Page 96 of Fated in A Time of War
When my body tenses, a whisper in the dark—her name. Her name anchors me. And when I pull away, our breaths tangled, I see it in her eyes: recognition that we’re still more than fighters. We’re human. Still.
Her fingers trace the raised lines and scars across my ribcage—tales of war, of wounds, of survival written into flesh. I stiffen at each touch, but don’t pull away.
“North flank,” I murmur. “South ridge. Those were the first.” My voice echoes in the hush; I’m giving her pieces of my history I’ve never spoken aloud. “One in the charcoal fields. Another where we ambushed the supply convoy.”
She presses a kiss to the nearest nick of flesh. “You didn’t have to tell me,” she says.
I shake my head. “You earned it.”
She digs into the corner of her pack and pulls out the syringe from my armor—blood still dried on the tip. Her fingers brush mine.
“My turn.” She names the children she couldn’t save, not in detail, but with quiet dignity. She wraps each name around my heart like a lifeline. No tears fall. Just voices speaking truth.
We lie like that for a while, memories and heat tangled between us. Above us, the viewport is cracked—city dust dusting the outer glass. The sky is cold, gray with starlight filtered through smoke. But inside, warmth pulses between us like a living thing.
After everything, we’re still here. Together. Not doomed. Not broken. Just real. And that might be enough to carry us forward.
CHAPTER 28
ALICE
I’m awake before Krall, submerged in the soft glow of the command console. It's dim, but the LEDs and flickering instrument panels lend this cockpit a heartbeat—punctuated with the faint pulse of the ship’s revived systems. The hum is low, more of a whisper than a roar, but it’s enough. Enough to tell me we’re not stranded, not yet.
I move quietly, but purposefully, across the narrow bridge. The air tastes faintly of electronics and recycled coolant, with a trace of Krall’s spice-tinged aftershave lingering on my clothing. I check systems—atmospheric stabilizers, power distribution, navigation array. Power reads green across the board, though I award myself an eye-roll for installing booster circuits from the transport mech yesterday. It’s reckless, but brilliant. Or at least… necessary.
“Alright,” I murmur to the empty cockpit, voice soft. “Ready when you are.”
The viewport frames it all: ruins of Tanuki—charcoal skeletons of steel, charred foundations of what once was a home, now half-swallowed in dust and early morning haze. The haze drifts across the broken skyline like shrouds over a battlefield. Flying away from this place almost stings—likeleaving a graveyard behind. Maybe it is one, after everything that’s happened.
I plant a hand on the rail, press my forehead to cool polished steel. I whisper a prayer—not for safe passage through the void, but for the one we’re navigating now. Our lives. The broken parts. The next breath.
Then Krall shifts behind me, groggy, spine coated with dust, guilt, and something warmer—hope. He rubs at the back of his neck and says, “Ship runs?”
I don’t turn, don’t smile yet. “She breathes,” I say quietly.
He steps closer, towering but gentle, the hum resonating through my ribs. “Let’s fly home,” he whispers.
I turn then, meet his eyes. His face shows me everything I already know—tired, still bleeding, ready. I press a hand to his cheek and taste salt.
“You earned this,” I say.
He grunts, nodding once.
We strap in side by side, hearts on our chests, living again in a world that doesn’t hate us yet. The controls hum, circuits coil to attention—it’s functional, ready. We’re not just moving through space; we’re passing through the darkest night into something like dawn.
Together.
The ship jumps, metal groaning like it’s waking from a nightmare. G-forces press me into the seat, breath hollowing my chest in rhythmic pulses. Outside the viewport, Tanuki's rising dust clouds shrink into a haze against the blackness of space. We’re leaving the graveyard behind.
The console’s glow flickers—LEDs bright, circuits humming life into a shell of scavenged steel. Then a ping, soft but insistent, echoes through the silence. A new blip on the command board. Alliance forces. A cruiser. Orbiting above us.
I glance over at Krall. His jaw clenches, eyes fixed on the alert. He swallows hard, as if tasting regrets. The hangar light casts dark lines across his face, sharp angles softened in the dim. He could respond. Call for extraction. Fulfill orders. Report what happened. The toll of war, the deaths, the war crimes—all of it.
But he doesn’t. Instead, his hand slides across the console, hovering over the beacon. My heart pounds, as if knowing the meaning of the moment before he does. His fingers curl around the switch. A breath. A flick.
The ping is gone.
“No signal,” I say softly, not needing to explain what that means.
