Where the Chrome Still Bleeds

Jax Thorne escapes a body-parts smuggler with a stolen cipher and a defective heart stabilizer that broadcasts his fear across the Ashlands. Kaelen Vance is a chrome-armored mercenary haunted by the squad he failed to save, and helping Jax should be one more fatal mistake. Hunted through acid rain and mechanical ruins, the two broken men discover that survival may require trusting someone else with the machinery keeping them alive.

A hunted mechanic trusts no one—until a chrome-armored mercenary becomes his only escape and the ticking inside his chest summons an army.