“Supran genetics are a tricky subject. From a research perspective, there is very little difference between homo sapien and homo supera. Both species can and have cross-bred countless times. But what does it mean to be considered supran?

As best as can be determined, few true Suprans survived the fall of the Imperium. They were created and constantly modified by the Eternal Emperor, an endless refining for some goal that we may never know. Most were slain in the Battle of Swiftes, but not all. We do know that the few pockets of Suprans that still survived the Coalition War and the Formican War that followed, are still alive today. We also know that the improvements to the human genome are sufficient enough that in many places, a supran bloodline is considered royalty.

Despite there being many living examples, there is remarkably little research. Suprans are devoutly loyal to an Imperium and an emperor that no longer exists. I could not find a single one who would even talk to me about my research, much less give a blood sample. The Solarian Federation of Republics, as the empire that rose from the ashes of the Coalition, have no Suprans at all. The Regnum Tertius declared me persona non grata and deported me simply for asking.

But despite all these setbacks, my meager findings are presented in this book, with the hopes that others may join me in taking up the research into this secretive species.”

Stanley Witherspoon, Unpublished Manuscript

Found in his personal effects after his suicide

Safira

Bela Vista, Planet Seguro

Hours later, a man came out of the room that Tanque had been carried into. Safira stopped her pacing and turned to face him. The man was wearing a blue smock that was smeared with bloodstains, but his hands were clean and well groomed. But what truly drew her attention was the dark, tired eyes and tight expression.

“He… did he…” Safira’s throat tightened, and the words couldn’t form.

“I’m sorry, miss. We did all we could, but he lost too much blood,” he said. “It’s quite amazing he lasted as long as he did, considering the nature of the wound.”

“Amazing,” she said flatly. “Tanque is dead, and you tell me his last hours, in pain and being dragged through a sand storm so that he could die on your table, were ‘amazing’.”

“Many apologies,” said the doctor. “I -”

“May I see him?” she interrupted, suddenly too tired to keep talking.

“Of course. Through that door.”

Safira walked into the room. It was much like the front room, with walls of sandstone but without a window. Instead, gleaming metal tables lined one wall, with a sink in the corner. Two people in blue smocks were tidying up a pile of bloody scalpels and implements on the table. When they saw her, they stepped out of the room to give her privacy.

But Safira didn’t notice either person, or the table. What she noticed was the operating table in the middle of the room. On it lay Tanque, with a blue sheet covering him from head to toe. She stepped over and pulled back the sheet so she could look at his face. It was pale, but relaxed. The horrible look of pain was gone, probably because of painkillers. Really, he looked asleep. She caressed his face.

The dream of a future together had been short-lived. Hope granted then snatched away. She hadn’t been in love with him, but she had trusted him. In Safira’s world, that was more valuable than love. She thought it could have been more, someday. Now it left her alone.

The middle aged woman walked in and patted her on the back.

“What happens now?” Safira asked.

“We take care of our own,” said the woman. “The Tutelum Comitatus will see to his cremation. Do you want his ashes?”

“What for?” she asked in confusion.

“Some faiths revere the deceased,” said the woman.

“I don’t have a faith,” said Safira, “and I don’t need ashes to grieve.”

Safira left the hospital stone-faced. She refused to show weakness, to allow tears to fall in front of strangers. She saw the nice clothes they wore, and how clean they were. She was a dirty, bloody, poor street rat. All she had was her dignity.

By the time she made it back to the warehouse, it was well after dark. Safira hoped the crawler hadn’t been stolen. She was sure that everything on it would be gone, picked clean by thieves and opportunists. But Safira still had the control ring for the crawler, so it probably didn’t go anywhere. At least she could sell that back to the Tutelum Comitatus. It wouldn’t be as much as the loot, but she wouldn’t starve. Depending on how much Tanque spent, she might even be able to get some clothes that weren’t covered in his blood. She fingered the bracelet on her wrist, wondering if she should take it off and add it to her tiny collection of memories.

Safira turned the corner and entered the warehouse. To absolutely no surprise at all, the crawler was no longer just inside the entrance. She poked her head in on the off chance she had parked it further than she remembered it. Then she spotted it, and was absolutely stunned. The crawler was parked much further down the wall, and all of the crates were neatly stacked next to it in an orderly pile. A woman in a Tutelum Comitatus uniform was sitting on a folding chair next to it, flipping through a clipboard holding a pile of plastic vellum sheets. Their loot was still there. This place really is too good to be true, thought Safira.

The woman looked up as Safira approached, and eyed the bracelet. “You are Safira? Tanque’s wife? How is he?”

“He didn’t make it,” she replied stiffly, her face a mask of ice.

“You have my sincerest condolences,” said the guard. “I’ve lost someone before. There are no words.”

“Thanks,” said Safira. “Umm, who are you, and what’s going on over here?”

“I’m Gracilia Amaral, the quartermaster for the Tutelum,” said the woman. “I went ahead and took the liberty of inventorying your finds and writing up an offer to buy. Are you selling the crawler back?”

Safira nodded. The woman went back to the clipboard, her stylus scratching across the plastic vellum. She then showed Safira a number on the page.

“That can’t be right,” said Safira finally. It was far too high. She’d never had that much money. She could live for… she couldn’t even think how long on that much money. For a street rat, this was a lot of money.

“Oh, I forgot to add in Tanque’s pay for the last few days he worked for us,” apologized Gracilia. “You’ll need to take this to the Depository. I’m sure Tanque kept his money there. I’ll write out an order to put his account in your name.”

True to her word, Gracilia stood there and wrote out a long, detailed order including the amount of money to buy everything on the crawler. Safira kept the knife and Tanque’s slug thrower, but sold the rifle. She would have to learn how to shoot it, and where to buy ammunition.

“Might I make a suggestion?” asked Gracilia when she wrapped up.

“What’s that?”

“Stop by the commissary next to the Depository after your done there. They have good quality clothes, and prices are kept low for Tutelum members. We take care of our own. And come back by when you’re ready. I’m sure we can find a job for you.”

“Okay,” said Safira, and she practically ran for the door. It was too much. It was all too much. Too much kindness, too much inclusion. The woman at the doctor’s office had been helpful and nice, then Gracilia had been sweet and comforting. Too many good people, and it made her hackles rise.

Safira asked someone for directions and found herself at the Depository. After a process that took way too long, she had an account flush with cash and a bag full of denars, because she couldn’t not take cash but knew it was too dangerous to carry a lot. She’d have to risk trusting the Depository. Afterwards, she went into the commissary, and wound up in a spending spree.

A box full of nutrition bars. New clothes that actually fit. A canteen. A sheath for Tanque’s knife, and a new belt to hold it. A nice smelling bar of soap and shampoo. A satchel to hold it all. And she still had money left over.

It took a few tries to find the street that Tanque’s apartment was on. It was in neutral territory, and was in a reasonably safe, albeit very poor, part of Bela Vista. The building was rundown but not decrepit. The apartment shared the third floor with six other apartments, making this one of the largest buildings Safira had been in before.

Tanque’s apartment had an iron door, and the key he had given her opened the three locks without a problem. Safira carefully locked the door behind her, then spotted an iron bar that dropped into two metal braces on either side. She dropped the lock bar into place.

Safira flipped the light switch next to the door, and the room lit with a low glow. This was Tanque’s space. The apartment was a single room, with a cramped kitchen on one wall and an actual bed against the other. Two other doors in the apartment revealed a closet with a few clothes, and a tiny bathroom that housed only a toilet and a showerhead on the ceiling. A drain on the floor with a bit of sand around it let the water back out again.

Tired and sore, Safira stripped off her old clothes and took a fast shower. Like all water in the city, it was carefully metered and charged. Safira rinsed off swiftly before turning off the water. Her new soap smelled of sandalwood, the shampoo vaguely like cinnamon. She couldn’t ever recall smelling something so pleasant. After rinsing the soap and shampoo, she used the ragged towel in the bathroom to dry off.

On her way out of the bathroom, she tripped over the satchel and nearly face planted in the apartment’s only room. The leather bracer and the empty power core spilled out of the open bag. Safira picked up the power core, and snagged a nutrition bar while she stuffed the bracer back where it belonged. Safira briefly considered putting on clothes and going back to her refuge, but it made little sense. She had things to figure out, and she had shelter now. Trekking across the city late at night was an added danger she didn’t need. Instead, she compromised by pulling out fresh clothes and setting them next to the bed.

Safira settled into Tanque’s bed after turning out the light. It smelled vaguely of heat and musk, reminding her of how she’d slept the night before. The pain of the loss was fresh and sharp. She had been a survivor for so long. A scavenger, an outcast, unwanted and unloved. Tanque had offered her something she hadn’t ever planned on receiving, and fate had snatched it away just as she had tried to accept it. It was cruel, but she was used to cruelty.

A pain hit her side as she rolled over onto her back. Safira reached under and fished out the empty power core. Tanque was right, it was pretty to look at. It caught the dim glow of the street lights from the window. Safira rolled it back and forth in her fingers as she thought.

What would she do? What could she do? Safira wasn’t sure she wanted to take up the Tutelum Comitatus offer. It seemed like too much, too soon. Perhaps she would wait a few days. She could rest and relax, hide away from the world without worrying about food or scavenging. It might be nice to...

As she fell asleep, the hand holding up the power core slipped and fell to her chest, bringing the core to rest above almost the exact spot in the sternum that she’d found it on the pilot. This core, however, was not a power core, despite Tanque’s limited ability to recognize an Old Imperium power core. It began to glow slightly, drawing energy in from a source that almost no living soul would fathom, and it began to scan.

The DNA of the woman it scanned had drifted pretty far from the core’s requirements, but it was close. There was sufficient amounts of homo supera DNA for her to be considered supran instead of human. She was badly malnourished, but had plenty of nutrients from recent meals to be a decent start. After concluding its analysis, the core melted into the woman’s skin. Still asleep, the woman didn’t even notice as the core replaced a piece of her sternum with itself and got to work.

Across the city, deep in Rager territory, a man who stood over two and a half meters tall sat in a room full of Rager thugs. All of them were drinking and smoking, a nightly party that only the most favored Ragers were allowed to attend. The man was larger than Tanque had been, and far more muscular. He worked out regularly, and despite appearances at the party, actually did not drink nearly as much as his men thought.

As the party really started to hit its groove, the door to the room slammed open. A man with a belt cinched around his thigh and the gritty, cut up look of someone who had roughed it in the desert staggered in.

“Jonatas?” said the man. “What happened to you? Where is my brother?”

“Celio is dead, Severino,” said the man. “I’m sorry, Boss.”

Severino, the leader of the Ragers, the most feared gang in Bela Vista, grabbed the injured man by the shoulder. “You will tell me who did this, Jonatas.”

“There was the independent guy, the big one, Tanque,” he said. “He shot the others, and shot me.”

“So he killed Celio?”

“No, what I mean is, he was there. But it was his little bitch who stabbed Celio.”

“What’s her name?” said Severino, his voice dangerously low.

“Sera, Serena, no. No, it was Safira. I heard Tanque shout it,” said Jonatas.

“You certain?”

“Yeah, man, I’m sure.”

“Good,” said Severino. He turned to look at the room full of thugs. All of them were quiet, the music stopped and drinks unfinished. “You heard the man. Find them. Find them both.”