“Yes, it is.”
“I don’t understand, sir.”
“The events which occurred on Soldate 219–41 AV have been classified Caecus Level Alpha. You will never speak of the events to fellow members of the Titans, Legion officers or enlisted of any rank, civilians, or any sentient life-form or artificial intelligence, at risk of high treason. Understood?”
She opens her mouth to respond, but nothing comes out. Why isn’t she being punished?
Her eyes drift to the glittering badges of rank pinned to his chest, and it hits her. It’s obvious.
She’s thinking like a guilty soldier. They’re thinking strategically, politically, public-facing. Formally punishing her would be a matter of public record. The citizens would want to know why. They’d want to know about the mission, what’d really happened.
“Understood, sir.”
“You are being assigned to the SCS Argus, effective immediately.”
She refocuses her eyes. “Yes, sir.” She doesn’t know what that means, doesn’t know what the Argus is. She doesn’t care.
The praetor seems to glow for a moment, and his edges ripple away from him as he continues to speak. He begins to outline what will be expected of her on the Argus. She half listens as his form wavers, then flickers in and out of existence.
Her heart races.
She stands in the hallway outside his office. At the end of the long, wide corridor two armed guards await. They are there to escort her to her new assignment.
As she crosses the navy-carpeted expanse toward them, her attention is drawn to a vid screen recessed in the wall. It’s playing a live newscast, but it can’t be right. The screen shows the symbol of the Titans and a caption that reads: “Titan Forces Eliminate Final Viator Threat.”
Behind the text, video loops of citizens celebrating in the streets of Elyseia, Viridis, Cautis Prime.
Text scrolls below it: “The Resurgence War comes to a close with confirmation from Legion officials that the last of the hidden Viator cohorts, along with the remaining breeders, have been executed on Paxus, under the command of the First and the Titans, helmed by Praetor Reneth Lugen.”
Her chest constricts, her jaw tightens.
Lugen had gone a step further than she’d thought. He hadn’t swept it under the rug. He’d called the mission a success.
He’d lied.
Then she sits atop the SCS Argus, legs folded beneath her. The Divide stretches out before her, infinite in its blackness.
It can’t speak. That’d be ridiculous.
It says, “Aevitas fortis,” and the words resonate in her chest like a bell being tolled. Warmth blooms and she feels a camaraderie with the edge of the universe.
Hull lights that don’t exist flash. Blue and red, blue and red. Sound that can’t exist in the vacuum of space blasts against her eardrums.
It’s the Argus’s proximity alarm. Enemy ships are incoming. She stands to find the interlopers, to meet them head-on. She turns her back on the Divide and faces inward, toward the light of the universe.
Billions upon billions of stars blind her.
* * *
Adequin’s eyes slid open.
Silence filled her cabin, save the quiet beeping notification on the holographic display on her bedside table. She rubbed the sleep from her eyes and turned to expand it. It was a request from Jackin to report to the bridge immediately.
The door opened and Cavalon Mercer rushed inside. He wore a standard white space suit with the sleeves pushed up, a helmet tucked under one arm. Adequin bolted upright in bed as he turned panicked eyes onto her.