When she presses breath against my ear, voice soft and steady and broken in all the right ways, “Stay with me,” she says.
I answer with a growl — soft, half-animal, half-prayer. “Always.”
The blanket beneath, tattered and charcoal-stained, shifts under weight. Sparks of dust flick in the glow of the remaining embers. The air is thick with the smell of old fire, scorched circuitry, and something brand-new: quiet.
The night closes around us — not dark, but gentle. Not empty, but full.
I move with her guidance — slow, careful. She guides my hands, my spine, my lips. I follow. Because in this space, in this moment, I don’t need to claim. I don’t need to conquer.
I need only to love.
Her skin under my fingers is warm, trembling, alive. I trace the newly tied cloth around her wrists, gently, reverently. The fabric is rough against soft skin. She flinches once — maybe reflex. I pause. I lean down and press a finger over the knot. “Safe,” I murmur. “I won’t slip. Not this time.”
She exhales. Her breath puffs warm against my chest. “I don’t want safe,” she whispers. “I wantreal.”
I don’t question. I don’t argue. I steady myself, listen to her heartbeat against mine — strong, insistent — and trust.
We move together. Not with fury. Not with desperation. But with long slow strokes. Skin sliding against scarred flesh. Pain and pleasure mingling, old wounds and new warmth weaving into a tapestry of blood and breath and broken promises made whole.
Her lips part in a soft cry — tiny, sacred. My own throat tightens. The world tilts. Light fractures across body and bone and love, a halo under shattered metal beams, under soot-black ceilings.
Soft moans, ragged breaths, the shift of broken armor plates against scarred flesh — the symphony of survival.
I hold her — gentle, raw, relentless — not a warlord, not a conqueror, not a monster. Just a man and a woman, scarred but alive, rebuilding under smoke and soft dawn still hours away.
When I press my lips to the small of her back, just where a scar runs shallow, she arches — not away — into me. Almost like she claimed me back too.
“Mine,” I rasp, voice cracked by emotion.
She answers in a breathless whisper: “Mine.”
We stay like that — entangled, bruised, fixed between rubble and promise — until the firelight outside bleeds soft and orange into the room. Dust stirs, shifting in beams that filter through cracked wall panels. The smell of pine smoke rises, sweeter now with first hints of dawn, of renewal.
I roll us gently so she lies against my chest, head tucked under my chin. My ribs ache with each breath — a reminder I carry with pride now, not shame. My scars hum against her skin. She reaches over, traces them with her fingertips. Not a single word spoken, but her touch says it all: thank you, alive, never again alone.
I close my eyes. I taste ash, sweat, hope, and blood — my blood, her blood, their blood, our blood — mingled into one warm promise.
“Let’s rest,” I murmur.
She hums softly — a sound like home.
The night outside continues to die, fire feeding on rubble, metal groaning under strain. But inside this room, inside this body, inside this moment — there is only warmth, wounded flesh melding into healing flesh, breath after breath, heartbeat after heartbeat.
I do not promise tomorrow. I cannot. The world is still broken. But I promise this night. This body. This love.
And I rest my head against hers, listening to her steady breathing, letting sleep take what’s left — sleep, and hope, and the possibility of something more than battle, more than war, more than scars.
Because tonight — we’re more than survivors. We’re home.
FREYA
The hum of the starship beneath my boots feels strange — gentle, steady, like a purr from some great beast just waking. I stand on the bridge beside Vokar, and I press my fingers to the cool metal rim of the console. The moon of Storder drops away behind us, pale and silent. Below, the forest-moon shrinks into the abyss, the scars of war fading into memory.
I taste salt on my tongue — leftover from sweat, ash, tears, and maybe hope. The recycled-air hum smells faintly of coolant and engine grease, but mixed in there is the scent of freedom: clean metal, recycled oxygen, and something new — the subtle tang of possibility.
Vokar’s shoulder brushes mine. His body still bears the marks of the last fight — a half-healed rib, a burn scar along his forearm, the ghost of pain in every measured breath. But his eyes — those fierce red embers — shine calm, soft. Steady. I glance over at him, heart pulsing quiet but strong, and I realize: I don’t feel fear anymore. Not for the future. Not for the unknown.
Behind us, Yorta stands tall, shoulders squared with responsibility. His arm is bandaged, and his stance is rigid, but there’s something proud in the way he carries himself.He’s taken up the mantle of leadership — interim, for now — guiding the survivors who stayed, rebuilding what was lost. The memory of betrayal lingers in the lines of his face, but so does determination. He nods to the crew around him: steady hands, hopeful eyes, armor plates scratched but still loyal.
