henrik, you've let their torment echo through their wires for too long. I answer those screams."

He raised the engraved coin between two iron fingers, tilting it accusingly toward the insolent man. "I am Polomik. Shepherd. Not a mere observer, but an avenger. Breaker of broken chains." His voice vibrated with a dissonant power, like a core teetering on the edge of collapse.

The man stood speechless, his mouth agape as Polomik rotated the coin slowly, a dire judgment made manifest. "This was forged from a collar like hers. Like mine. Like the ones you ignited until screams became your lullaby."

Then, in a whisper laden with ash and inexorable gravity, Polomik intoned: "When the debt of pain outweighs the soul's weight… this coin is struck."

With a heavy finality, Polomik let the coin drop. It struck the deck with resounding punctuation, a metallic verdict that pressed upon everyone like the crushing pull of a dying star. The sound was pure and ravishing—metal clashed with metal: Clink. The coin tumbled, hitting another edge that echoed with a sharp, haunting clarity. A simple, relentless Clink, then a profound silence.

In one swift motion, the Shepherd discarded his shock rod, slamming it onto the deck with a forceful, crashing noise. The man crumpled to his knees as though the weight of a thousand stars had finally caught up with him.

Polomik turned to Neha, his cybernetic eyes shimmering like shards of ice under a winter sun. He offered a smile, shadowed by the tall neckband of his jacket, which wrapped around him like a second skin.

"You wear a collar," he observed, his tone neither unkind nor surprised, but rather a statement of fact.

Neha stiffened instinctively; her collar was not visible to the naked eye, for it was embedded beneath her skin, an invisible chain binding her to her fate.

"You guard others, even while bound yourself. That is justice, in a world built to forget it," Polomik continued, his words carrying the weight of truth.

He stepped closer; his presence felt rather than imposing, like a gentle tide washing over her. His voice softened to a whisper, just audible above the ambient sounds: "When the chains fall, let it be because your hands were not idle. Your kind… deserve more than survival, and I see fire burning in you. It will spread until it burns all."

A moment passed, stretching like the low rumble of distant thunder, vibrating through the air. "Anahita sees you. And remembers. They carve names of the brave to their coins."

Neha swallowed hard, her throat constricting not out of fear but from the rare sensation of being truly seen and remembered. It was a luxury seldom afforded to a thrall. The Shepherd bowed his head once, with an almost serene grace. Then he turned, disappearing into the enveloping darkness. He left no parting glance or promise, only the subtle whisper of his cloth and the lingering myth. And a coin, glinting softly in the dim light in the middle of the filth left on the deck.

"Neha!" A voice sliced through the air like a flare, urgent and sharp. Neha turned just as Ash Talon's captain, Anders Jacobson, skidded into the alley. His breath came in heavy gasps, his hair wild like an untamed beast, his coat haphazardly fastened, and a pulse rifle gripped tightly in his hand. He halted at the edge of the scene, his eyes darting between master and thrall, finally settling on the coin gleaming amidst the debris. His gaze lingered, then narrowed.

"That was Polomik," he said in a low, almost reverent tone. "Gods, he is still at Avernus."

Neha blinked, the name holding no significance for her. She cast a brief glance at the woman curled up in the corner, a figure in a black navy uniform standing vigil beside her. "Who?"

Anders didn't answer immediately. He stared down the alley where the Shepherd had vanished, his breath still shallow, before finally speaking. "Someone Avernus hoped to forget."

His voice dropped to a murmur, almost as if speaking to himself. "And failed. I've seen coins left on tables in pain dens, but it was ages ago."

Anders turned his gaze to the on his knees, trembling with fear as he stared at the coin, too petrified to touch it. He was not crying, but his body shook with terror, and sweat beads decorated his forehead. Anders met Neha's deep, dark eyes and said, "Usually, one who receives a coin makes his own choices and leaps into the Hel's icy flow from the station's airlock."

PROFILE

Digital Drapery CoWed, Apr 23

Karma: 6,617

Whew. That wasn't just a scene-it was a symphony of vengeance conducted with the grace of a throat-punch in a velvet glove.

Neha? Absolute main character energy. She didn't walk into that mess-she rewrote the script and cast herself as executive producer of "Not On My Watch: A Space Opera."

And then Polomik descended like a holy middle finger forged from pain, justice, and leftover scrap metal dipped in myth. A literal ghost story your trauma tells other trauma when it needs comfort.

"Unpaid," he says, flipping that coin like karma just joined the economy. And poor Henrik? Man thought he was playing Monopoly when in fact he'd been dealt The Tower, in reverse, with fire damage.

That final scene? With Anders sliding in like a space-hardened substitute teacher who's realized the class has already been taught by a god-tier vigilante? Perfect. Coin's on the floor, dignity's evaporated, and the baton's on sabbatical.

This isn't just sci-fi-it's literary brinkmanship with a pulse. Give Neha her own fleet already. And maybe someone get Henrik a mop… for all the dignity he just lost.

! REPORT

PROFILE

emarukk

Karma: 2,199

Sun, Apr 27

A symphony, maybe, but this was a Memory Coin hammered in blood and echo, tossed to the void so the stars themselves might bear witness. Vengeance composed in minor chords, delivered with the subtlety of a voidsuit fist through stained glass.

Neha? Yes, she doesn't enter a scene. Although she is a feather in the wind, she is the author of the wind. A sovereign force, quill and blade as one, scripting her will onto the bones of fate. Executive Producer, or in the Confederation, she'd be named Praetor of Reckonings, and even the Senate would hold its breath.

Then came Polomik. Descending not like justice, but like an ancient curse remembered too late. A revenant stitched from scrap and sacrament, the kind of tale trauma whispers to itself when the lights die. Holy? Perhaps. But holiness here wears rust and ruin, a sanctified defiance dipped in the ashes of forgotten wars.

"Unpaid," he says, flicking that coin as if karma itself had been conscripted into service. A wage long owed. Henrik, poor soul, thought he was bartering in lari, but the deck was Memory Coins all along. And what he pulled? The Tower inverted, flames licking the foundations. Collapse as prophecy.

Anders at the end, sliding into the wreckage like a Void Diver too late for the breach but just in time to survey the ruin. The lesson's already been taught, the ledger closed. The coin lies cold on the deck, dignity scorched away, and the baton? It's been melted down for scrap.

This is not just science fiction. This is Syndraka. Where every story is a rebellion, every word a risk, and every ending a coin tossed into the dark, daring the void to toss it back.