“That is worse.”
I can’t help the small, surprised laugh that escapes me. It feels fragile, like glass.
“You sound jealous.”
His head turns sharply toward me. For a heartbeat, his expression is unreadable. Then—slowly—he exhales.
“No,” he says. “I sound decided.”
Decided.
I swallow, pulse skidding, palms sweating.
“About what?”
His eyes hold mine. No heat, no threat—just truth laid bare in a way that feels far more dangerous.
“About standing with you,” he says. “Not because the ship demands it. Not because it is strategic. Because… of you.”
My breath catches. Inside, something shifts—something fundamental sliding into place with a quiet certainty that leaves no room for doubt.
“I didn’t ask you to,” I whisper.
“I know.”
“You could walk away from this,” I continue. “From me. From the ship. From whatever this becomes.”
“I could,” he agrees.
The way he says it—calm, unforced—makes it clear he’s already considered it. Weighed it. Rejected it.
“But you’re not going to,” I say.
“No.”
The certainty in that single syllable is like a hand closing around my spine, steadying me from the inside. I realize then that my fear hasn’t been about the ship at all. Not really. It’s been about being alone in this.
And I am not.
The knowledge warms something in me that’s been cold for a long time, even as the containment rings hum softly behind me—ancient, patient, and dangerous—already recalculating around a variable it doesn’t yet understand.
Us.
The ship doesn’t interrupt us, and that—more than anything—makes my skin prickle.
The containment rings brighten in a slow sequence—one, then the next—like a breath drawn carefully through clenched teeth.
The air tightens. Not pressure like before, but focus.
A thin line of light spills from the base of the column, tracing across the floor until it reaches my boots. It stops there, hesitates, then branches outward in sharp, angular lines that feel too deliberate to be a path.
Travnyk shifts, head tilting. “It is initiating a change-state,” he murmurs.
My throat goes dry. The ship isn’t just observing anymore. It’s starting the process—waiting for my authorization to complete it.
It’s observing. Logging. Adjusting to a new variable that wasn’t part of its original projections.
Rakkh does not step away from me when Travnyk approaches.
