The name enters the room like smoke.
I grip the cleaning rag. It tears slightly between my fingers.
Evie notices. “You don’t have to tell me.”
“I know.”
“I’m curious, but I’m not owed your pain.”
That should make silence easier.
It makes speech possible.
I set the torn rag on the counter. “Horus IV was not a battle. Not truly. Battles have fronts. Objectives. Supply lines. Retreat options. Horus IV became a grinder, and everyone fed it because admitting failure would have cost less pride but saved more lives.”
Evie says nothing.
Good.
Words are easier if they are not interrupted.
“My squad was assigned to escort civilians through a service corridor under Damaris City after the surface route collapsed. Alliance command believed the corridor would remain stable for twelve hours. It held for one.”
The bakery fades around the edges. I smell bread and cleaner, but beneath it comes smoke, hot dust, burned plastic, bodies too close together in a tunnel with failing air. My hands close around nothing.
“There were thirty-seven civilians when we began. Children. Elderly. Two pregnant females. A teacher who kept singing so the children would walk. We had six soldiers. We were told extraction ships would meet us at the plaza beyond the corridor.”
Evie’s hand comes to rest on the counter, not touching me, near enough that I can see her fingers.
“The ships were late.”
My voice changes. I hear it and cannot stop it.
“Enemy fire collapsed the rear section first. Then the ventilation failed. We pushed forward because there was no backward. My lieutenant ordered us to split ammunition between clearing debris and holding off Coalition advance scouts entering from maintenance shafts. I carried a child for three kilometers because her legs were crushed.”
The girl’s weight returns to my arms. Small. Too light by then. Her hair stuck to her forehead with sweat and ash.
“Her name was Anika. She asked whether the stars were broken because she could not see them.”
Evie makes a soft sound.
I continue because stopping now would leave me trapped in the corridor alone.
“We reached the plaza seven minutes before extraction. Seven minutes. That was what my squad bought. We held the entry while civilians crossed open ground toward the landingzone. But the ships came twelve minutes after our signal. Five minutes too late.”
My throat tightens. I force the words through.
“Artillery found the plaza. I ordered them into cover. There was not enough cover. My squad died around me. Varro first. Then Jelek. Then Nessa. I remember parts. Not all. My armor failed. My comm failed. I kept carrying people because that was the only order left inside me.”
The bakery is silent except for the refrigeration hum.
“When extraction arrived, four civilians were alive.”
Evie’s eyes shine.
“Four,” I say. “Out of thirty-seven.”
My claws press into my palms. “Anika was not one of them.”
