Chapter 99: Smoke in the Marketplace

"Hold the brace steady, Jafar, or I swear the entire shoulder is going to fracture before we even step out of this forge," Pak Kasim muttered, his scarred hands tightly gripping the thick, oil-treated leather straps as they bit deep into Rangga’s stone-bound shoulder.

"I am holding it as steady as a man with half-blind eyes and shaky fingers can manage," the old blacksmith snapped back, slamming his heavy iron hammer down onto the anvil with a deafening, metallic clang that rattled the soot-covered corrugated tin walls. "If you want it tighter, Kasim, you come over here and wrench the rivets yourself."

"Quiet, both of you," Arung hissed from the corner of the small, suffocating workshop, pressing his back against the damp brickwork while clutching his freshly bandaged ribs. His face was slick with cold sweat, the dull ache in his chest flaring up every time he took a sharp breath. "Arguing over rivets isn't going to stop Thorne's recovery unit if they've already picked up our trail in the alleys."

"They don't need a trail when half the village is ready to sell us out for a handful of corporate scrip," a sharp, youthful voice cut through the heavy air of the forge.

The heavy iron door swung open with a harsh groan, and a young local runner named Dedi slipped inside, his chest heaving as he leaned against the doorframe for support. His eyes were wide with panic, darting frantically between Rangga’s towering, half-calcified frame and Arung’s bruised face.

"What are you talking about, Dedi?" Arung pushed himself off the wall, ignoring the sharp stab of pain in his ribs as he limped toward the boy. "Did someone talk?"

"Not someone—Joni," Dedi panted, wiping a dirty sleeve across his forehead to clear away the sweat and grime. "I saw him slipping out the back of the tea house not ten minutes ago. He was talking to two men in gray tactical vests—clean boots, heavy comms gear, corporate spec. They didn't look like regular valley security. They were black-ops, the kind that clean up messes without asking questions."

Pak Kasim dropped his leather-working tools onto the wooden workbench with a sharp clatter, his weathered face darkening into a scowl. "Joni? That miserable little rat. I gave his uncle credit at the supply depot all through the rainy season, and he sells us out for a pocketful of bounty scrip?"

"Poverty doesn't ask for a moral compass, Kasim," Jafar said quietly, not looking up from the heavy leather strap he was busy securing around Rangga’s torso. He pulled the metal buckle tight with a sharp click, testing the tension against the unyielding stone of Rangga's shoulder. "When a man's children haven't eaten warm rice in three days, loyalty to strangers from the mountain is the first thing he forgets."

"We don't have time to debate the philosophy of hunger," Rangga spoke up, his deep voice vibrating with a cold, tectonic resonance that seemed to shake the dust motes falling from the rafters. He flexed his right hand, the normal flesh gripping the handle of a heavy iron wrench while his left arm remained locked rigidly inside Jafar’s custom leather brace. "If they're in the marketplace, they're already moving to seal the exits."

"Then we run for the back ridge," Arung said immediately, grabbing his heavy canvas jacket from a wooden peg near the door. "There's a drainage culvert behind the textile warehouse. It'll take us past the perimeter fence before they lock down the sector."

"You won't make it fifty yards toward the ridge," Dedi interrupted, shaking his head frantically as he pointed a trembling finger toward the street outside. "They anticipated the escape routes. There’s a second extraction team cutting off the north alley right now. They've got motion sensors, drones, and heavy suppression gear. If you walk out into the open, you're walking into a crossfire."

"Then we don't use the back ridge," Rangga said, his flat, emotionless tone cutting through the rising panic in the room like a blade.

Arung stared at him, a knot tightening in his stomach. "Rangga, what are you talking about? If we don't slip out quietly, we have to fight our way through a full tactical squad with nothing more than a blacksmith's hammer and an iron wrench."

"I am not going to let them tear this village apart looking for us," Rangga replied, taking a heavy, deliberate step toward the front entrance of the forge. The mineral dust drifted from his calcified skin, catching the dim slivers of light piercing through the gaps in the tin walls. "If Thorne wants the monster from the caldera, I'll give him something to look at."

"Are you insane?" Pak Kasim lunged forward, grabbing the heavy fabric of Rangga's sleeve. "You can't take on a black-ops wet-work team by yourself! Even with that rock skin, high-velocity kinetic rounds will shatter your joints right out of their sockets!"

"They aren't looking for a corpse, Kasim," Rangga said, pulling his arm away with effortless, terrifying strength that caused the old trucker to stumble backward. "Thorne wants the data, and he wants the anomaly alive so his scientists can pick it apart in a lab. As long as I am the loudest target in the marketplace, they won't waste time tearing down Ibu Marta's clinic or searching every hut on this street."

"Rangga's right," Arung said slowly, a grim realization settling over his features as he gritted his teeth and checked the slide of the makeshift pistol tucked into his waistband. He looked at Dedi, then at the old blacksmith. "If we run, they hunt everyone in Kranji. If we draw them into the open square, we dictate where the fight happens."

"You're both out of your minds," Jafar muttered, but there was a strange, grim respect in the old blacksmith's eyes as he handed Rangga a heavy steel crowbar. "Take this, then. If you're going to break their toys, use something with some real weight behind it."

Before anyone else could speak, a sharp, concussive pop echoed from the main marketplace just beyond the narrow alleyway, followed immediately by the whine of an automated drone sweeping low over the tin rooftops. A synthetic voice boomed through a localized loudspeaker, bouncing off the narrow corridor walls with ear-splitting distortion.

"Attention residents of Sector Four. Area is under active quarantine. Remain inside your dwellings. Any unauthorized movement will be met with immediate non-lethal suppression."

"They're here," Dedi whispered, pressing himself flat against the back wall of the forge as the sound of heavy tactical boots crunched against the gravel outside.

"Stay here," Rangga told Arung, his stone-bound shoulder scraping against the doorframe as he stepped out into the dim, smoke-filled alleyway. "Keep the boy safe."

"Like hell I'm staying behind to watch from the sidelines," Arung spat, gritting his teeth against the searing pain in his ribs as he stepped out right beside the towering former engineer, his knuckles white around the handle of his wrench. "If we're going to ruin Thorne's day, we do it together."

Rangga didn't argue. He simply strode out of the alley and into the open expanse of the Kranji marketplace, his massive frame casting a long, imposing shadow across the muddy stalls.

The village square was a ghost town of overturned fruit crates, scattered baskets, and panic-stricken silence. Shutters were bolted tight, and terrified faces peered out through narrow cracks in the wooden windows. In the center of the square, four operatives in matte-gray tactical armor stood in a disciplined diamond formation, their heavy-caliber suppression rifles raised and ready. Leading them was a tall, sharp-featured squad leader whose visor glowed with blue tactical telemetry data.

The squad leader stopped dead in his tracks as Rangga emerged from the alley, his eyes locking onto the unnatural gray mineral crust creeping up Rangga's neck and over his left shoulder.

"Target acquired," the squad leader barked into his shoulder comms, his rifle snapping upward without an instant of hesitation. "Subject is mobile and non-compliant in Sector Four. Engaging with suppression rounds."

"Do it!" the squad leader roared to his men.

The four operatives opened fire in perfect synchronization. A barrage of heavy, non-lethal kinetic riot rounds—solid rubber-coated steel slugs designed to shatter bones and drop a charging bull—screeched across the marketplace with deafening velocity.

Instead of dodging, Rangga stepped directly into the storm of fire. He raised his massive, calcified left arm in front of his face, planting his boots deep into the muddy soil of the marketplace.

The impact of the first high-velocity slug sounded like a sledgehammer hitting solid granite. A shockwave of gray mineral dust exploded off Rangga's forearm as the heavy round flattened instantly against the stone-bound skin, dropping harmlessly into the mud without leaving so much as a scratch. A second round slammed into his shoulder with a dull thud, its kinetic energy absorbed entirely by the dense, inorganic armor encasing his flesh.

The tactical operatives froze in their tracks, their rifles stuttering to a halt as disbelief flared across the squad leader's visible features.

"What the hell is he made of?!" one of the operatives shouted over the ringing silence that followed the sudden cessation of gunfire.

"He's not human anymore," the squad leader cursed, frantically slapping a fresh magazine into his rifle. "Switch to live rounds! Burn him down!"

Before the operative could chamber the lethal ammunition, Arung burst out from the alley behind Rangga, swinging the heavy iron wrench with every ounce of strength he had left, hurling a broken wooden crate straight into the lead operative's chest to break their formation.

"Now, Rangga!" Arung roared, ducking as a rubber suppression round whistled just inches above his head and shattered against the brick wall behind them.

Rangga surged forward across the muddy cobblestones like an unstoppable avalanche, his stone-bound fist cocked back and ready to smash straight through the corporate vanguard before they could switch to live fire.

Suddenly, a blinding flash of white light erupted from the corner of the marketplace above the textile warehouse. A heavy anti-materiel stun grenade whistled through the air, landing directly at Rangga’s feet with a sharp, ear-splitting hiss that flooded the entire square with a searing, disorienting brilliance.

Arung cried out, shielding his eyes as white static filled his vision, the sound of marching boots multiplying rapidly from all three intersecting alleyways.

Through the blinding glare and the thick, choking smoke that rolled across the square, a cold, amplified voice cut through the chaos from a heavy armored transport idling at the edge of the perimeter.

"Drop your weapons, Rangga. Your little stunt ends here."