He snapped to attention. “Commander! We’re nearing the Tear in the Pattern.”
Already? Her heart lurched, but her face held steady. No reaction. No hint of the dread squeezing her chest as she looked at the boy.
He was one of many refugees they had picked up along the way, arriving and departing in waves as her ship hunted the Wraith deeper into the unraveling periphery of the universe. Faces blurred together now, too many to track, changing with every emergency offload on unstable moons and crumbling outposts.
“Very well.” She forced her pulse to steady. If even one made it to safety, it mattered.
She swallowed the wild laugh threatening to rise.
Great Aspects, how had this become her life? How had she, the dark one’s bastard daughter, become responsible for thousands? She could feel them now, each life teasing the edge of her mind like wind whistling through a broken seal. Hers to protect. Hers to fail.
“What are your orders, Commander?”
The question was simple. The weight behind it was not.
She’d watched worlds die, scorched and hollowed out, the Pattern stripped like marrow from bone, leaving nothing but silence. Each loss dragged her crew lower—shoulders heavier, reactions slower, feeding the Wraith with their despair.
Yet, for every world Aimeena reached in time, more souls clung to her ship, hungry for hope she wasn’t sure she could provide. TheSilandagroaned under the weight of them. Supplies strained and morale frayed, all while the enemy pushed forward, devouring life like wildfire through dry brush.
“Prepare the foundlings.” She didn’t look away.
His eyes widened, fear flickering in their depths.
She memorized the shape of his face in that moment. Not because she expected to forget it, but because too many others had already fallen through her grasp.
Their Mission mattered. That was why so many of the refugees stayed, pledging their hearts to hers. To fight. They’d seen whathappened when the chase faltered, when the Wraith escaped the net. Worlds vanished, civilizations blinking out like dying embers. And no one else was coming to stop it.
Anomenel understood that. He was small and quiet, but he moved like the rest of them now, carrying the same burden.
She let the smallest smile curl beneath her sternness.
He’d been aboard theSilandalonger than most. No one had named him bridge messenger, but somehow, he’d become one, moving through the decks with ease. He’d done more than adjust. He had claimed the younger ones, too—the children left shivering in corners, fists scrunched around torn clothing and broken buttons.
He made sure they had food, water, and a place to rest that didn’t stink of panic. In the nights that stretched too long, his quiet footsteps often answered the whimpers and cries of the youngest. To them, he was more than a helper. He was safety.
But, even that glimmer—the rare, steady burn of something good—flickered and died beneath the weight of what came next.
“Commander?” His brows pulled tight as his voice wavered. Tears welled, rising fast beneath long lashes. He didn’t blink them away. He didn’t speak again. He only stared at her, chest rising in shallow bursts.
He knew whatprepare the foundlingsmeant.
It meant stasis pods and drug-induced sleep. Quiet, dreamless sedation designed to smother fear, so the children wouldn’t see the lights fail. So they wouldn’t cry when the fire came. So they wouldn’t feel pain when the end reached them.
It was a last resort, cruel in execution but necessary, used only when hope failed.
Her hand lifted against the nearest console, knuckles white as she braced herself. His dread rang through her mind, wild and hot, like a yell with no sound. She gritted her teeth, grounding herself againstit.
But when she looked up, he was standing taller, despite the fear. His chin lifted once more. “I’ll see it done, Commander.”
Then he pivoted on his foot, the movement precise, and strode away down the corridor toward the children. Toward the task. Toward the terrible possibility of what came next.
She watched him disappear down the corridor, his small frame held too straight, shoulders pulled too tight. The bridge crew didn’t speak, but their silence rang loud. Every one of them had heard the order. Every one of them knew what it meant to tuck the children away.
She drew air in through her nose, held it, then exhaled. Her eyes squeezed shut. When she opened them again, the command deck snapped back into focus, lights humming, panels blinking, and screens scrolling with readouts that could mean life or death.
If everything went to plan—if the calculations held, if the engines didn’t fail, if the Wraith didn’t break and scatter too soon—this final, brutal push might actually work.
They might end the threat once and for all.
