Later, inside the dome, I sit at the modular table and pull the slate toward me. The screen glows softly. Documents: old files from my service record, encrypted Alliance logs, a half-deleted adoption file with Nessa’s data line incomplete. I trace the line with my fingertip, feel the cool glass under my skin, the slight vibration of the processing chip underneath. My stomach twists.
Vael sits across from me, leaning back, arms crossed. He watches me swear at a corrupted file. I mutter words too old for this light-field screen.
“Need help?” he asks.
I laugh—short, bitter. “You happy correcting my screw-ups?”
He shrugs. “Just stable enough to stay out of the debug limbo.”
I jolt him with a look. “Thanks.”
He nods. “No problem.”
I flick to the next file: the orphan registry ledger. Rows of names, some struck through, some still active. Mine appears with an alias. Another column shows “Untraceable.” Nessa’s file is missing—but that’s exactly the danger.
“This one,” I whisper. “They’ll find it eventually.”
He leans forward. “Then we give them the truthfirst.”
I close my eyes. It’s not a rallying cry. It’s just a fact. The arena of truth feels unfamiliar. I’ve always moved in shadows. But maybe the shadows are what made me ready for this.
“Yes,” I say. “We'll go.”
Over breakfast—vakutan root-bread soaked in sea-foam honey, and the local blue-leaf tea that burns the tongue—that morning feels different. Even Nessa senses it: she stirs in her seat, eyes bright.
“Mama? What’s a tribunal?” she asks.
Vael smiles at her. “It’s a place where people listen. Where you tell what happened and they decide what that means.”
Nessa nods sagely. Then takes a big bite of bread. “I’m gonna tell them I broke the post.”
I snort. “Maybe later, kiddo.”
She glares at me. “Later? Why not now?”
I ruffle her hair. “Too early for that kind of honesty.”
Vael chuckles. “Maybe too early for the rest of us, too.”
Her eyes drift to the windows—where the sea and sky merge. I see the question there: Are we really fixed in this spot now?
And I answer with my voice low: “We don’t run. Not again. Not ever.”
The rest of the day is planning. Logistics. Travel vectors. Legal permissions. One of the elders in the settlement, a quiet man named Sorvan, runs a communication net out of the basalt tower. Vael meets him in the workshop where nets and sensors and sound-fields hum. I stand back and watch Vael and Sorvan talk war-code and advocacy. The smell of solder, of hot metal, of old circuitry fills the air. My mind keeps pinging: they’re talking about our names out loud. Names meant to stay hidden.
That afternoon, I walk the shoreline alone. The sand is darker than memory, flecked with bioluminescent shards like stardust ground up. I hold the slate in one hand and let the waves slap my calves. The sea’s foam tastes bitter against my lips. The gull-calls overhead sound distant, melodic. I pick up a shell, rough with salt-etch, smooth where the water’s worn it. I slide it into my pocket.
I remember the camps. The scream of alarms. The smell of fear. The feel of my hands shaking when I thought I couldn’t move. I remember what Ididn’tknow.
Now I breathe in the sea. Now I feel the shell against my palm.
This is different.
Evening comes.We gather in the circular council hall of the settlement: timber beams carved with old runes, a stone floor etched with the patterns of the coast and sky. Candles flicker, casting long shadows that dance like ghosts across the assembly of villagers. Rynn sits beside Vael, Nessa between our knees. I feel more exposed than I’ve ever been.
An elder stands to speak: “The tribunal invites you to present your case. We will arrange travel within two cycles. Terms acceptable to you will be met. You say you seek not running—but standing.” His voice is low, resonant like the sea in the caverns below.
I grip Vael’s hand. My ring finger brushes his mechanical plating. It reminds me he’s still half machine, still enhanced. But here, I see the humanity in him more than ever. The decision he made to kneel, to bear scars and truth. To build.
