"I know this is hard," he says. His hand settles on my arm in a casual gesture of comfort. His fingers are cool through the fabric of my sleeve.
He doesn't let go.
It's not aggressive. It's not even obviously wrong. It's just... a beat too long. A half-second past where a casual touch should release. And in that half-second, I feel something. A tug. A pull toward trust, toward letting my guard down, toward leaning into the kindness he's offering because kindness is so scarce here that even the counterfeit version triggers something desperate in my chest.
I step back.
His hand falls away. His smile doesn't change. Nothing in his posture shifts, no tension, no frustration. But something flickers in his eyes, fast, if I'd blinked I would have missed it.
Not anger.
Recalibration.
"Just trying to help." The warmth in his voice hasn't cooled by a single degree. "You'll need friends here, Talia. The station is big, and the people who run it are bigger. It helps to have someone in your corner who understands the game."
The warning underneath the offer. The offer underneath the warning. I can't tell which layer is real and which is camouflage, and maybe that's the point.
"I appreciate it," I say. Neutral. Giving nothing.
"Anytime." He reaches into his jacket, produces a small data chip, and holds it out between two fingers. "My direct contact code. Reach out if you need anything. Or if you just want to talk about your father. I have stories." His smile softens. "Good ones."
I take the chip. Our fingers don't touch.
He walks away, and I stand in the empty corridor holding a piece of technology that's either a lifeline or a leash, and I can't tell the difference.
The quarters arequiet when I return.
Zane isn't here. He's rarely here during the day cycle, or at least I can't sense his presence. I don't need to think without the pressure of his presence distorting everything, the gravity well of him bending my thoughts toward survival calculus that centers on his moods, his movements, his hands.
I stand in front of the mirror in the bathroom.
The mark on my throat has settled. The first day, it was raw, angry, the skin around it inflamed and hot. Now it sits against my pulse like it's always been there. The bioluminescent pigment catches the light differently depending on the angle. From straight on, it's a dark iridescent blue. From the side, it shifts toward violet. Up close, I can see the fine lines of the pattern, geometric, precise, a design that means something in Empri culture that no one has bothered to explain to me.
Ownership. That's what it means, plain and simple. Nothing is important beyond that.
I press my fingers against it. Cool to the touch. My pulse beats beneath it, steady. Calmer than it should be.
I stare at my own face and I run the scenarios.
Escape.Through what?
The station is sealed. Ships are controlled. The docking ring requires clearance codes I don't have. Even if I got off the station, I'd be in deep space with no nav coordinates, no supplies, and a mark on my throat that identifies me as stolen property in every port from here to the Core systems.
Probability of success: negligible.
Sabotage.What would I even target?
I don't understand the station's systems well enough todamage them meaningfully, and any attempt would be traced back to me within hours. I'm the newest variable in a closed system. Every anomaly will be attributed to me first.
Probability of success: near zero.
Probability of surviving the attempt: worse.
Kill him.He's Empri. Faster, stronger, enhanced in ways I don't fully understand.
He sleeps, presumably, but he also has security protocols I haven't mapped yet. And even if I managed it. Even if I somehow put a blade through the throat of a man who's been killing people since before I was born. Then what? His organization doesn't collapse. It transfers. To someone like Ethan, maybe, or to whoever is next in the hierarchy. And the person who murdered their boss becomes the most wanted asset on the station.
Probability of survival after success: zero.
