“They already do,” I say, and my voice carries the faintest grim humor, because hatred is at least honest; what I cannot tolerate is the polished indifference that masquerades as justice.
As the binders hum and the escort forms around me, I keep my gaze steady on the bench, on the projection field that still faintly shows Kirell’s scarred orbital grid, on the corridor line that they have made into a noose. Somewhere in that line is a twelve-minute seam, a recalibration that was not mine, and now, because I spoke it on broadcast, it belongs not only to me but to everyone watching.
Let them try to lie again.
CHAPTER 5
SELENE
The archive lab feels different after the broadcast.
It isn’t louder—if anything, it’s quieter—but the silence has weight now, the kind that presses against the skin and makes you aware of every small sound your body makes. The low-frequency hum of the storage columns vibrates faintly through the soles of my boots. The overhead light panels cast an even white wash across the projection tables, too bright to be comforting, too sterile to hide behind. The air smells faintly of coolant and ionized metal, the scent sharper than usual because my nerves are lit like exposed wiring.
They called me “emotionally compromised” on live broadcast.
I set my compad down harder than I mean to, and the sound cracks through the chamber like a reprimand.
“Focus,” I mutter to myself, because anger is a luxury and I don’t have the budget.
The corridor map blossoms into the air above the central table as I unlock my station. Kirell rotates slowly in holographic relief, its cloud cover scarred by the remembered glow of artillery fire. The evacuation path threads across the orbital lattice in pale blue, innocent-looking, almost delicate.
“Let’s not pretend,” I murmur. “You weren’t delicate.”
I pinch two fingers together and drag the timeline slider backward until the display stabilizes at 13:57. The initial evacuation order glows with clean authorization tags, metadata layered in transparent stacks: issuer ID, timestamp, command hierarchy, relay confirmation.
Varos, R.
Authorization: Coalition Fleet Command.
Vector alignment: Safe-zone projection confirmed.
Everything about it is textbook.
“Fine,” I say under my breath. “We agree on that part.”
I advance the slider incrementally, watching the telemetry pulse forward in small, disciplined jumps. 13:58. 13:59. 14:00.
At 14:01, the corridor line flickers.
It doesn’t lurch. It doesn’t scream. It simply shifts, the pale blue arc bending inward by degrees that look harmless until you overlay artillery trajectories and realize those degrees are fatal.
“There you are,” I whisper.
I isolate the twelve-minute window, collapsing everything else into dim transparency until only the interval between 13:57 and 14:09 remains bright. The lab darkens perceptually around the highlighted data, and the hum of the storage columns feels louder, like distant engines idling before ignition.
“Authorization metadata,” I say aloud, because speaking keeps my thoughts from spiraling into memory. “Full extraction.”
The system responds with a soft chime and unfurls the recalibration command in intricate detail: encrypted command strings, validation markers, relay authentication codes.
My fingers hover for a second before I expand the signature layer.
League Command Authority — Verified.
Rank clearance: High-level operational override.
Authentication: Valid at time of issuance.
I blink.
