Steam bled off the pipes and collected in tanks, turning the Spine’s washroom into a hazy box of tile and rust.

  Karauro stood beneath the feeble spray, forehead pressed to the cracked tiles as warm water flowed over bruises and fading cuts. The Vesta run lingered—Anvi’s laugh on the scaffold, her head resting on his shoulder, the touch of her hand on his shirt just before—

  He closed his eyes, a small, sly grin pulling at his lips.

  “Someone’s in a good mood.” Nera’s voice drifted over the stall divider. The walls were high enough to keep things mostly decent—just shoulders and ankles visible between them—but he knew that tone.

  Karauro jolted, inhaled at the wrong time, and got soap in his mouth.

  He spat. “You jinxed me.”

  “Didn’t think you were capable of being happy enough to jinx,” she said.

  He scrubbed faster, trying to hide the heat in his face with his hands. Water ran pink around his ankles where old scabs had softened. The fall, the ruins, the Ripper—they’d left their mark, pale lines and jagged patches across his ribs and back. Nothing like Nera’s network of scars, but they were getting there.

  On the other side of the divider, he could see the curve of her shoulder through steam, metal glinting where her cybernetic arm met flesh. She washed efficiently, no wasted motion, like even here she was on a timer.

  “You’re humming,” Nera said.

  He froze. “…No I’m not.”

  “You are. Badly.”

  He turned the water off with more force than necessary. “Maybe I just don’t hate being alive for five minutes. Is that a crime now?”

  There was a beat of silence. For a second, he thought he’d pushed too far.

  Then, quietly: “No.”

  They stepped into the changing room, separated by a low wall. Towels were thrown over their shoulders as steam clung to their skin. Karauro's dark hair strands fell flat against his skull, and the scars from his tanned skin became more apparent. His hair was slicked back, highlighting the thin white line above his right eyebrow.

  Nera pulled on a fresh shirt, tossing her towel aside. Her eye tracked automatically—cataloguing damage the way she did with armor plates.

  He’d filled out a little since the first time she’d seen him in Spine’s showers. Less hunched. Less shaking. The bruises were real, but the flinch wasn’t as deep.

  He caught her looking and braced, half-expecting a jab.

  Instead, he cleared his throat. “About what I said. Out there. ‘Let me die in the ruins.’”

  Her fingers halted on a buckle. That wasn’t what she anticipated.

  He kept going, words rough but steady. “It was stupid. You were right—I froze. Roy got hit. I know that doesn’t just vanish because I did better later.”

  He tugged his shirt over his head, voice muffled for a second, then came out clearer. “So… yeah. Sorry. For that. And for making you drag me around like a broken crate.”

  Nera stared at him, and this time he didn’t look away.

  Not just the apology—plenty of recruits muttered them when cornered. It was his eyes.

  Last she’d looked closely, they’d been fogged—hollow, like something important had slipped loose. Now, for the first time since the Ripper, they were clearer. Tired, yes, shadows under them—but grounded. Like whatever Vesta had done to him, it had put some piece back where it belonged.

  “Didn’t think you knew how to say sorry,” she said finally.

  “Don’t get used to it,” he muttered, stuffing his arms into his battered jacket. “I’m not good at it.”

  “Got that right, you’re terrible at it,” she agreed. “But…”

  She tightened her belt, looking away for a heartbeat. “…Accepted.”

  That caught him more off guard than anything.

  He bent to lace his boots, hiding the small, startled curl at the edge of his mouth. The ring in Anvi’s pocket flickered through his thoughts, along with the way her hazel eyes had looked at him on that scaffold.

  “Something happen out there?” Nera asked, voice deliberately careless. “You were quiet when you got back. Now you’re… less fogged.”

  He hesitated. “We held the line. No one else died. Feels like… the first time I didn’t just survive by tripping into luck.”

  “Hm.” Her tone gave nothing away. “Don’t let it go to your head.”

  “Pretty sure you’ll beat it back down if it does.”

  “Correct.”

  They stepped out into the corridor together, boots squeaking faintly on the damp floor.

  Roy lounged against the opposite wall, hands behind his head, one boot flat, the other toe dragging patterns. His hair looked like he’d dried it with a cheap fan and bad decisions.

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  “There you are,” he said. “Spine’s two loudest shower singers.”

  Karauro groaned. “I wasn’t singing.”

  “Sure. And I don’t talk too much,” Roy said. “Come on. Whren said to swing past the med wing before breakfast so she can pretend she’s in charge.”

  They started down the hall. Karauro slouched without thinking, shoulders curling forward.

  Nera’s knee snapped up and caught him in the lower back—not hard enough to drop him, just enough to straighten him.

  “Walk like you have bones,” she said. “Not like the ruins already chewed you.”

  He stumbled, glared at her, then begrudgingly pulled himself upright. “You’re going to knock a vertebra loose one day.”

  “I’ll weld it back in.”

  Roy chuckled. “Domestic violence, Spine edition. Warms the heart.”

  They turned a corner and nearly collided with Whren.

  The medic stood with a tablet tucked under one arm, glasses perched low on her nose. She looked like she hadn’t slept enough, which was normal, and like she’d been thinking too much, which was worse.

  “There you three are,” she said. “Perfect. Karauro, you’re cleared for breakfast. No scans. No pokes. Go to the cafeteria.”

  Karauro frowned. “You don’t want to check if I’m secretly bleeding out from the inside?”

  “Your vitals look stable, and I’m choosing, for once, to trust my readings over my desire to annoy you,” she said. “Eat something while Aaron finishes his yelling.”

  Nera’s eyes narrowed. “Yelling about what?”

  Whren’s smile was a little too smooth. “Paperwork. The man thinks if he shouts at reports, they’ll file themselves.”

  Karauro tipped his head. “Since when do you care where I go?”

  “Since you walk around with foggy eyes and a kinetic glove that can blow holes in my walls,” Whren said. “Food. Go.”

  Something in her tone made Nera’s neck prick.

  Karauro, clueless or just hungry, shrugged. “Fine. Cafeteria.”

  He started to turn away.

  Aaron’s voice detonated down the hall from the briefing room.

  “What do you mean Vesta is gone?!”

  The words snapped through the Spine like a shock.

  Karauro froze.

  Roy winced. “Guy’s gonna blow his ghost-eye right out of his skull yelling like that.”

  Whren closed her eyes for a heartbeat. “Damn it, Aaron.”

  Nera’s gaze snapped to her. The way Whren flinched, the way she’d just tried to shoo Karauro toward the cafeteria with no scans, no questions—

  “You saw it before we did, didn’t you?” Nera said.

  Whren nodded once, jaw tight. “I saw the first report. I was trying to buy him ten minutes where his world wasn’t on fire.”

  “That went well,” Nera muttered.

  Karauro was already moving. He slipped past them like water, boots hammering the floor as he bolted toward the briefing room. Roy swore and sprinted after him.

  Nera took off after them a beat later.

  They reached the briefing room doors in time to see Karauro shoulder through a half-open panel.

  Inside, the room buzzed with feeds and voices. A holo-table projected the region around Vesta—static-ridden satellite imagery, energy readings spiking and dropping, a red ring where the outpost should have been.

  Argos stood at the far end, one hand braced on the table. His mechanical arm whirred softly as it adjusted.

  Aaron was mid-argument with a comms tech. “—lines dead, shield signatures gone, no standard flare, no fallback ping—are you telling me an entire outpost just went quiet and nobody thought to wake us sooner?”

  The tech swallowed. “Sir, the first blackout could’ve been a grid fault. It was the corrupted packet that—”

  Karauro’s voice cut through. “What happened to Vesta?”

  Everyone went still for a moment.

  Argos lifted his head, his one human eye narrowing. “You’re not cleared for this room, boy.”

  “I don’t care,” Karauro said, stepping closer to the table. His hands were clenched so tight the knuckles had gone bloodless.

  Aaron grimaced. “We lost contact. No return on any channel. Last automated relay was… wrong.”

  He thumbed controls. A still frame flickered above the table—a freight lift, red light spilling out, a gurney half in frame. A medic with a cracked visor. Something heavy in a black bag.

  Static crawled across it, distorting the image. A heartbeat later, the feed went white, then dead.

  “That was pulled out of a corrupted stream,” Aaron said. “Audio’s shot. After that—nothing. No comms. No shield readings. Like someone cut Vesta out of the grid.”

  Roy’s jaw clenched. “It could still be a glitch. Something hit their lines, fried their transmitters—”

  “Could be,” Argos said. “Could also be something worse. Onyx command flagged it as ‘high-risk non-responsive asset.’ They want eyes on the ground.”

  He looked at Aaron, then Nera, then Riven. “Unit Seven is taking a recon-haul. You go in, you look, you don’t play hero. You see a horde or anything… wrong, you fall back and report. Clear?”

  Nera’s gut twisted. “Sending him back there right now—”

  Karauro’s voice cut in, sharper than she’d ever heard it.

  “I’m going.”

  Argos’ gaze locked on his. “This isn’t a vote.”

  “You need people who’ve been there,” Karauro said. “Who know the layout. The drains. The blind spots. I do.”

  Roy stepped up beside him. “He’s right. He knows the corridors we fought in. You send anyone else cold, they’ll get chewed before they find the main bay.”

  “And you?” Argos asked.

  Roy shrugged. “Someone has to make sure he doesn’t try to punch a Griever in the face out of spite.”

  A muscle ticked in Argos’ jaw. He turned to Nera. “You were his commander on the first run. Opinion?”

  She wanted to say no.

  Wanted to say he’d only just stopped looking like he was going to step off the railing for fun.

  Instead, she looked at his face.

  No fog. No blank panic.

  Just something carved, hard and cold, beneath the tired.

  “He’ll go whether we sanction it or not,” she said. “Better we keep him in our sights.”

  Argos grunted. “Fine. Aaron, Riven, Roy, Karauro—gear up. You leave within the hour. Nera, you’re staying. Spine needs a commander with functioning restraint.”

  She bit back a protest. Orders were orders.

  Karauro didn’t look at her as he turned away from the holo-table. The projection of Vesta’s outline flickered across his face for a heartbeat—then vanished as he stepped out of its light.

  In the corridor outside, the noise of the briefing room dulled to a distant hum.

  “Karauro,” Nera called.

  He stopped but didn’t turn fully, profile sharp in the cold corridor light.

  She stepped closer. “You don’t know what’s there. Rushing in like this—”

  His eyes met hers then.

  For a moment, the boy from the scaffold was gone.

  What looked back at her was dull and steady, like stone. Whatever light Vesta had put in him had slammed shut, replaced by something slower, heavier.

  Not panic. Not despair.

  Just anger. Focused past her, past Spine, directed at something only he could see.

  “If the ruins wiped them out,” he said, voice low, “then I’m going to see what’s left… and add it to the ruins’ receipt. Paid in full.”

  The words made the hair on her arms stand up. It wasn’t an intimidation.

  It was a guarantee.

  She wanted to step closer, to say something that might pull him back a little—but the look he wore held no trace of invitation for her to do so.

  “Kar—” Nera’s words trailed off as Roy jogged over, skidding to a stop at the look in Karauro’s eyes. The joke he had ready died on his tongue.

  “Easy, kid,” Roy said, softer than usual. “We’re going to check, yeah? Not burn the world down in one trip.”

  Karauro’s expression barely shifted. “It’ll burn whether the ruins accept it or not.”

  He stepped past them, heading for the armory.

  Nera watched his back recede down the hall. The slump was gone; his shoulders were straight, movements controlled. Almost too controlled.

  The void she’d seen in him before had come back—but this time it had edges. Sharper. Hungrier.

  Roy let out a slow breath. “He’s not scared,” he murmured.

  “That’s what worries me.” Nera’s fingers tightened around her own forearm, servos in her cybernetic arm whining.

  She’d wanted him to stop drifting, to stand firm instead of shrinking every time she pushed him.

  Now, seeing what was forming behind that emptiness, Nera wasn’t sure she liked what the ruins were creating instead.