When we part, we stay close, foreheads nearly touching, breath mingling in the small space between us.
“I’m still mad at you,” Selene whispers.
“I know,” I reply.
“I’m mad that you ever thought dying neatly was the right move,” she continues, voice trembling slightly with the force ofit. “I’m mad that you carried that alone. I’m mad that I had to yank you out of it with my teeth.”
A rough, helpless laugh escapes me. “Fair.”
Selene’s eyes narrow, but there’s a flicker of humor there too, sharp and alive. “Don’t ‘fair’ me like you’re taking notes.”
“I am taking notes,” I murmur. “You’re terrifying.”
She huffs softly. “Good.”
We settle onto the couch together, not collapsing, not surrendering, but sitting in a way that keeps our bodies aligned, her shoulder against my chest, my bound wrists resting carefully so I don’t jostle her, so I don’t forget what she’s carrying. Selene shifts slightly, and I feel her hand drift again toward her abdomen, protective and instinctive, and the sight of it tightens something in my throat.
“You really want to do this,” she murmurs, as if asking the question out loud makes it more real.
“Yes,” I answer without hesitation. “I want the truth, and I want you, and I want the future you’re carrying to have a world that doesn’t call dead civilians acceptable.”
Selene is quiet for a long moment, then her voice comes softer, not weak, just tired. “I don’t know what kind of world that is.”
“Neither do I,” I admit. “But I know it won’t exist if we keep letting men like Vol decide what’s acceptable.”
Selene’s fingers tighten lightly on my shirt. “Then we keep pushing.”
“We keep pushing,” I agree.
Outside the suite, boots pass in the hallway, muffled by the privacy field, and the faint drone hum shifts as a patrol changes position. The institution is still there, watching, waiting, preparing its next containment move. The protests are still raging beyond the complex. The doctrine is still in play. The breach inquiry is still aimed at Selene like a loaded accusation.
None of that vanishes because we chose tenderness in a locked room.
But the tenderness changes something anyway, because it reminds us, in the most grounded and human way, that we are not only fighting against a machine—we are fighting for a life, for a future, for the right to remain people even when the tribunal wants us to be symbols.
Selene lifts her head and looks at me, eyes bright and steady now, the anger still there but braided with something firmer.
“Promise me,” she says.
I swallow. “What.”
“No more disappearing into silence,” she replies. “No more choosing martyrdom as a shortcut. No more letting them isolate me and calling it strategy.”
I hold her gaze. “I promise.”
Selene exhales slowly, then presses her forehead to mine again, and for a moment the world feels small enough to hold.
“Okay,” she whispers.
CHAPTER 25
SELENE
The tribunal building smells like overheated circuitry and panic sweat—like someone’s been running a marathon inside a server room. The air is too cold for how crowded it is, but the cold doesn’t help; it just makes the tension feel sharper, like it could cut skin.
I push through a knot of aides and security at the corridor intersection outside Chamber B. Someone’s voice cracks—laughing, maybe, or crying—and then another voice snaps back, “Not here. Not now,” like the floor itself is wired to record weakness.
My compad is vibrating so steadily it’s basically purring in my palm.
