EPISODE 8: TAX AND TENDER ## Midnight Protocol — Season 1, Episode 8 --- Iron Marrow sent a tax collector with a baseball bat titled Policy. ``` [DEMAND: SPINE ROAD STREET TAX] Pay 30% of all Harbor deliveries OR cede Dock B Deadline: sunset ``` Aegis sent a tender document with better fonts. ``` [AEGIS ACQUISITION TENDER] Buyout: 5,000 coin + founder seat on logistics board Clause 14: Dependent assets (Maya Voss) enter sponsored care ``` Rae burned the clause in her mind until the System recorded a formal reject. ``` [TENDER REJECTED] [AEGIS HOSTILITY: +15] [IRON MARROW HOSTILITY: +10 (tax ignored so far)] ``` --- ## CHAPTER 1: DOUBLE FRONT Sunset meant bats and drones. ``` [EVENT: DOCK B SIEGE] Attackers: Iron Marrow vanguard + Aegis "observers" Defend for 20:00 or lose warehouse node ``` Spine Road held with ugly creativity. Rae auctioned a decoy route through Route Auction—Pewter as visible bait, Sasha as real path, Ortiz as wall. ``` [ROUTE AUCTION USED] [DECOY SUCCESS] [SIEGE TIMER 12:00] ``` A Level 9 Marrow enforcer broke the dock door. Rae Satchel-Linked two skills at once—Guard Stance and a scavenged Flash Step—and danced him into a Parcel Bomb stack. ``` [ENEMY DEFEATED +120 XP] [HP 64/100] [STA 21/100] ``` Lin remote-healed through a Medic Alliance link. The siege timer hit...