CHAPTER 30: [30] I’M GONNA BE...

The square fell into absolute silence. Not the respectful quiet of an attentive crowd, but the breathless hush that follows a lightning strike.

Pierre stood in the middle of the cobblestones, his red hair catching the morning sunlight like flames. Every head turned toward him—sailors gripping their rifles tighter, civilians shrinking back, officers on the platform freezing mid-motion.

A young sailor on the stage raised a trembling finger, his voice cracking with shock and recognition.

"It’s him! The Red-Haired Menace!"

The words hit the crowd hard. Mothers pulled their children closer. Men who had been standing straight suddenly found reasons to study their shoes. The Navy personnel snapped to attention.

Pierre watched the color drain from Captain Hardy’s face, only to be replaced by a blotchy, rising crimson.

"You," Hardy breathed into the speaking horn, his voice barely controlled. "YOU!"

Pierre walked. One step. Then another. He stopped at the base of the platform, tilting his head back to meet Hardy’s murderous glare.

Hardy’s hand scrambled at his hip, tearing the flintlock free. His fingers, slick with sweat and shaking with fury, fumbled at the grip, nearly dropping the weapon.

"The terrorist who disrespected me!" Hardy screamed, his voice cracking on the high notes. "You dare show your face here? Desecrate this sacred ceremony with your presence?"

The pistol’s barrel wavered as Hardy aimed it down at Pierre. Sweat beaded on the captain’s forehead despite the morning chill.

"Men like you are chaos! Civilization is a garden, and weeds like you must be pulled out by the root!"

Pierre clasped his hands behind his back. When he spoke, his voice carried clearly across the silent square without need for amplification.

"Lawless?" Pierre’s tone held genuine curiosity, as if Hardy had asked him about the weather. "Tell me, Captain—what law gives you the right to steal a man’s livelihood? What statute authorizes you to imprison fathers for refusing to surrender their property to spoiled children?"

Hardy’s jaw worked soundlessly for a moment. "The law of order! The law of civilization! The weak must yield to the strong!"

"Ah." Pierre nodded thoughtfully. "Your law, then. Not justice. Not righteousness. Just the will of whoever holds the biggest stick."

The crowd stirred uneasily. These were words they’d thought but never dared speak aloud.

Pierre gestured toward the prisoners being dragged onto the platform—Mika’s father among them, his wrists bound, his face bearing fresh bruises. "And what crime did these men commit under your law? What terrible transgression warrants death?"

"They defied legitimate authority!" Hardy spat. "They questioned rightful commands! They—"

"They said no."

Pierre’s voice cut through Hardy’s sputtering rage.

"They looked at your demands and refused to comply. That’s their crime. That’s what you call worthy of execution."

Hardy raised the pistol higher, his finger tightening on the trigger. "Silence! You will not poison these people with your anarchist propaganda!"

Pierre stepped closer to the platform. Several sailors raised their rifles, but their rifles wavered, the barrels dipping by a fraction of an inch.

"Your law? It’s a cage. Nothing more. Your ’order’ is just the silence you find in a graveyard. And your ’peace’..." He met Hardy’s eyes. "That’s the quiet a man makes when your boot is on his neck."

A low rumble started at the edges of the crowd. It wasn’t speech, not yet. It was the sound of a thousand people shifting their weight at once.

Of men who had been studying their shoes slowly lifting their chins.

Of women pulling their children behind them, not away.

The collective intake of breath caused a pressure change across the square. A dam groaning against the weight of the water.

Hardy’s face twisted into a snarl. "You know nothing about order! Nothing about the burden of command! I have brought stability to this island! I have brought—"

"Terror." Pierre replied. "You’ve brought terror. You’ve made children afraid to laugh too loudly. You’ve made men afraid to speak their minds. You’ve made women afraid to walk these streets without bowing their heads."

He gestured broadly, encompassing the entire square. "Look around you, Captain. Look at your subjects. Do you see respect in their eyes? Do you see loyalty? Or do you see people counting the seconds until they can escape your presence?"

Hardy’s breathing grew ragged. The pistol shook more violently in his grip.

Pierre took another step forward, now close enough to touch the platform’s edge. His voice dropped, but somehow every person in the square heard his next words clearly.

"You call me a criminal. You call me lawless. You call me a terrorist." He paused, letting the words hang in the air. "If standing against a monster like you makes me a criminal..."

A slow smile curved Pierre’s lips, a crescent of pure contempt that didn’t touch his eyes.

"Then I’ll be the greatest criminal this world has ever seen."

Hardy’s face contorted, the blood rushing to his head until he looked moments from bursting. A low, strangled sound escaped his throat.

"KILL HIM!" he roared, shoving Lieutenant Commander Reynolds aside so violently the man nearly fell off the platform. "FORGET THE PRISONERS! KILL HIM NOW!"

The sailors looked from their furious captain to their target. They tried to see a criminal. Instead, they saw eyes as flat and cold as a winter sea. There was no fire, no fear. Only a calm that felt more dangerous than any rage.

"Well?" Pierre called out to the hesitating soldiers. "Your captain gave you an order. Aren’t you going to follow it?"

The nearest sailor—a young man barely out of his teens—raised his rifle with shaking hands. The barrel wavered as he tried to sight down it.

"I... I can’t get a clean shot, sir! Too many civilians!"

"Then clear them out!" Hardy screamed. "Drive them back!"

But the civilians weren’t moving. If anything, they seemed to be pressing closer, forming a loose circle around Pierre. Not protectively—they were still too frightened for that—but with a kind of horrified fascination, like people watching a man juggle fire.

"Useless!" Hardy snarled, his voice thick with contempt. "Cowards! Weaklings!"

He threw the flintlock aside. It clattered across the boards, stopping dead, inches from Alyssa’s feet.

"I’ll do it myself!" he roared. "I’ll rip your heart out with my bare hands!"

Hardy leaped down from the platform, his boots hitting the cobblestones hard. His prosthetic left leg made a solid metallic thud that echoed across the square. He stumbled slightly on the landing but caught himself, drawing his sword in one smooth motion.

The blade was polished steel, its fuller inlaid with gold. The crossguard, shaped like spread wings, caught the sun. It was the weapon of a gentleman, an officer, a representative of civilization and order.

Hardy raised the sword above his head, sunlight dancing along its edge.

"You want to see what happens to criminals who threaten everything decent and lawful?" Hardy’s voice had gone hoarse from shouting, but it carried a deadly quiet now. "You want to know the price of rebellion?"

Pierre finally moved. He reached into his jacket and withdrew the section of pipe he’d carried from the previous night’s sabotage. It was maybe eighteen inches long, dented and stained with rust. Compared to Hardy’s elegant sword, it looked like something a beggar might use to fend off stray dogs.

"I already know the price," Pierre said, hefting the improvised weapon.

"The question is whether you’re prepared to pay it."

Hardy’s eyes narrowed. He took in Pierre’s stance. Relaxed, but ready. Weight on the balls of his feet. The rusty pipe held loose in his right hand, almost like an afterthought

"Last chance," Hardy growled. "Surrender now, and I’ll make your execution quick. Continue this farce, and I’ll take you apart piece by piece and execute ten civilians for cooperating with a fugitive."

Pierre’s smile widened. "Can I tell you the difference between us, Captain?"

"Enlighten me."

"You fight to maintain your position. To preserve your power. To keep what you’ve taken." Pierre shifted his grip on the pipe, testing its weight. "I fight because I’ve got nothing to lose."

Hardy’s face went white. Something in Pierre’s tone—a complete absence of fear, doubt, or hesitation—sent ice through his veins.

"And that," Pierre added, his voice dropping to barely above a whisper, "makes me very dangerous."

The square held its breath. Two men faced each other on the cobblestones—one representing the established order, the other embodying its complete rejection. Between them lay twenty feet of space and an unbridgeable gulf of philosophy.

Hardy raised his sword higher, muscles coiled for the attack.

"The shouts of the crowd, the frantic orders, the scent of sea salt cut by the sour tang of sweat—it all sharpened. The chipped gold inlay on Hardy’s sword. The single bead of sweat tracing a path down his temple. The cracks in the cobblestones across twenty feet of no-man’s land. An entire world, narrowed to this.

Hardy’s sword began its descent.

Pierre moved to meet it.