CHAPTER 1
JAELA
It’s barely 0600 and my caf is already cold, which tells you just how well this day is going.
The kinetic rehab wing hums like a nest of hornets, all buzzing medtech and testosterone. Overhead, the anti-grav track squeals as a rig repositions itself three millimeters to the left for no reason whatsoever except to screw with my sanity. My patient of the morning—a Sergeant Kael with a jaw like a back alley bruiser and the attitude to match—is glowering at me like I just slapped his mama.
“I said I don’t want the damn limb.”
I crouch beside him, adjust the neural tether around his shoulder, and give him my best tight-lipped smile. The kind that saysI’ve been doing this longer than you’ve had the prosthetic.
“And I said this isn't a build-a-body workshop, Sarge. It's your new leg. You're either going to walk with it or I’ll drag you to group therapy so they can do their crying circle about resistance to change.”
He snarls, flexes the golden alloy limb. The servos whine in protest.
We’re on round three of this dance. I’m already two steps ahead, tweaking settings with one hand while spooning caf intomy mouth with the other. The bitter tang cuts through the antiseptic bite of the room, doing absolutely jack to improve my mood.
Behind me, the door hisses open. I don’t look up. Probably Jenkins with another broken neural net from that clumsy-ass nurse who keeps mistaking spinal cords for USB ports.
But then the air changes. Like a drop in pressure. A silence with weight.
“Code Black inbound,” someone whispers.
My hand freezes mid-air.Code Blackis for veterans with catastrophic limb loss—Alliance-level clearances. The kind of patients who come in on grav-stretchers, sealed in trauma pods, their bodies held together by hope and proprietary polymers. I rise, setting down my caf.
“Where’s the intake?”
“Bay Six,” the nurse says, eyes too wide.
I stride toward the observation deck, pushing through the sluggish current of orderlies and rubberneckers. The big talk is that this one’s not just any vet—he’s a Vakutan war hero. One of the golden-scale giants bred for front-line brutality. The kind who don’t go down easy. Which makes me wonder just how badly he had to be wrecked to end up here.
Outside the reinforced window, the shuttle lands with a bone-shakingthunk. The tarmac shimmers, and not just from heat. The ramp lowers. A grav-stretcher hovers out, flanked by four guards in Alliance black. Then I see him.
Even unconscious, he’s massive.
Golden scales catch the light, marred by lacerations, soot, and cybernetic ports. His remaining eye—glowing, red, predatory—is shut tight, but everything about his frame screams restrained danger. Like a bomb wrapped in gauze.
My throat tightens. Not fear. Just… impact.
He’s missing a leg. An arm. Half his face is wrapped in medfoam. I catalog the damage clinically, but there’s something under it—something primal.
They roll him past the window and that’s when it happens. His eye cracks open, just a sliver.
And it lands on me.
Red meets green, and for a second, I’m caught in it. Trapped. He shouldn’t be conscious, shouldn’t belookingat me, but there’s a flicker of something there—recognition? Amusement? A warning?
Then it’s gone. His eyelid drags closed. I exhale like I’ve been holding my breath through the entire damn war.
I turn to leave—get my head back in the game—but then I hear it.
A low, guttural rumble from the trauma bay.
“…Jaela…”
My name. Growled like a curse. Or a prayer.
My skin goes tight. Nobody’s called me that in a voice like that.
