“Is the child Vakutan?”
“Garokk’s ghost?”
“Did Isolde lie to Novaria?”
“Diplomatic repercussions pending.”
“Celebrity. Or war crime?”
I don’t log in. But Reflector reads the metadata. Tracks the escalations. Filters the threats from the noise.
He flashes red once. “Security is breached at the third-level access feed. They’re trying to pinpoint your location.”
“Then change it,” I say.
He does.
Quietly.
Efficiently.
I don’t move from the window.
My knees are stiff. My spine aches. But I don’t care. Because outside, the stars don’t care who I am. What I did. Who I loved.
They justburn.
I pressmy lips to Pyramus’s temple.
He smells like warm skin and formula and something faintly electric—like a storm caught in stillness.
He doesn’t look like the children from my old world. Too golden. Too sharp.
Toohis.
But when he sleeps?
He looks like peace.
He looks likemine.
“I used to think he’d come back,” I whisper, my voice too soft to echo. “That maybe... maybe he’d show up in the night with that stupid grin and that ruined hand, and he’d say something awful and perfect like he always did.”
Pyramus shifts. Doesn’t wake.
I swallow.
“But he won’t. He’s not coming back.”
It’s the first time I’ve said it out loud.
The first time Iletit be real.
The words sit heavy in my chest, but they don’t crush me.
Because next to my heart, this tiny body breathes. Grows.
Because even if the galaxy never gives me closure...
