Page 26 of She Who Devours the Stars

I left her with the taste of my smile—the kind that lingers on the tongue like a secret, sweet and sharp, impossible to swallow. A cursed flavor that haunted my exes like teens flocking to new memes.

And the promise of more.

Thread Modulation: Dyris Vaelith

Axis Modulation: Glimmer Zone, Pelago-9

The corridor outside the Meldin apartment was darker than when I’d entered.

I shut the door behind me and let the city’s quiet violence settle back into my bones. The whole Glimmer Zone felt like it was holding its breath, as if every molecule of rust and plastic and rot had pivoted to align with the new center of gravity that was Fern Meldin. Even the drones seemed to sense it—two floated abovethe landing, but when they turned their lenses on me, the lights dimmed and they powered down, as if excusing themselves from an assignment they wanted no part of.

I descended the stairs, slow, careful. My boots made no sound. I catalogued every step, every angle of attack, every ambush vector, but nothing moved. No one followed. The absence of threat was, itself, a kind of threat.

Outside, the rain was heavier. The city’s skin glistened under the onslaught, every puddle a lens refracting the sodium glare into strange, mythic shapes. I cut left, then right, until I reached the old lot where my drop-pod was supposed to be waiting. It wasn’t.

Instead, the pod’s perimeter had been breached, the security lights dead, the bio-lock scanner unresponsive. I tried the override code, then the manual. Both failed. The warpod sat like a coffin, stubborn and inert. I looked at the status panel, but the screen only showed a single phrase, over and over: “I see you.”

I fought the urge to shiver.

I keyed in the deep reset, burned my palm on the quick-heat surface, and forced the door. Inside, the temperature was subzero; the air tasted of old blood and cooling agent. I ran the diagnostic on the flight panel, but the resonance map was corrupted. Instead of a grid or a path, the display resolved to a single point, a sharp blue-white pinprick surrounded by a field of chaos.

I deleted the scan log. Flushed the backup. Wiped my own biometric from the entry system.

Then I composed my report. “Subject stable. Recommend monitoring only. Awaiting further orders.”

I knew what would happen to it. The message would get filtered, then rewritten, then buried in a data-silo where even the Accord’s best wouldn’t bother to retrieve it. They would send someone else. Maybe a team. Maybe a weapon.

But not me.

The reply came faster than I expected. Two lines, no signature.

“RETURN TO CRUISER FOR REASSIGNMENT. LOCAL OPERATIONS SUSPENDED PENDING REVIEW.”

I stared at the screen. Not a reprimand. Not a request for clarification. Only distance, enough for me to be clear of whatever came next.

I powered down the comms and sat in the cold, letting the chill soak into my bones. I ran through the interview in my head, cataloguing every mistake, every moment I’d lost control. There were more than I wanted to admit.

I tried to close my eyes. I tried not to remember the way Fern had looked at me. Like she knew something about the world that I didn’t. Like she was already mourning the future.

After a while, I just sat and stared at the city through the warpod’s fogged window, the light outside bending and splitting as if the world was about to fracture.

I didn’t move until the rain stopped and the next shift arrived.

Thread Modulation: Fern Meldin

Axis Alignment: Roof, Above Meldin Apartment, Pelago-9

I was back in the stairwell, three flights up, hunched with my back against the wall, a burner smoke hanging from my lips, and my hands tucked under my knees. The chemical in the cigarette was illegal on at least seven worlds, but it numbed the cold and quieted the hunger, which was all I ever wanted from a drug. My hair clung to my face, still wet, and my skin felt raw, as if the rain had stripped it down to something honest.

Below me, the Glimmer Zone was waking up. People emerged from their holes and their hideouts, eyes wide and hungry, scanning the sky for the next disaster. The kid with theration-steak was still out there, still running, still chasing the impossible. I found myself rooting for him, though I doubted he’d ever catch it.

Up above, the storm clouds had split, curling around each other like hands ready to wring a neck. There was a shimmer to the air, a tingle in my teeth, and I realized the city was watching. Not me, but the thing in me. The part that couldn’t be mapped or explained away.

I took a drag. Let the smoke roll out of my nose.

Somewhere, a voice whispered: “Nullarch.”

I didn’t know what it meant. Didn’t care. The word hung, heavy and perfect.