Page 22 of Signed, Sealed, Seduced
“It is also deadly,” I add. “Had your ship encountered this storm during your approach, you would not have survived.”
She glances at me, a flicker of understanding crossing her features. “So the gravitational anomaly that forced me down...”
“May have saved your life,” I confirm. “Though that does not explain why your navigation system directed you to my landing pad specifically.”
She turns fully toward me now, arms crossed in a posture I’ve come to recognize as her defensive stance. “You still think I’m some kind of spy or saboteur, don’t you?”
“I think,” I say carefully, “that coincidences are rare in matters of interstellar politics. And your arrival has been marked by several such improbabilities.”
The first tendrils of the storm reach the outer asteroids, electricity arcing between the floating rocks in brilliant flashes of blue-white light. The display momentarily distracts us both.
“I’m nobody, really,” she says quietly, her eyes fixed on the approaching storm. “Just a courier trying to make enough credits to keep flying. Whatever game you think is being played here, I’m not a player. I’m barely even a pawn.”
There is truth in her words—I can sense it. Yet there is also something else, something unspoken that hangs between us like the charged particles of the approaching storm.
“So was I, once,” I find myself saying, the admission unexpected even to me. “Nobody. Before the war. Before I became First Blade.”
She looks at me sharply, surprise evident in her expression. “You weren’t always... this?” She gestures vaguely at my formal attire, the insignia of my rank emblazoned on my chest plate.
“No.” I turn back to the storm, watching as it engulfs the nearest asteroids in a dance of light and energy. “I was born tothe mining caste. My family extracted crystal from the outer belt. I was not destined for warfare or leadership.”
“What happened?” she asks, her voice softer than I’ve heard it before.
The question is simple, yet the answer is anything but. How to explain the War of Shattered Moons to an outsider? How to convey what it means to rise from nothing, to be forged in conflict, to become something both more and less than what you were born to be?
“War happened,” I say finally. “And I proved... adaptable.”
She studies me for a long moment, her gaze more perceptive than I find comfortable. “That’s quite the understatement, I’m guessing.”
Before I can respond, the storm reaches us. The platform trembles slightly as energy washes over the fortress’s shields, creating a shimmering curtain of light that surrounds us completely. Within this cocoon of energy, sound itself seems transformed—deeper, more resonant, as if we speak within a crystal bell.
“Whoa,” Suki breathes, turning in a slow circle to take in the phenomenon. “This is incredible.”
“The shields convert the storm’s destructive force into sustainable energy,” I explain, watching as she extends a hand toward the barrier, stopping just short of touching it. “The effect is temporary but... significant.”
“It’s like being inside a rainbow made of lightning,” she says, wonder coloring her voice. Then she laughs—a genuine sound of delight that echoes strangely in our enclosed space. “That made no sense, did it?”
“It is an apt description,” I assure her, finding myself drawn to her unguarded joy. “Few outsiders have witnessed this phenomenon. Fewer still have appreciated its beauty rather than its practical applications.”
She turns to me, her expression curious. “Why show me, then? If it’s so rare for outsiders to see.”
It is a question I have been asking myself since I diverted our path to this place. Why indeed? What impulse drove me to share this private wonder with a human courier who, by all rights, should be nothing more than a temporary security concern?
“Perhaps,” I say slowly, “because you fixed the droid.”
Her brow furrows in confusion. “What does that have to do with anything?”
“It was broken,” I explain, the realization forming as I speak. “Deemed unworthy of repair. Yet you saw value in restoring it, not for gain or purpose, but simply because you could. Because you saw what it might be, rather than what it appeared to be.”
She stares at me, something shifting in her expression. “It’s just a droid, Henrock. It was making an annoying noise, so I fixed it. It’s not that deep.”
“Is it not?” I step closer, drawn by some force I cannot name. The storm’s energy crackles around us, charging the air between our bodies. “You see broken things and mend them without question. It is... unusual.”
“In my line of work, if you can’t fix what’s broken, you don’t survive long,” she says, but there’s a slight tremor in her voice that betrays her affected casualness. “Self-preservation, that’s all.”
“Is that why you spoke to it as if it could understand? Why you promised to return and complete its repair?” I press, sensing her discomfort yet unable to relent. “Self-preservation?”
She looks away, her profile illuminated by the storm’s ethereal light. “Maybe I just don’t like leaving things unfinished.”
