A soft chime interrupts me. My private comm-alert:Aebon, need your input on a proposal.I swipe. A file appears—land development contract from ex-Sect coalition.
His message:Everything good?
I type back:Reviewing now. See you soon.Then I hold the reflection in the mirror, letting the person behind the screen settle in.
I speak to the reflection, voice low:Yes. You’re here. You earned it. But keep balancing the sword and the gavel.
I step into newly lit streets—clean, colorful, alive. Children scamper past neon murals; families dine on the sidewalk; a former Syndicate safehouse now transformed into a library.
A vendor calls out to me by name, offering free sample of herbs from a Sect-funded wellness program. I taste rosemary and mint, fresh as hope.
A small group of civilians congregate near a fountain engraved with the Centauri sigil and Valhanna symbols—unity between alien and human. They smile, wave.
I wave back, heart swelling. One woman snaps a holo-photo:Aria Dawson and the renewal of Goldwin.
I raise my hand in acknowledgment, even though every part of me whispers—I deserve this.
Back on the penthouse balcony,wine glass in hand, I watch Aebon beneath the starlit sky. He stands strong, silent sentinel. I join him, the breeze cool, comforting. The scent of cedar in his suit mingles with my lavender.
We stand side by side. Without turning, he says: “You’re doing beautifully.”
I rest hand on his back. “We’re doing beautifully.”
He touches my hand. “Tell me what you see.”
I smile softly. “A city healing. A justice recalibrated. Power explained, not enforced. And a second pacing beside me.”
He looks at me—soul recognition in his crimson gaze. “I trust you.”
I breathe deep, savoring the moment. Wind brushes my cheek, soft. Neon mirrors pool across faces.
I reply: “I trust us.”
He kisses my hand. “Rest, Second.”
I rest against him. In that hush, we conquer reflection and responsibility. We are a duo—two souls forged by blood and machine, kindness and ruthlessness, love and legacy.
In the silence, a future hums—clean, hopeful, ours.
Because at dawn, the mirror will still show this woman—a survivor, a ruler, a healer. And she’ll know she earned every line, every battle-scared step, every measure of peace she helped create.
I exhale. Goldwin breathes in. The night stretches warm with promise—and hope.
I push open the scorched gates of the old courthouse, its hollowed-out columns rising like ghostly sentinels in the pale morning light. Charred stone crumbles beneath my fingertips as I trace the arc of the entrance where I once strode—briefcase in hand, heart full of righteous purpose. Now it's a monument to collateral damage—ruined during the height of the mob wars, left untouched as a grim testament to the cost of power.
The air inside tastes of ash and regret: dust-laden, acrid, like the remnants of ambition smoldering long after the fire is gone. Every step crunches on fragments of marble and shattered borrowed hopes. I can still hear the echoes of my own voice—the firm cadence of a prosecutor convinced justice could tame the underworld. I breathe deeply, drawing in dust and memory, paper-thin. The ache in my chest tightens: how far we’ve come, and what we left behind.
A sudden shuffle behind me pulls me from the past. I turn, expecting a construction crew or perhaps a relic reporter. Instead, I see a young man—around my age, but his shoulders droop with deference. He’s wearing the dark blazer of the Prosecutor’s Office, insignia still intact. His eyes flick up to me, widen for the fraction of a second, then drop away in disgust.
My heart clenches. I don’t remember that reaction. I remember respect—or at least fear. But this boy sees somethingdifferent now. He sees a prosecutor who abandoned the courtroom for the boardroom, who chose shadow leadership over legal procedure. He sees me, but not the woman I once was.
I square my shoulders and raise my chin. “Morning,” I say with calm confidence, though my voice trembles in unexpected defiance.
He doesn’t answer. Keeps his gaze locked on the cracked floor beneath him. I feel the weight of everything I sacrificed.
I step toward him, gravel crunching beneath my heels. “You used to know me,” I say softly. “Junior Assistant Prosecutor Aria Dawson. I put people away in this very chamber.”
He glances at me—green-eyed recognition, but not relief. Maybe regret.
