# Chapter 7: The Debt is Called
The Warden's gaze moved on, but the pressure lingered, a cold hand on Barrett's spine. He was no longer just a man seeking revenge; he was a specimen under a microscope. Every move he made from this point forward would be scrutinized. The Culling was no longer just a deadline; it was a guillotine, and the Warden had just personally checked the rope. Panic, cold and sharp, threatened to overwhelm him, but beneath it, a new, harder emotion began to form: resolve. If he was going to be watched, he would give them something to see. He would not be a victim. He would not be culled. He would become the monster they feared. Straightening up, he pushed off the railing and merged with the flow of guards leaving the balcony. It was time to hunt.
He descended the metal stairs, his boots ringing with a new, deliberate rhythm. The sea of blue uniforms parted around him, a river of anonymous faces, but he felt exposed, a single dark stone on a sun-bleached shore. His mind, however, was not on the Warden or the Culling. It was on Eirik. The man had given him the Void Stone, a tool that had likely saved him from Cole's probing. He owed him. And in a place like Blackstone, debts were not forgotten; they were collected.
He needed to find Eirik. Not just to repay the favor, but because the cynical inmate was his only map to this treacherous new world. He changed course, breaking away from the stream of guards heading toward the barracks and moving instead toward the general population blocks. The air grew thicker here, the scent of stale sweat, cheap disinfectant, and the acrid tang of ozone from the flickering fluorescent lights. The roar of a thousand conversations, arguments, and laughters was a physical force.
Barrett moved with purpose, his eyes scanning the catwalks and cell blocks. He was looking for a specific aura—the dim, weary flicker he associated with Eirik. He passed groups of inmates, their auras a chaotic spectrum of colors. Most were the dull, lifeless grey of the unranked, but here and there, he saw the faint glimmer of Iron, the muddy brown of Bronze. He saw the crude, self-inflicted tattoos that marked their rank—a simple iron bar for G-rank, a tarnished bronze circle for F. These were The Marks, a public ledger of power.
He found Eirik in Block C, near the laundry room. But the scene was wrong. A crowd had gathered in a loose, predatory circle, their jeers and shouts a low, ugly hum. In the center of the clearing was a whirlwind of violence. Eirik was on his feet, his back against a corroded wall, his face a mask of desperate fury. He was fighting, but he was losing. Three men were on him, their movements coordinated, their auras the same muddy brown of Bronze Rank. They wore the skull-and-crossbones insignia of the Skullcrushers.
One of them, a brute with a shaved head and a neck thicker than Barrett's thigh, swung a crude shiv made from a sharpened piece of bedframe. Eirik twisted, the blade scraping a deep gouge in the concrete where his head had been a second before. He drove his elbow back into the ribs of another attacker, eliciting a grunt of pain, but a third man landed a solid kick to Eirik's knee, buckling his leg. He went down with a cry of pain.
The crowd roared its approval. This wasn't a fight; it was a punishment.
Barrett's blood ran cold. This was because of him. Eirik had helped him, and the Skullcrushers were making him pay. His first instinct was to charge in, baton drawn, to use his authority as a guard. But the Warden's face flashed in his mind. He was being watched. A direct intervention now would be a signal, a declaration. It would paint a target on his back so bright even the Warden couldn't ignore it. He was still a ghost. A ghost couldn't fight a legion.
He clenched his fists, his nails digging into his palms. He had to do something. He raised his stun baton, not to charge, but to activate its emergency alert function. A piercing shriek tore through the air, a sound that cut through the din of the crowd. Heads turned. The attackers froze for a crucial second.
"Guards incoming!" Barrett bellowed, his voice laced with an authority he didn't feel. "Break it up! Now!"
The hesitation was all he needed. The Bronze-ranked Skullcrushers, brave enough to beat a lone man, were not foolish enough to take on a squad of guards. They spat on the ground near Eirik's fallen form and melted back into the crowd, their identities lost in the shifting sea of bodies. A moment later, two other guards, Miller and a burly man named Rizzo, came running around the corner.
"What the hell happened?" Miller asked, his eyes wide as he took in the scene—Eirik crumpled on the floor, blood already seeping through his prison jumpsuit.
"Jumped," Barrett said, his voice tight. "Three of them. Skullcrushers. They were gone before I could get a clear look."
Rizzo grunted, nudging Eirik with his boot. "Serves him right for snitching. Get him to the infirmary. You're with him, Kane."
Barrett nodded, his jaw set. He holstered his baton and knelt beside Eirik. The man was conscious, but just barely. One eye was swollen shut, his lip was split, and his breathing was a ragged, wet sound. He looked up at Barrett, his one good eye filled with a mixture of pain and something that looked chillingly like resignation.
"Shouldn't have… done it," Eirik rasped, a bubble of blood forming on his lips.
"Shut up," Barrett said, his voice low and intense. "Save your strength." He carefully slung one of Eirik's arms over his shoulder, lifting him with a grunt. The man was dead weight. As he hauled him toward the infirmary, the weight felt heavier than just a body. It was the weight of a consequence. The weight of a debt.
***
The infirmary was a sterile white island in a sea of grey decay. The air smelled of antiseptic and boiled linen, a clean scent that did little to mask the underlying odor of sickness and despair. A single nurse, a woman with a tired face and eyes that had seen too much, directed Barrett to an empty cot. He laid Eirik down as gently as he could. The nurse moved with efficient, practiced motions, cutting away Eirik's jumpsuit to assess the damage. The extent of the beating was worse than it had looked from a distance. Ribs were bruised, if not broken. His knee was swollen to twice its normal size. A long, deep gash ran down his forearm.
Barrett stood by, feeling useless, his guard uniform a costume that offered no real power here. He watched as the nurse cleaned the wounds, her touch surprisingly gentle. She worked without speaking, the only sounds the clink of metal instruments and Eirik's pained hisses. After she had finished, she gave Barrett a weary look. "He'll live. For now. But he won't be walking for a week. And he'll be a target the second he's out of that bed."
She left them alone, pulling a thin curtain around the cot for a semblance of privacy. The space felt small, claustrophobic. Barrett pulled a metal stool over and sat, the legs scraping loudly against the polished floor. He looked at Eirik, who was staring at the ceiling, his one good eye tracking the slow rotation of a ceiling fan.
"They came for me because of you," Eirik said, his voice a dry whisper. It wasn't an accusation. It was a statement of fact.
"I know," Barrett replied, the words tasting like ash. "I'm sorry."
"Sorry doesn't exist in here, Kane. Only consequences. You saved my life with that alarm, I'll give you that. But you put me in this position to begin with." Eirik shifted, wincing. "The Skullcrushers have a code. We don't help outsiders. Especially not guards. You're a ghost, a variable. By helping you, I became a traitor in their eyes."
"So this is my fault."
"It's *our* fault," Eirik corrected, turning his head to look at Barrett. "And now, there's a Debt."
"A debt? I already owe you for the stone."
Eirik managed a weak, bloody chuckle that turned into a cough. "No. Not that kind. *The* Debt. It's a system. A way of controlling people. When someone does something that breaks the balance, a Debt is created. It's not a favor. It's a chain. I helped you, so the gang collected from me. You helped me, so now the gang is collecting from you. But since they can't get to you directly—not yet, anyway—they'll collect from me again. It's a cycle. It only stops when the balance is restored with blood."
Barrett felt a cold knot tighten in his stomach. "What does that mean? What do I have to do?"
"You have to make a move," Eirik said, his voice gaining a sliver of strength. "You have to hurt them. Badly. You have to take something from them of equal or greater value than what they took from me. An eye for an eye is the basic currency. A life for a life is the premium."
He was being forced. His hand was being pushed. The plan to hunt, to slowly build his power by preying on the weak, was being torn apart. He couldn't afford to be patient anymore. He had to act against the Skullcrushers directly. He had to escalate his personal war, and he had to do it now.
"Who?" Barrett asked, his voice hard as iron. "Who do I go after?"
Eirik's eye gleamed with a feral light. "That's the right question. Not 'if,' but 'who.' You can't just pick a random grunt. That's an insult. It has to be someone who matters. Someone whose absence will be felt."
He paused, taking a shallow breath. "The beating… it wasn't random. It was a message. Ordered by one of their lieutenants. A man named Taaland."
The name hung in the air between them, heavy and sharp.
"Taaland," Barrett repeated, committing it to memory. "Where do I find him?"
"He runs the workshop in the sub-levels. Forges weapons. Enforces the Skullcrushers' territory down there. He's always got a crew around him." Eirik's gaze grew intense. "And he's not like the grunts who beat me. He's Bronze Rank. A solid F. He's been cultivating for years. He's strong, fast, and cruel. You're still a ghost, Kane. You've got a flicker of Iron in you, but that's it. You can't beat him head-on. You can't walk into his workshop and challenge him to a fight. You'll be dead before you can draw your baton."
Barrett leaned forward, his mind racing. The Warden's scrutiny, the Culling's deadline, and now this. The walls were closing in. "Then what do I do? You said I have to make a move."
"You do," Eirik confirmed. "But you have to be smarter. You're a guard. Use that. Your uniform is a weapon. Your authority is a shield. Taaland expects an attack from a rival inmate or a desperate ghost. He doesn't expect a systematic takedown from the inside. You need to find his weakness. Everyone has one. A contraband route he relies on. A personal stash he hides. A man he trusts who can be turned. You have to find the lever and pull it."
Eirik's eye began to droop, the pain and exhaustion finally claiming him. "He's Bronze Rank, Kane. Remember that. He feels powerful. He feels untouchable. That's his vulnerability. Arrogance. Use it."
Barrett stood up, the stool scraping against the floor again. He looked down at the broken man on the cot. Eirik had risked everything for him, and now he was paying the price. The debt wasn't just a prison concept anymore. It was personal. It was a debt of honor, of blood. He would repay it.
"Rest," Barrett said, his voice low and firm. "I'll handle it."
As he turned to leave, Eirik's voice, barely a whisper, stopped him. "Kane."
Barrett looked back.
"He's Bronze Rank. You're still a ghost. You can't beat him head-on. You have to be smarter."
Barrett gave a single, sharp nod. He understood. The hunt was on, but the prey had changed. He was no longer stalking the weak and defenseless. He was hunting a predator. And he would use every tool, every lie, every ounce of his newfound perception to bring it down.