The Broken Warden
The struggle was brief and brutal. Eli, fueled by years of suppressed rage and survival instinct, pinned Cole’s arms beneath the heavy iron fire-poker, disarming him with clinical efficiency.
Cole groaned, spitting blood onto the pine floor. When he looked up into Eli’s unblinking eyes, the swagger drained from his expression, replaced by raw terror.
"Subject Seven," Cole wheezed. "You... you should be dead. The resonance frequency at dawn should have burst your eardrums."
Eli knelt, pulling the notebook from his belt and writing with his left hand while keeping Cole pinned with his right knee:
I am not a number. I am Eli Vance.
Eliza stepped forward, binding Cole’s hands with heavy hemp rope. She retrieved Cole’s key ring—a heavy set of iron keys stamped with foundry sector numbers—and a brass acoustic whistle hanging from a chain around his neck.
"This whistle," Eliza said, holding the instrument up to the lantern light. "It triggers the paralysis, doesn't it?"
May you like
Cole sneered through broken teeth. "Blow it, girl. Blow it and watch him drop. You have no idea what Arthur Mercer has built beneath the gorge. The entire valley runs on our steel. We are building the rail lines of the future, and progress does not care about your sympathy."
"Progress without humanity is just slaughter with a calendar," Eliza replied, gagging him with a strip of canvas.
