Page 14 of Alien Assassin's Heir

CHAPTER 4

KRAJ

The stink of repurposed coolant and burnt circuitry clings to the inside of my nostrils like poison. I sit in what passes for a chair—half of a salvaged mech pilot’s cradle bolted into the dirt floor of my shack—watching the flicker of a dim console wired to stolen Helios undernet scraps.

The screen hums low, faint static curling along its edge like a warning whisper.

This is what exile looks like.

Not the screaming chaos of war. Not the steel-glint orders barked over comms. This. Silence. Dust. A slow crawl of ones and zeroes sliding back to Targen across a cobbled link wrapped in a thousand encryption layers.

The report is boring on purpose.

Location: Arkosh. Wildwood Outskirts.

Observations: Civilian activity at fabrication hubs within expected patterns.

Threat assessment: Low.

I tag it with the right signatures, let the encryption sweep finish, and hit send.

The moment the file vanishes into the void, I slam the console shut and grunt, cracking my neck with a tired twist. The silence that follows is worse than any battlefield.

I shift, stand, stretch until my joints creak. The air inside this dump is dense with old heat. I can smell the rust in the walls, the glue that’s starting to bubble off my patched-together insulation, the damn sweet rot of the ration paste I keep forgetting to throw out.

It’s hell.

And I deserve every second of it.

Because I betrayed her.

There’s a window—just a thin plastiglass slit that overlooks the Wildwood tram path, a narrow spine that snakes into the colony heart. And every day, like clockwork, she passes it.

Luna.

She walks like she’s holding up the sky by herself, chin high, shoulders tight. Her hair’s longer now—more sun-bleached than gold. The wind pulls at it, tangling it around her face, but she never stops to fix it.

She’s harder. Sharper.

Still beautiful enough to make my ribs ache.

And today, like yesterday, there’s a small hand wrapped in hers.

The kid’s a tiny wisp of movement—lively as a spark, darting and skipping, tugging at Luna’s hand like gravity’s optional. Her laugh pierces through the air when she runs too far and Luna gently reins her back.

She calls herSolie.

I heard it once. Caught on an open vendor comm as they passed a food stand.

Solie.

It hits the back of my throat like glass.

My claws dig into the edge of the window frame. I force them to retract.

She has a kid.

And I’m not part of it. Not that I should be.