There was a room made of stainless metal. A crown of hastily installed spotlights was focussed on a table. The dead groupie on it was bathed in bright light while the rest of the room was cast in long shadows from the alien limbs. Kathrain stood on a movable platform that lifted her short figure up. While her nose was wrinkled because of the odd peach and mint smell, her forehead showed deep creases for another reason.

“This can’t be right”, she said and tapped her pen-shaped instrument against the table, “Retry. Begin new report”

A small light in her peripheral vision blinked acknowledgement. With a push of a button, one of the lights came down from the ring above. She shifted it towards the dead alien that looked like crumpled paper with patches of curled hair.

“Subject is a creature of unknown origin. Cause of death was reported as electrocution which agrees with a cursory glance. Apparently, our little friend was smart enough to operate a stolen plasma weapon but not smart enough to not cut open a live wire”

Kathrain pressed the pen-tool against a string limb and clicked a mechanical button. The sound of sharp hissing was followed by a three-dimensional projection of the leg. It flickered before it stabilized with a crosscut of the inside.

“Motor function is based around a series of flexor and extensor muscles nested around hollow bones. These muscles are responsible for the familiar phenomena of curled limbs from burn damage. Hmm, seems the flexor muscles overpower the extensors – as expected”

Her hands moved up the limb, the projection followed and left a razor-thin strip of red blood on the limb. She stopped when she reached a lumpy knot. The projection showed it to be covered in muscles while a deeper look revealed a brain like structure.

“Each limb is equipped with a series of micro-brains, four in total. That comes out as one per joint – contrary to appearance the limbs are closer to mammals than cephalopods. The microbrains hint at a decentralized system supported by thick nerve strands”

Kathrain put the pen down and narrowed her eyes. So far - so alien. The creature was like nothing she had ever seen in her life, outside of speculative fiction. However, it still followed the anatomic knowledge of millennia that mankind had accrued from wars and morbid curiosity. The latter part caused her hairs to stand on edge. With a sudden motion, she stabbed the pen into the main body further up. New readouts appeared in a listed form.

“Base element analysis. Oxygen at 65%, Carbon 18.5%, Hydrogen 9.5%, Nitrogen at... 3.2%”

The doctor stopped again. A slight shaking had taken her hands. This was it. The part she didn’t like for the connotations it brought.

“Continuing. The body also contains calcium, phosphorous, potassium, sulfur, sodium, chlorine and magnesium in order of quantity” she said while her voice grew tense, “All values are within expected tolerance levels for... human bodies”

There it was. Air left her lungs. The composition of base elements told a story she didn’t want to follow. It was the entire reason she was on her third round doing it, each time with a fresh set of tools. Her thumb hovered over the mode switch. Kathrain felt a coldness in her limbs and despite the lowered gravity, she got the impression of a heavy weight on her shoulders.

“DNA analysis shows a near perfect match to humans but additional information is coded within the double helix. The groupies appear to be an evolutionary step of... mankind”, she said and suddenly smacked the tool onto the table.

“That’s just nonsense. My instruments must be broken from exposure to self-healing protocols.”

She had expected some proximity to the genetic stock of earth. Scholars had long hypothesized that humans acted as agents of the old Panspermia thought experiment. This was the idea that life in the universe was seeded by interstellar objects such as dust or meteoroids. Spaceships would function much the same way. Of course, the theory had been disproven by a galaxy full of barren rocks.

“Heart? Give me a sanity check, could evolution go from human to this in just north of three hundred thousand years?”

.: Negative. The slow generational cycle doesn’t allow for rapid changes. :.

Kathrain twisted the pen and clicked two of the buttons. The screen changed again and projected an image of the reproductive system. Two weeks. That’s how long it took to go from nothing to one more fluffball. Maturity was reached within another two weeks. That was... rather fast.

“What if those humans had a cycle of uh... let’s say that of lab flies?”

.: Given the extensive deviation in form and function, that still seems unlikely. :.

She bit her lower lip until it tasted of iron. Kathrain quickly stepped off the platform and away from the corpse. After she had burned her gloves, she sank down in a chair. With her back hunched, the head lowered and dropping shoulders, discomfort set in within minutes. After another minute, her entire body ached and she still didn’t move. Implications and complications, that’s what these things were.

“Continue report. Addendum. The following is speculation. Groupies can be assumed as our distant relatives which means there’s a chance of cross-compatibility in diseases. Furthermore, according to these findings, groupies are an evolutionary step of mankind while also being technically impossible, given the amount of time that passed. That means... potential outside influence.”

A frosty knot settled in her stomach. Was this the work of a scientist? Maybe mankind had taken to create aliens for entertainment. A lot could happen in those mad long millennia. Was this why mankind had seemingly not bothered to check up on them at all? Maybe actual aliens had shown up and smudged all humans into a genetic paste to toy with? Kathrain suddenly grunted and shifted her posture.

“Heart, give me the administrator.”

.: I’m afraid that’s not physically possible right now. :.

“Uh...? Heart? Oh, greetings uh ahem.”

Had Heart just played a prank? The communication whisked into existence with little warning. If there was one thing she knew that the iron dragon hated, it was flat-footed stumbling. Kathrain swallowed and focussed on the image of Strehin. The angle was a bit off and the picture appeared flat –side effects of someone using a device instead of an implant.

“We need to expedite the removal of the groupies”, the doctor began. In a normal flow of conversation, the other person would ask why and how but not the iron dragon. The administrator simply waited. Her icy stare was enough of an answer.

“Your conversational skills have improved significantly”, Kathrain added with a snide tone in her voice. If in danger, strike first!

“The groupies are biologically related to humans. As such they pose a major threat as possible vectors for disease. Throw them out, burn everything they left behind. Since that Balayuna girl had contact with just about all of us, we’ll need everyone to come in for an examination. I’ll schedule on your confirmation.”

Strehin nodded once. Kathrain took it as a sign to continue.

“Two additional problems. First. The groupies are rapid breeders. Pregnancy lasts about two weeks. At worst, we’re looking at several hundred of them in a week or two. Second. We’re fast approaching the point where our muscles and organs will begin to weaken due to the lower gravity. Finally, I apologize for not considering the disease angle earlier – it simply slipped my mind with all the counselling.”

There was no way around it. She had messed up. The disease problem had crossed her mind but the groupies seemed so entirely unlike anything she had seen, her mind had filed them under too different for cross-compatibility. Strehin took precisely ten seconds but to Kathrain it felt like an eternity. She kept glancing at those icy eyes in an attempt to glean a possible glimpse of what the tall woman felt. It was like a staring contest with a lizard. Or an actual dragon.

“Understood”, said Strehin, “We’ll use drones to get the groupies to leave. You monitor the disease angle. Let me play the angry landlord.”

A space station shouldn’t need lumberjacks. Period. Sovan paced through a cloud of sawdust. People flashed past him in a busy buzz. Technically, there were about thirty people down in the docks but it felt like more. The stench of burning plasma weapons hung in the air and entire swarms of medium-sized drone dragged lumber out of the docks. They looked like miniature versions of what Sarina called her metal body but these were operated in a swarm setup. One pilot controlled a whole bevvy of them at once. He suddenly saw the back of a bald head with a metal implant in open view and accelerated.

“Xim! Finally! Our salvage is almost here. This is good enough, we should... where’d he go?”

Sovan blinked. The man was just gone. What? How and perhaps also why? He shook his head. The last member of their leadership circle was a ghost. One you could only see by the clearly visible effect of his work. Someone tapped him on his shoulder.

“We’re good to go. Agriculture has cleaned up the requested docking port. The rest will come later, the biospheres require more work”

He turned around but whomever the voice had belonged to: He was already gone. Another voice rang through the room and echoed inside his mind.

.: The requested cargo has arrived. Gravity will be disrupted in this section for the docking procedure. All personnel is recommended to leave. :.

That broadcast was for him, he realized. Sovan followed the crowd out of the docks. The immediate second he was out, the large doors shut behind him. Gravity shifting was a neat trick to allow a heavy lifter to drag around an inert spaceship in atmosphere. A sudden wave of physical discomfort washed through Sovan. One second he was light as a feather, then heavy. Gravity adjusted to the corridor he was in with fluctuations because he was close to the edge.

He didn’t need to see what happened. Experience told him. The loud and drawn out thumping in the floor indicated the opening of the outer docking port. A moment of silence followed and then, pumps hammered a steady rhythm. Oxygen was cycled into the airlock.

Several more loud sounds rang out of the docking bay and he waited patiently until he heard a whirring sound, followed by six loud metallic booms. There would be one more step – and here it was! His stomach lurched again as gravity was once more rearranged. Metallic groaning came out of the dock and once it settled, the door swung open. A smile crept on his face. He waved to some people out of his crew and noticed a familiar face from when they had checked up on the observation deck.

“Oh grey gods, not again... Sarah? Katharina? Anna? Anna, something, something? ”

She shot him an angry look and he couldn’t even blame her. Maybe that spruced up celebrity girl had some truth to her: He was a cargo-hold gnome with the social graces of a welded metal clump. Sovan brushed the hair out of his face and stumbled into the docks. His apprehension turned into confusion and then disappointment.

“Uh, Heart, confirm that this chunk of debris is the spaceship?”

.: Can’t comply. My readings indicate that this is just another wreck. :.

If this was supposed to be a spaceship, he was no longer a nano-engineer. It was a broken mess of bent hull segments, struts and internal compartments exposed to the vacuum. Micro-Asteroids or debris had taken chunks out of it. The lettering on the metal identified the mess.

“It’s the Balance Vitae... or is it the Ravenlander? How many names does this... oh”

His lips parted for a second and then formed into a grin. The ship looked like a cobbled together mess, because it was. Technically. It had a hull segment that looked like the bow of a Nova Luxury Cruiser while the section just below was obviously from a bulky warship. He found it impossible to discern the shape of what was underneath.

“CLEVER! ISN’T IT?”

He jumped in response. His angry glare led to a round of amusement. Lieutenant Sarina had somehow managed to sneak her oversized drone right behind him.

“Remind me to kill your speakers Sarina”, he glowered and then returned his attention to the ship. Six docking clamps held it in place, although the large machines were apparently just as confused as he had been – their placement seemed random.

“It’s certainly a strange thing”, he said, “The ship somehow collects actual debris and uses it to fake out visual identification”

“IT GETS BETTER! IF YOU LOOK CLOSER, THERE ARE ODD HOLES IN THE CARAPACE THAT SEEM GLAZED. THIS THING HAS A SYSTEM TO DISTRIBUTE STORED HEAT IN ANY DIRECTION IT WANTS”

“A system to throw off image-based detection and something to irritate heat scanners. Maybe a Stellar Mage could find it in their specialized ships but they’re kind of rare. Why does someone like an entertainer have something like this?”

Sovan reached into his pocket and fished out the electronic key he had gotten from Strehin. The electronics to the proximity of the ship and showed him a series of holographic buttons. He skipped the one that deactivated the camouflage and instead opened up the service bay at the bottom. The debris suddenly moved out of the way and revealed the ship underneath.

The roughly two hundred meters long ship was no beauty. That much was certain. The form he could make out appeared to be tear shaped but the impression was thrown off by tentacle-like robotic arms nesting on the hull. A section in the bow screeched open. A single light activated and flunked out a moment later.

“IF OLD HORROR MOVIES TAUGHT ME ANYTHING, THIS SHIP IS CALLED PROVIDENCE TERMINUS AND SPAWNS DEMONS FROM OUTER SPACE”

Sovan gnashed his teeth. He heard a chuckle and saw that Anna woman look away. It was someone else that didn’t like him. Ever since the stasis, he had gotten into the habit of collecting them. When had he become so insufferable? The sight of letters around the service bay distracted his thoughts.

“The name seems to be Odyssey Calibur. Yeah, I’m betting on space demons too”, he said and then raised his voice, “Alright everyone, we’ve got a job to do. Our first order of business! Let’s see what state this is in. Each group will be accompanied by a swarm of drones. Let them go first. This should be routine but nothing ever was since we woke up”

They approached the service bay as a group. The small drones circled around them and used their searchlights to illuminate the entrance point while Sarina stayed behind. The entrance looked decidedly normal. Clean walls, no decoration – just compartments for storage and cranes to lift goods off the platform with. If this was a horror movie, the dull nature of it meant something ugly would soon kill the first crew member. Sovan smirked and stepped onto the lift platform. Once everyone was on, he ferried them up with a press on the electronic key.

“You know what to do, let’s get to it!”

Several corridors led out of the bay. The largest was half-sealed by a massive door. Three drones swung around and climbed through the gap. Their searchlights cast eerie shadows but a tinny voice from one of them signalled no danger. Several of his technicians followed them through to the other side when the door suddenly shut with a loud bang. Sovan rushed to the door but a comm-line opened in his vision. It was that Anna woman. She looked shaken until she saw him – then her bad mood won out.

“We’re fine, one of the drones accidentally kicked the hydraulics. We’ll get it fixed... ‘boss’”

Anna Solokov, the display told him. He pressed his lips together and nodded. This time he wouldn’t forget the name. Sovan kept the connection active and spoke so that everyone could hear him.

“Alright, everything is clear so far. Link up your oculus implants. Heart, you are to create an automap as we go deeper. Provide an overlay of our positions based on implant readout. Monitor vital signs and display on my system”

The effect was immediate. A blue map appeared in his mind. White lines marked the edges while another light indicated several levels of detail. Green dots marked his crew while a list of colour coded vitals hovered in the back – they shared the green colour with their dots. Sovan watched part of his crew follow down a long corridor deeper into the ship and turned around to face the opposite sight.

“You and you, you go and see the side corridors. Everyone else, follow me – we’re going to get to the bridge and see if we can’t get this thing to power up. If anyone finds the reactor, let me know”

His crew reacted and he watched their progress on the map. They disappeared through the two side corridors and he watched their progress on the automap. Busy little dots hurried along, uncovering more of what lay inside the Odyssey Calibur.

“Did she have to mention horror? Now I’m expecting something to jump me from the shadows”, he grumbled as he paced towards the last remaining corridor. Uncomfortable chuckling came from the other two technicians with him. The tiny drones reached the last door and waited until they were close, then pushed it open. Their searchlights illuminated a corridor. Like everything else, the walls were clean but signs of usage showed on the floor. Slight smudges from overuse marked a path frequently walked.

His automap expanded to include the new room. Two more corridors lead to either side with the central one leading further in. The ship might only have been two hundred meters, but it was built like a labyrinth. One room was labelled as the pantry. A drone quickly dove in and back out. Nothing left, naturally. The other side-room was the kitchen. Everything was neatly arranged, there were no signs of struggle. Obviously, Sovan added in his mind, this was just a normal ship after all.

Heart kept filling in the automap as all crews headed deeper into the Odyssey Calibur. The section he was in seemed to be focussed on food production while the other direction included more general cargo. One of the side teams had found the maintenance vents for the robotic arms and the last group had yet to find another room. Their path led all the way around the vessel.

“This is Solokov. We found the engine core. Beginning examination”

Sovan noted a marked increase in heart rate amongst the technicians near the core. A smile found its way on his face. In the end, they were just as crazy about technology as he was. With renewed vigour, he gestured towards the end of their way. The drones buzzed forwards until they reached a ramp and a staircase. A railing with welded on ribs looked like it was used to drag wares up the ramp. His entourage of drones took point and Sovan followed with his people.

The end of the staircase was an actual wooden door decorated with gold trim. When the first drone pressed against it, the door crumbled to dust. Sovan gasped for air. Lush carpets covered the ground in a long hallway. Candelabra were attached to the walls and the ceiling. Paintings added to the charm and the walls were made of something that looked like marble. He rapped against it and corrected his impression. It was marble.

“The palace isn’t helping by giving me nightmare fuel”

A shiver ran down his spine and he swirled around. He saw a shadow vanish down the corridor.

“There! Something!”

His companion drones immediately turned. All their searchlights focussed on the end of the path but there was only a wall. He bit his lips and noticed the blank stares from his companions.

“Trick of the light”, he said. Yeah, that’s what they always said before some alien horror jumped them dead. Sovan wrapped his arms around his shoulders and sighed. He was unfit for command. Simple. A commander should not jump at shadows and scare his crew on a critical job.

“Emperor alive”, came the voice of someone else over comm. His icon blinked on his map.

“Found the reactor. Just one but it’s comically oversized for a ship this size”, the voice added. Another icon began to blink, it was that Anna woman in the engine room.

“I can shed some light on that. The engine isn’t just your standard Stellar Drive. This thing is a genuine magecraft. There’s a port for manual navigation through an IMBUE mage here. Boss, let me ask what everyone is thinking right now. Why does a celebrity, mage or not, have a magecraft?”

Sovan nodded along with the question. Everyone, as it turns out, included him as well. Magecrafts were exceedingly rare. Their main difference was that they were built custom tailored to a mage and their tastes. As there were four types of magic, there were also four types of magecrafts. The ship of an IMBUE mage could channel the energy of the spellcaster into its systems and boost them on demand. These vessels didn’t need image recognition or heat to find a target, the mage sensed their surroundings using circuitry built into the hull. If Stellar Mages were wizards, then these ships were their magic staff.

“Boss?”

“Right, no idea. Remember the rumours about her being some sort of spy? Guess there was something to it. I mean, why would a mage become a singer anyway?”

He prodded his nose and then focussed on the pompous hallway ahead. It led to a series of guest quarters, dining halls and even rooms made for private concerts. The automap in his head had also filled up in the meantime. Some of the green icons passed right by him with a thin wall between them. He switched the mode to detailed and saw that their paths were much more utilitarian than this. Just like with the Star herself, there was a fake veneer of elegance.

Pretty soon, they had gotten a good idea about what the ship looked like. They passed several more hallways, some decorated with statues, some with paintings, three-dimensional installations and even some smudges that no one knew whether they were intentional or not. According to the automap that had nearly filled the whole ship, two rooms remained. The bridge and the master bedroom.

“Let’s start her up then, shall we?” he said and headed for the bridge. Most people followed him and the drones inside. The bridge was just as bad a pompous display as the rest of this deck. His feet stepped on golden metal covered by what remained of the carpet. In contrast to the artificial one in the hallways, this one seemed to have been made with something organic, because it crumbled away on touch. A large sphere stood in the centre with metal rings around it. Consoles covered the walls and the entire front section was made up of large panorama screens. All of it was anchored around a chair that wouldn’t have been amiss in a throne room - at the end, for the emperor to sit on. A strange apprehension took hold of him as he approached the chair. Searchlights focussed on the area. There was something inside. The light for his heart rate turned from green to yellow.

One step. Another. His hands reached for the back of the chair when there was suddenly a loud scream! He glanced at the minimap and saw that one person had entered the bedroom instead. Her heart rate was deep in the red.

“Sorry!” shouted that Anna something from the other room, “Stumbled on something, everything is okay”

Her pulse told another story. As did the private comm-line indicator.

“You better come here, boss”, said Anna Solokov. Thank you screen display. Sovan made a mental note with her name. He wouldn’t forget it yet again. Sovan nodded once and then raised his voice.

“Everyone, try to get this thing operational. Let’s see if it works out. I’m going to check in on...”

He had to look. He actually had to look not even five seconds later!

“Anna Solokov. Be right back”

The way to the bedroom wasn’t too long. It was just a bit off to the side and accompanied by a pool in one room and several dressing rooms on the other. He quietly opened the door and found Anna Solokov in the dark.

“No drone?” he began but Anna dismissed it with a wave of her hand. She motioned for him to close the door and he shut it behind him. It took a while for his eyes to get used to the near absolute darkness.

“Anna? What are you doing?!”

She gave no reply but he noticed that her heart rate had slowed down to yellow again. It communicated that Anna seemed apprehensive but not threatened. First, he started to notice the subtle sounds. Her breathing, his own – even the rhythm of his own body became something he could hear. That and a strange tingling. It was funny the tricks darkness could play on the mind. Just now, he thought he had seen a faintly glowing skeleton on the bed. That would be absurd, wouldn’t it?

As his eyes adjusted further, he noticed the finer details. Patterns and circuitry like something electronic had taken on a humanoid shape. Sovan reached for his toolbelt and plucked the cube from it. He flicked it on and the green light from the holographic screen nearly blinded him. It also tinged the room in more light. It was a skeleton. One with bones that shined like a mirror and creases that had a soft blue light glim within. The circuitry laced every part of the skeleton but was most focussed on the ribcage and the skull. Large circles rested on the ribs. They were four in total and he noticed their symbolic shape for FRAY, FLOW, STRUCT and then by far the largest one: IMBUE.

He noticed something else in the green light. The skeleton was partially clad in a well-preserved dress. The curse of self-healing protocols, organics broke down, artificials were constantly repaired. He knew that dress. It had waltzed into his workshop this morning, worn by a beautiful but annoying butterfly.

What was going on?

Sovan looked at Anna... Solo... koch? Kov? Solokov! Emperor alive, his brain was a sieve when it came to names.

“Don’t tell anyone about this. This has the potential to be a big mess and I’m not sure we can use one right now.”

“Make one guess why I called you, Boss”

“You’re right, I was mostly talking to myself... it helps me focus when I’m thinking. Here’s what we do. We leave and accidentally seal the room, I’ll keep delaying repair orders and in the meantime, I’ll get Strehin in on this”

A smart man would tell the iron dragon and then wash his hands of the mess. Sovan was not a smart man. He fancied himself one but when he found himself standing in front of her room, he came to realize that he was, in fact, rather stupid. He had kept a lid on the discovery and decided to confront the celebrity first. The symbol of a star had been sprayed on the outside. Their celebrity guest had a room of her own while most still slept in tents. He covered his mouth with a hand. Should he be doing this?

Without warning, the door squeaked open and he stared at a dark room. Her silhouette was barely visible in the shadows. A crystal clear voice reached the nano-technician.

“Come inside, Sovan”

His body listened before his mind could put the brakes to it. The door shut behind him and the light gently raised to a level where he could see what was around him. There wasn’t any decoration in the room, just an assortment of furniture, clothes and a pleasant scent that lingered wherever the Star of Ashina had been. It’s just – he didn’t recognize the woman on the bed.

“Who are you?”

She seemed vaguely familiar. Her body had the right proportions to be the Star of Ashina and the voice fit but everything else looked different. With the brunette hair and skin with actual blemishes, he struggled to reconcile this image with the garishly perfect Balayuna. He locked onto her signature eyes, that usually used to sparkle with alluring energy – but without any makeup to emphasize them, she looked just plain average.

“Wow” was all he said.

She chuckled and crawled to the edge of the bed. Her motions carried the familiar grace and the smile had the usual impact. This really was her even though his mind struggled to accept it.

“Well, what do you say? This is the real me”, she said and provocatively leaned forward before suddenly snapping back up with a chuckle. Her voice continued.

“Perhaps not all of the real me. Balayuna was always rather focussed on her body, always luring, always seducing, like a femme fatale. In time it became hard to turn off. Oh, by the way, a femme fatale means a dangerous woman that tends to be the death of men. It comes from old cinematography and literature. Books, those are made of paper and...”

Sovan carefully paced closer to the bed but chose to stay instead. The stranger woman followed each of his motions with her eyes. Wait, had she just insulted him?

“I know that”, he snapped and realized by the grin on her face, that she had played him.

“You’re right. Of course, you would. It would, after all, be rather presumptuous of me to judge someone on looks alone”

This had been a mistake. He turned around when a hand suddenly grabbed his wrist. Her skin was cold with slight moisture and there was subtle vibration in her fingers that hinted at her nervousness. Sovan turned back to look at her again but her smile was full of confidence – but now that he knew to look, he noticed that she had wrapped her other hand around her chest in a protective gesture. Her muscles were tense and she had slightly narrowed her eyes. She was nervous.

“Stay. You’re here because you’ve found my epitaph and I shouldn’t antagonize you further”, she suddenly said and took a deep breath, “My name is not Balayuna. I’m not the Star of Ashina. The dead woman you’ve found, however – she was the original.”

He looked into her eyes and noticed that they were unsteady as if she simultaneously forced herself to look at him while trying to not do so at the same time.

“She was killed in a premeditated murder by her adopted child”, the woman said and then pointed at her chest, “That would be me.”

It took that revelation for Sovan to finally sit down on the bed. He turned to look at the tall woman and suddenly realized that she appeared vulnerable. A cynical part of him whispered that she was acting the part while another part wanted to believe it.

“So you’ve killed her? Why?”

Her voice took on a sudden fire.

“Because slave might have been a better designation than child. She was evil. Did you notice that no one else died on that ship? It’s because they were all in on it.”

Sovan brushed a hand through his hair. This had been a mistake. He felt like he was swimming in the void, without a spacesuit while navigating by clicking his tongue in a vacuum. In short: Overwhelmed, half-dead and internally screaming for help. The tall woman suddenly slumped her shoulders. Her every gesture seemed genuine but at the same time, he had seen her switch between personalities on the fly. Was this real? Was it another act?

“My name is... You. Maybe leech if you want a nickname”, the woman said with a bitter smile, “Never had a real name. I was a child the black market stole from a mage cradle. Sold, modified and nurtured to serve as a copy of the Star. At all times, I was her slave, but also a message to her – you too are replaceable. When Balayuna killed for political plays – I was there. When she did so out of boredom – I followed. She was a nasty and depraved woman. She had it coming”

All throughout her explanation, he sat still and listened. His eyes once more wandered over her shape before he finally inched closer and offered his arms for a friendly hug. The tall woman looked at him with a bewildered expression before accepting the gesture.

“You’re a sick cargo-hold gnome, Sovan”, she said in a voice that cracked with emotion, “A girl tells you that she killed someone in cold blood and your impulse is to hug her”

“Maybe because you look vulnerable and I’m tired of miserable people being ignored because they’re good at smiling. You’re shaking, you’re afraid. You did something bad but you could have done so much worse.”

He suddenly remembered the smiling face of his once friend Adam. The large man had always smiled and now that gesture had one day turned sour. Sovan pressed his lips into a thin line. That was his failing. He wouldn't fail another human again.

“Thank you for telling me. It’s always better to talk then to soak it all up”, he said and held out a hand. Strangely, he found it shaking. The tall woman took it with a slight smile.

“I’m... s-s-sorry. Let me apologize. You really weren’t what you seem and I’m not convinced what I’m seeing now is real. But from here on out, you’ll be Yun to me - and a friend if you want one”

A flare of anger flickered in her facial expression and Sovan realized it had sounded like you. He held up a hand and reached for his toolcube. With a few touches of his thumb, three letters floated in the air above it.

“Yun”, he said and then added with a smile, “As for your murder – I won’t tell anyone. If you ask me, it’s your duty to tell. However, the iron dragon must know. I owe the truth to her”

Yun suddenly reached out to his face and forced him to look over his shoulder. His heart skipped a beat and temperature dropped to near zero. The Administrator stood in the doorway with a look that had probably melted the innocent metal.

“Nano-technician Sovan Terastris – congratulations on avoiding the airlock. Now for you, ‘Yun’ – once Sovan has seen fit to re-attach the brain to his body and walk out of here, we’ll have a talk of our own”