Then she growls.
The sound isn’t loud. It’s not even angry.
It’s possessive.
The room seems to shrink around us. I scoop Chelsea up before anyone else can react, pressing her face into my shoulder.
“I warned you,” I snap, sharper than I mean to. “She’s sensitive.”
The nanny stares at me, eyes wide, hand bleeding. “That wasn’t—babies don’t?—”
“Leave,” I say. “Now.”
Later, I scrub the carpet myself.
Later still, I sit on the nursery floor with Chelsea asleep against my chest, her breathing slow and even. When she dreams, her fingers flex like claws opening and closing.
I press my lips to her hair and whisper, “We have to be careful.”
Her eyes flutter open.
For just a second, they gleam crimson.
And I know.
Kallus, wherever you are—she’s yours.
And I will destroy the galaxy before I let them take her from me.
3 years later…
Time has a way of slipping past you when every day is spent hiding something sacred.
Chelsea is nearly three before I realize how much of her childhood I’ve spent in fear. The early months were a blur of sleepless nights and hushed stories, gene masking and whispered warnings. Then, like water carving through stone, the routines settled. Bottles became solids, gurgles became words. Crawling turned to walking. Her laugh grew louder. Her curiosity bolder.
But still—always—there’s the watching. The scanning. The hope she might just… remain undetectable.
Hope is a fragile thing. A brittle lie I tell myself.
Because it happens just after her third birthday. We’re in the garden, just the two of us. The air smells of lemon blossom and synth-grass, and Chelsea is giggling as she chases a blue-winged hopper that darted past the hedge.
“Mommy! Look!” she calls, holding out her arms in triumph.
And that’s when I see it.
A sharp edge of bone just below her right elbow—like a blade budding from her skin. Not broken. Not bruised. Growing.
My breath catches.
“Chelsea,” I say, careful, calm, kneeling down. “Let me see your arm, sweetheart.”
She toddles over, oblivious. “It tickles,” she says, grinning.
My fingers are ice as I run them along the raised edge. Smooth, sharp, already hardening.
Panic coils in my stomach.
I bundle her inside, make excuses to the staff, lock the nursery door. My hands are shaking as I initiate the gene recalibration interface. I run her biometric scan twice, three times, because I don’t want to believe what I see.
