Page 289 of Reaper Said Mine

Then I straighten and turn toward the bridge.

“Drokk,” I call through the ship. “Get us home.”

The captain laughs as Black Mercy’s guns open fire and the deck kicks beneath us.

“With pleasure, lord.”

I look once more at Ursa as the medical team works around her. She is bruised, bleeding, furious, alive, and still clutching the evidence that might cut the legs from this war.

Outside, hostile ships close through the dark.

Inside, my heart has found its way back to my body.

I return to command with smoke in my lungs, prisoners in my hold, Ursa aboard my ship, and the first true hope I have felt in days burning brighter than every weapon in the void.

CHAPTER 35

URSA

Nobody is shooting at us.

The realization arrives slowly.

Guyver Station is incapable of complete silence. Somewhere beyond the bulkhead, repair crews work through the cycle. Distant engines hum through the station’s bones. Emergency announcements echo faintly from another sector. Metal groans as damaged docking arms adjust under strain. Life continues in thousands of tiny sounds.

Yet beneath all of it lies an unfamiliar absence. Nobody is shooting. No alarms scream. No reporters demand statements. No politicians call emergency sessions. No military officers argue over corridors and intervention zones. No one is trying to board my ship, and no one is trying to kill me.

The medical bay assigned to temporary VIP recovery is warm and dim, lit by amber wall panels instead of emergency red. The air smells faintly of antiseptic, brewed tea, recycled air, and the medicinal salve the station doctor insisted on smearing across my shoulder despite my repeated objections. A soft blanket covers my legs. My ribs ache every time I breathe too deeply.

I have never been more grateful for pain. Every sharp pull in my side reminds me that I'm alive, that I made it back, and that Gnash made it back too.

The door slides open.

I know it is him before I look up. The bond tells me.

The room changes.

That is the only way I know how to describe it. The tightness beneath my ribs eases. The air feels warmer. The space inside my chest that has been clenched for days finally loosens.

Gnash steps through the doorway wearing fresh clothes instead of armor. The sight almost startles me more than the boarding action.

There is no blood on him. No weapons hang from his belt. No command insignia marks him as a warlord or fleet commander. He's just a male in a dark shirt stretched across shoulders broad enough to block half the doorway, a walking siege engine somehow burdened with a conscience.

His silver hair is loose, and exhaustion has settled deep into his face. Not the kind cured by sleep, but the sort that accumulates over months of impossible decisions and too many names added to casualty reports.

He closes the door behind him.

Neither of us speaks immediately. The bond hums softly between us, steady and familiar. It doesn't tug or demand. It simply exists, a bridge stretched across every argument, every fear, every light-year that has separated us.

Finally, I gesture toward the chair beside the bed.

"Sit down."

His brow lifts.

"That sounded like an order."

"It was."