Page 25 of Ravaged By the Reaper

HAKTRON

The Widowmaker’s halls are bathed in their usual blood-red glow, but it doesn’t feel the same anymore. The ship breathes differently now, slower, deeper—like a beast freshly fed but still hungry.

I stalk the corridors with silent steps, my boots whispering across the alloy decking. Reaper recruits clatter past in tight formation, their armor still too clean, their swagger too forced. They nod when they pass me. A few salute. Most glance sideways, pretending not to look too long.

They all smell like tension. Like gun oil, sweat, and nerves.

And underneath it is her scent. Faint, yes. But it lingers. On the airlocks. In the mess. In the very wiring. A soft perfume of ozone and wildness, threading through a ship made for slaughter.

She’s marked this place. Like I have.

And the crew knows it.

They whisper, of course. Always do. Old comrades crouch near engines and act like I can’t hear them. New blood fumbles codewords and stares too long. Some call her a distraction. Others—more clever, more dangerous—call her a threat.

“A Companion turned pirate?” I hear one say near the lift bulkhead. “Pretty. Poisonous. Like a thorned rose.”

“Or a trap,” another hisses, quieter. “Reapers don’t fall for pink-skinned bait.”

I turn the corner, and the conversation dies faster than a scream in vacuum.

I say nothing.

Not a word.

They know better than to expect one.

My blade—Bloodfont—hangs heavy at my hip, still humming from the last re-sharpening. It doesn’t need to be drawn. Not yet. My silence is blade enough.

A shadow follows me. Not physical—mental. Emotional. It's her. Always her. The way she walked aboard this ship like it owed her something. The way her chin lifted when Panaka sneered. The way her collar gleamed like defiance forged in fire.

They think I gave it to her.

They don’t know she earned it.

I step into the training hall. Sparring mats. Steel walls. The scent of sweat and ambition. A pair of recruits lock blades, clumsy but fierce. One stumbles. The other lunges. I stop him mid-strike with a look alone.

They freeze. Breathe hard. Bow shallowly.

I keep walking.

Because that’s the lesson today: discipline. Not rage. Not bloodlust. But purpose.

Amara is purpose.

I hear them ask questions behind my back. And I simply let them.

Because when the time comes, when the next war bleeds into the void and survival hangs on one thread of loyalty or loss, they’ll remember who I am.

And they’ll remember who she is to me.

She’s not a weapon or a weakness.

She’s mine.

Not in the crude, possessive way they imagine. Not in chains or demands or stolen freedom.

But in the way gravity claims a planet. In the way fire claims air.

She doesn’t follow me.

She stands beside me.

I round the corner to the main deck, passing the mural of old campaigns—the ones carved into the metal, not painted. Reaper victories, etched in blood and flame. Names of worlds we took. Names of commanders we broke.

Someday, maybe hers will be up there too.

Or maybe mine will be beside hers.

I pause at the viewport overlooking the stars.

Space stretches endless and cruel, cold and blinding. But all I can see is her—the way she stood in the middle of a summit and broke Malem with words. No plasma. No blade. Just fire behind her eyes and steel beneath her skin.

“Sir,” someone calls behind me.

I don’t turn.

“What?”

A young recruit—Talen, I think—steps up, helmet tucked under his arm. “Permission to speak freely.”

“Denied,” I mutter.

He speaks anyway. Foolish. Brave.

“It’s about the human. Amara.”

I look at him slowly, one brow rising.

“She’s… different,” he says, voice uncertain. “Not like the others. Not soft.”

“No,” I say, voice low. “She’s not.”

He swallows.

“Some think she’s dangerous.”

I grin.

“She is dangerous.”

He blinks. Hesitates. “So why…?”

I take a step forward.

He flinches. Just a little.

“She wears my collar,” I say, slow and deliberate. “Not because I own her. Because I respect her.”

Another step.

“She stands aboard my ship,” I continue, voice dark and full. “Not as a trophy. Not as a trick. But as my equal.”

I let the weight of it settle over him like a lead blanket.

“Anyone who forgets that…”

Bloodfont hums.

“…can discuss it with me personally.”

Talen bows. Quick. Low. “Understood, sir.”

I turn away before I gut the point too hard.

Let them talk.

Let them guess.

The Widowmaker feels like home. But not in the way it used to. Not just metal and death and the hum of engines beneath my bones.

Now, it feels like potential.

Like partnership.

Like purpose.

And if the crew doesn’t understand it yet?

They will.

They always do.

The Widowmaker’s hull still thrums like a beast recovering from battle, but now there’s a new rhythm—one threaded with purpose, sharpened edges of ambition. I find myself walking the decks quieter, not because I’m fading, but because I’m watching. Watching her.

Amara adapts faster than any human—or Reaper—I’ve ever known.

She doesn’t flinch at blood-smeared corridors. Doesn’t blink at the hum of blinking lights warning of system breaches. She drinks in the chaos, hinges open, absorbing it like a tide that reshapes everything it washes over.

I see it in her eyes: steel forged in fire, tempered by doubt, now wielded like a weapon.

In the arms yard, she leans over Bloodfont, running a whetstone along its edge, angle precise. Sparks flicker, scent of hot metal and ozone curling into the air. She hums softly—not nervous, but deliberate. In that hum, I hear progress.

“Checking my work, Reaper?” she asks without looking up.

I smile, low. “Or testing mine.”

She grins, slipping the blade home with a hiss. “We’ll be hungry tonight.”

Later, I catch her studying a briefing holo of targets and cargo manifests. Raider life—legal or not—is as much about ledger balance as it is gunpowder. Understanding that was never her domain before. Now, she pours over margins, cargo value, projected yield. Her eyes sharpen.

“She’s learning,” I murmur to Panaka at my side as we watch her.

He snorts, steepled fingers tapping the helm console. “That human’s dangerous. Not because she fights. Because she calculates.”

Danger is her resonance.

Then it happens.

Our next raid: a merchant convoy caught between crumbling alliances and desperate supply lines. Normally, we’d blast open the hull, ransack, and disappear. Tonight, we board.

Amara leads. Not me. Not Panaka. Her boots pound in the corridor, steady command. Her voice echoes: “Open that transport door. Single file. Keep hands visible.”

I stand behind her, blade sheathed but ready. The corridor smells of coolant and fear and hushed surprise.

She steps into the bridge of the transport ship. Civilians freeze—panicked, pleading, sweaty. She removes her helmet, letting the glow reveal her face in calm. Beautiful. Savage.

She speaks, voice steady: “You can live. You can go. But give me your cargo manifest—and a percentage of it. Or you die here.”

They freeze. No dialogue, just fear and calculation. Then the ship’s commander kneels, voice clipped. “Deal.”

I can taste the shift before she announces it. Calm. Persuasion. Hunger met not with blades, but with promise.

We leave with double the haul: luxury goods, medical supplies, precious metals. No blood spilled. Raiders dancing in corridors, disbelief lit behind their eyes.

I see the whispers now.

At the mess, one of the grizzled fighters—a Vul, scarred and silent—leans in, voice rough: “She doubled the haul... without firing a shot.”

Another nods. “I’ve never seen the Widowmaker work like that.”

I lean in. Voice low. “That’s because she’s making it work.”

They look at me. Not surprise—but acceptance. An acknowledgment that she’s not just the captain’s human. She’s useful. Dangerous. Valuable.

I don’t need to assert dominance. The blade at my side hums quietly, a background note. She’s earned everything now.

Later, we stand on the upper deck, the stars pressed close, the hangar lights fluttering red and gold across her face. She breathes deep, exhaling twitching with triumph and calm.

“You did that,” I say softly.

She shrugs, hands clasped behind her. “We did.”

“And you... you didn’t flinch.”

“Flinching is for those who aren’t clear on what they’re protecting.”

I smile—a slow, feral thing. “That’s you.”

She laughs, warm, low. Leaning into me. “You’d better hope I stay protective.”

I kiss her temple. “I always will.”

Something shifts in the air—the crew watching, knowing that their captain’s not just a vicious poet or a diplomat’s pawn. She’s a strategist, a leader, a lethal force cloaked in humanity.

And I stand beside her. Not to own the story—or to define it—but to ensure it doesn’t end in silence.

Because she’s not just my jalshagar. She’s my equal.

And together, we’re more than a team. We’re a reckoning.

Night drapes over the Widowmaker in soft blue shadows, its blood-red lighting dimming to embers. The ship feels worlds away from war in this hour—less predator, more sanctuary. But even sanctuaries can bleed.

I find her in the corner of the hold, where the bulkheads are cold metal and the hum of the engines is a slow heartbeat. She’s seated on the deck, knees pulled up, staring at nothing. Glassy eyes catch the red glow, but for a moment, she’s lost in something deeper than tired.

I stay hidden in the doorframe, breathing low—metal breath and devotion waged in each inhale. The air smells of machine oil and distant ozone, faint traces of gun smoke still clinging to her uniform. I don’t want to interrupt the quiet pulsing of her mind.

She shifts, tracing a pattern along the plating—like she’s lost in how light fades over steel. I know that pattern. I painted it there once at the forge, while we waited for new recruits to fall in line. It’s her anchor. She’s searching for calm.

I step closer, fingers unclenching—the blade at my side hums but remains sheathed.

“You okay?” I ask, voice low.

She doesn’t startle. Just blinks, a slow breath sliding out like a ghost. “I’m... just thinking.”

Long pause.

Not the kind of pause after battle. This is different. It holds weight—like regret, like memory, like longing for something that slipped away.

“So...” I begin, and the rest is a tremor. “I see that look sometimes.”

She doesn’t look at me.

I sit beside her, leaving space.

“The quiet after the hunt… sometimes it’s not peace. It’s emptiness.”

She finally meets my gaze, eyes dark. “You gave me everything I asked for.”

I shake my head. “No. I gave you everything I can.”

She breathes in—trembling. “I have freedom. I’m powerful. Respected.”

“You’ve earned that.”

“But I’m still… haunted.”

I swallow, taste the metal of worry on my tongue. “By what?”

She laughs, but it’s brittle. Sad. “By blood. By what I used to be. And by what I’m not.”

I lean forward. “You’re still a warrior.”

Her shoulders hump. I feel the grief coil in the shallow basement of her throat.

“Do you remember the first night we patrol-stepped after the raid—when we thought we lost ourselves in chaos?”

That night shimmers in my memory—smoke, heat, her feral whisper: We’re soldiers. Not killers.

“I remember.”

Her eyes shut tight, and when they open, there’s rain behind them. “I miss her,” she whispers. “The only person I thought I could be.”

I reach out, thumb brushing her knuckles. “We all lose parts of ourselves.”

She breathes into it, a slow defiance weaving through her bones. “But I’m not the same—not because someone changed me. I changed.”

“Yeah,” I say, softer. “You did.”

She meets me then—eyes red and bright. “Sometimes I wonder if I lost more than I gained.”

That question scrapes across my chest.

I hold her gaze.

“You’ve gained a future,” I say. “Just don’t let the price weigh you down.”

The silence wraps around us, fragile. She leans into me, forehead resting against my shoulder. Her breath warms my collar.

I wrap my arms around her. Metal plates shift quietly. My voice trembles.

“You’re not alone.”

She holds onto me.

Outside, the engine hum is steady—proof that the Widowmaker still lives. But right now, the only pulse that matters is the one between us, slow and steady.

We sit in the hush. No words. Just the knowing.

Because freedom and power are heavy gifts. And sometimes it’s darker when you receive them than before.

But together?

We’ll carry it.