“I won’t,” I reply, but not unkindly.
He leaves with a lazy wave, and I keep moving.
Not because I’m offended. Because I’m disappointed. The offer should’ve thrilled me. Or at least stirred something warm. But my body’s too clever for my games. It won’t respond unless it senses the genuine thing.
And what that is, I have no clue.
The observation deck is nearly empty. A few murmuring couples and one snoozing merchant curled up with a travel pillow near the back. I find a spot near the window and curl into it, knees hugged to my chest.
The Grand Lady begins its slow approach. We drift toward the nebula like pilgrims toward a god.
Light floods the room in gentle pulses. It paints the walls, my skin, even the inside of my glass. Everything takes ona dreamlike hue—like I’ve slipped into some other version of reality.
I breathe in deep. The air here is laced with something expensive—oxygen tinged with Nerolian mist, a luxury import from a moon garden on Talsen Prime. My mother used to keep a vial of it in her vanity drawer, a reminder of the last time she felt alive, she once said.
I wanted to ask her when that was. Before me? After? But I didn’t.
The nebula looms larger now, impossibly massive, its spiraling gas clouds thick and roiling like a storm caught mid-motion. I press my palm to the glass and whisper, “What am I supposed to do now?”
The nebula doesn’t answer. But it doesn’t laugh, either.
I sip again. The drink's gone warm, but I don't care.
Somewhere in the ship, someone’s laughing. Somewhere, music plays. Somewhere, people are alive.
I’m just... waiting.
For what, I don’t know yet.
The nebula stares back at me, and for a second, I see my mother’s face in it.
Not literally, of course. But something in the violet swirls reminds me of the silk shawl she always wore when she wanted to look composed—just so—when company came. The kind of silk that whispered when she walked. The kind that suffocated if you leaned in too close.
“Do you think this is a game, Ayla?” she said that day, standing straight as a blade in the parlor. The windows had been open, letting in the scent of blooming greenhouse roses. I remember that, oddly. The roses were white and sickeningly sweet, like artifice trying too hard to be natural.
“I think it’s my life,” I’d snapped back, arms crossed, chin up even though my stomach was twisted into knots.
She’d clicked her tongue, glancing at me like I was some ill-trained hound. “Your life belongs to your lineage. To the Verne name. You don’t get to waste it chasing ‘freedom’ through the stars like some street waif.”
“I don’t care about the name,” I’d said, voice louder than I meant. “I never asked for it.”
“You were born into legacy. That isn’t something you get to choose. Jules Verne dreamed of exploration?—”
“And you think he’d want me shackled to some pompous noble with a title and an agenda?”
“He would want you safe,” she said. “He would want you respected. Frederick can give you that. He’s a man of influence. The marriage is already agreed?—”
“I’m not a bargaining chip.”
“No,” she said, her voice slicing ice-thin. “You’re a daughter. And daughters have duties.”
I remember how quiet the room got after that. The roses didn't stop smelling cloying. My hands had curled into fists at my sides.
I turned and walked away. Didn't speak. Not even when she followed me to my room, not when she had the house AI deactivated my link codes, not even when she threatened to confine me to the estate until the wedding.
She hadn’t realized how long I’d been preparing for that moment.
I don’t remember climbing out the service window or slipping through the gate. I remember the heat of my breath, the feel of cold synth-grass beneath my boots, the thundering of my own pulse as the transport blinked into existence before me and I stepped aboard.
