He's standing in the corridor. Alone. Past midnight. Looking at the camera like he can see through it to where I'm sitting with evidence of what we were.
I should tell him to leave. Should delete the message. Should bury the box again and pretend I never looked.
Instead I walk to the door.
Stand there with my hand on the panel.
He's a monster. He left me. He'd do it again.
He's also the only person who knows what that photograph meant. The only other survivor of the unit that died on Sigma-9.
The only man I ever loved, even when I was killing strangers who reminded me of him.
I open the door.
He's there. Blue skin and electric eyes and six years of distance that evaporates the moment we're in the same air.
"Astra."
My name in his mouth, the way he shapes the syllables, the resonance in his chest that makes it sound like a question and a claim at once. I'd forgotten the exact timbre of his voice when he's being honest instead of tactical. Forgotten how that single word could feel like a hand against my spine, familiar and dangerous in equal measure.
"You shouldn't be here." The words come out harder than I intend. Military clip. The voice I use on subordinates who've fucked up.
"I know." He doesn't move. Doesn't defend. Just stands there letting me look at him—six years older, harder, new scars I don't recognize mapping a history I wasn't part of.
"It's past midnight." I'm stalling. We both know it. "Past any reasonable hour for a courtesy call."
"I know." Still that same steady tone. The man who calculated my life in ninety seconds, now standing in my doorway like he has all the time in the universe.
"I could kill you right now." My hand moves to the knife at my hip before I decide to reach for it. Old reflex. Combat instinct. "Tell Zane you attacked me. He'd believe it. Hell,he'd probably expect it."
"I know." His bioluminescence pulses once, soft, muted, the patterns along his temples glowing faint blue in the dim corridor light. The color looks sad, if light can look like emotion. Maybe it can when it's an Empri's marks betraying what they're feeling. "But you won't."
The certainty in those two words makes me want to prove him wrong. Makes me want to draw that blade, test whether he's right about what I'm capable of now.
"Why not?" My voice drops lower. Quieter. The tone I use right before violence. "Give me one reason why I shouldn't put a knife between your ribs and watch you bleed blue all over my nice clean floor."
"Because you need answers more than you need revenge." He takes a step forward. Not quite inside. Not quite leaving. "And because you want to know if I'd leave you again."
The words land like a blade between ribs.
I step back. Let him in.
The door closes behind him with a sound like a cage locking.
We're alone. Finally. With six years of damage and the photograph still open on my table and the memory of what we were before everything broke.
This is either closure or the beginning of something worse.
I can't decide which I want more.
Chapter 4
Dexter
I shouldn't be here.
The thought arrives clean and sharp as I stand outside Astra's door at 0300 station time, the corridor empty except for the sound of my own breath and the low hum of life support cycling through the walls. My hand hovers over the entry panel, not quite touching.
