We use a hardware nail gun for the joints.
It's faster and quieter than the old mallet-and-spike method, and less likely to draw attention from the night patrols.
The body is cleaned, the wounds cauterized, and the blood channeled into tidy lines that run off the bridge into the Liffey.
No mess, no theatrical spray.
Just the fact of it, undeniable and permanent.
By 06:17, the first runner—a retiree, ex-army by the look—finds the tableau.
He vomits on the spot, then dials the guards with shaking fingers.
The response team arrivesinside seven minutes, but they don't touch the corpse.
They just stand at the south end of the bridge, radios dead silent, and wait for someone with more authority to tell them what to do.
At 06:41, the first photo hits social.
By 07:00, every street kid, doorman, and kebab vendor in a five-mile radius knows what's happened.
The story mutates instantly—some say the body was left by the Spaniards, others blame the Easterners, a few even claim it's an inside job, some cannibal trick by the O'Duinns.
The truth is more subtle than that, but no one wants the truth.
They want the fear.
By the time I finish my breakfast, three crews have already bailed on their Connolly contracts.
One goes to ground in Swords, another calls in sick to a week's worth of shakedowns, and the third sends an emissary to our safe house with an envelope, a bottle of decent bourbon, and a single line written on hotel stationary—We'd rather switch than burn.
Fiachra calls at 08:22, voice sharp with caffeine and triumph.
"It worked," he says. "They're shitting themselves."
"Of course they are," I reply.
"But don't get greedy. This is when they try to flip it."
"Doesn't matter," he says, and I can hear the smile.
"We have the river. We have the bridges. And after today, we have half the market in the city center."
He's right, but I remind him anyway.
"Don't let the council see your hand."
He grunts, and the line goes dead.
The rest of the day is a series of small aftershocks.
The Crowley colors show up in places we never bothered with before—on the trusses of a pedestrian overpass near the university, on a set of roller shutters in Donnybrook, even stenciled over the old O'Duinn graffiti on the train platformat Clontarf.
It's not random.
Every mark is placed with intent, mapped out two weeks in advance, calculated to hit the points where the city's old boundaries have started to rot.
I spend the afternoon in the north dock offices, watching the feeds as the city pivots, piece by piece.
