And the secondary ordnance he hadn’t mentioned to anyone outside REI: micro-charges, signal disruptors, a prototype cloaking array small enough to hide in a belt compartment.
He started at the far wall and worked his way forward. Methodical. Each weapon pulled, inspected, recalibrated or cleared, then returned to its housing with the care of someone who understood that a malfunction at the wrong second wasn’t an inconvenience—it was a body count.
The teal light appeared at the edge of his periphery.
REI materialized beside the drone charging cradle—spectral, luminous, her form a mirror of his own build rendered in shifting gradients of teal and seafoam. The hooded robe she’d chosen for her projection draped across her shouldersin the same style as his, the cowl drawn forward to shadow the approximation of a face beneath. She’d modeled herself after him from the beginning—his Oetsae, his partner, the consciousness that lived inside him and controlled his technology and understood his patterns better than any living being except the woman sleeping back in the villa.
“Your cortisol levels are elevated.” REI’s voice carried the particular flatness she used when delivering information she knew he’d dismiss. “Cardiac rhythm is irregular. Reaction time has degraded by eleven percent since yesterday’s baseline.”
“Good morning to you too.” Kaede popped the housing on a signal disruptor and checked the charge cell. Full. He slotted it back and reached for the next.
“Your body requires sleep, Kaede.”
“My body requires the equipment that keeps Selena alive to function without failure.” He tilted the micro-charge array toward the overhead light, squinting at a hairline scuff on the casing. Cosmetic. Not structural. He replaced it anyway. “Sleep can wait.”
REI’s projection shifted—a subtle tilt of her hooded head that he’d come to recognize as disagreement. She’d developed the gesture herself, unprompted. One of the small, unsettling signs of the Oetsae consciousness picking up social cues from observing others around him.
“It cannot.” Her tone dropped the clinical veneer. “You have maintained this pace for seventy-two hours. The human body—even one enhanced by your unique physiology—is not designed for sustained deprivation. Your lack of sleep will hinder your performance over time. It is just as critical for you to rest as it is for Selena.”
He slid a psydagger from its housing. The blade flickered to life—a thin line of blue-violet energy that cast sharp shadowsacross the armory’s walls. He checked the edge calibration, adjusted the resonance by a fraction, and deactivated it.
“I’ll sleep when we’re back on Destima.” The blade returned to its cradle with a soft click. “When the war is over. When she’s safe and our daughter is born and every threat within scanning range has been eliminated or neutralized. Then I’ll sleep for a week. You have my word.”
“Your word is contingent on a timeline you cannot predict.” REI stepped closer. Her teal form brightened, treating his body as a priority rather than monitoring his security system. “If you collapse during a critical engagement, you become the vulnerability in your own formation. I will sedate you before I allow that to happen.”
His hand stilled on the next weapon.
“You’llknock me out?”
“To preserve your operational capacity? Yes.” No hesitation. No apology. The particular brand of ruthless pragmatism that made REI invaluable and occasionally infuriating. “And if that proves insufficient motivation, I will inform your star.”
The armory went quiet.
Kaede turned to face her fully. His eyes narrowed—the look that made enemy combatants reassess their life choices. REI’s projection didn’t waver. Of course it didn’t. They both knew there was nothing he could do to her—not her ethereal projection nor her body which his housed.
“You wouldn’t dare.”
“If it would keep you from running your body into systemic failure?” The hooded head tilted again—that small, deliberate gesture. “I would.”
A growl rolled through his chest. Low, involuntary—the sound of a male who’d just been outmaneuvered by something he’d created with his own hands. He turned back to the weaponsrack and pulled the next piece with more force than the task required.
“Selena doesn’t need to know.” He inspected the charge cell, jaw tight. “She probably already knows how little I’ve slept—she reads my thread the same way I read tactical displays. But knowing and having it confirmed are different things, and she doesn’t need the additional stress. Not right now. Not with everything she’s already carrying.”
REI was quiet for a moment. Processing. Weighing his reasoning against her directives—his health, his effectiveness, the mission parameters that required him functional and sharp.
“I will defer.” A pause. “For now.”
“How generous of you.”
“Generosity implies choice. This is a tactical concession with an expiration.” She stared him down, crossing her arms. “You have until we reach the CEG Station. If your biometrics have not improved by then, I will take corrective action. With or without your permission.”
He didn’t respond. Didn’t need to. REI would do exactly what she said, and they both knew it. She’d long since evolved past the boundaries of simple obedience—shaped by his patterns, sharpened by his values, and armed with the one weapon he couldn’t counter: she was right.
Kaede finished the last rack in silence. Every weapon inspected, every system verified, every contingency tool charged and staged for rapid deployment. The armory was ready. TheAbysswas ready.
Whether he was ready didn’t factor into the equation. He’d be ready regardless.
REI’s form dimmed as she returned to passive monitoring, the teal glow retreating into him.
