Mars Time: 16:16, March 2, 2295

  Phoenix's Nest, Dock Bay 55, Phoenix District, Xing Hong

  Dilinur led them through restricted passages that descended below the administrative palace, past security checkpoints staffed by Blackcoats who snapped to attention as the Prefect passed. The corridors grew rougher as they went deeper: unfinished rock replacing polished stone, industrial lighting replacing elegant fixtures.

  Sigrun kept pace near the front, her suitcase dragged and rolling on its wheels behind her. The divination blocks were still in her memory, that clear ringing note when they'd struck the marble. She didn't believe in any of the Thousand Gods. She'd told herself that for eleven years. But something had happened in that chamber, and she wasn't sure what to do with it.

  Ahead of her, Haylen walked rigidly, her black greatcoat swaying with each step. The Senior Sergeant hadn't looked at Sigrun since leaving the temple.

  She's going to be a problem, Sigrun thought. Not now. But eventually.

  They passed through a chamber that made her slow her steps.

  A massive archway stood against the far wall, over sixty meters tall at least, its frame carved from some black alloy that seemed to drink the light. Devavā?ī script spiraled up its surface, the characters dormant. No power hummed through it. No glow. Just dead metal, waiting.

  Sigrun studied it as they passed. The shape reminded her of old holos she'd seen as a child, back when the Jotunheim Institute of Europa—the school she and Ivar had attended—still stood. Nirboh ruins. To hear Ivar say, the Nirbohs were an ancient species that had vanished before humanity even learned to write.

  "A Tether Arch," Xin said beside her. His glasses reflected the structure's bulk. "I've read about these on the Extranet. Nirboh tech. They say paired Arches can transport you across light-years instantaneously, if they're functional."

  "This one sleeps," Dilinur said without stopping. "Its partner location remains unknown. Perhaps one day we'll wake it." She glanced back. "But that's a matter for another time."

  Sigrun looked over her shoulder as they left the chamber. The Arch stood silent. Waiting for a partner that might be buried under rubble somewhere, or floating in debris, or simply lost to time.

  Eleven years.

  Eleven years of Radi-Mon hunting. Eleven years of men who paid to use her body and walked away without looking back. Eleven years of clinic visits and Medi-Vap and counting every Atomic Dollar twice. Eight hundred sixty-seven thousand, three hundred. Still not enough. Never enough.

  And somewhere beneath Xing Hong, there was a door that could have taken her home in seconds. If it worked. If anyone knew where it led.

  If, if, if.

  Her feet stopped moving before she realized it.

  "Sigrun?" Xin's voice came from beside her. He'd stopped too, H?kon peering at her with confused beige scales.

  She stared at the Arch's dark frame, jaw tight. All those nights she'd lain awake calculating. How many more bounties. How many more clients. How many more years until she could afford passage back to Europa, back to the place where Ivar had died so she could run.

  And the whole time, this thing had been sitting here. Asleep. Useless. A cosmic joke with no punchline.

  "Sky Lady sad?" H?kon asked quietly.

  "No." The word came out harder than she meant. She made herself look away from the Arch. "Just remembering that the universe doesn't give a damn about fair."

  Xin didn't offer platitudes. Didn't try to make it better. He just stood there, close enough that she could feel the warmth of him, and waited.

  "Hey!" Jabari's voice echoed down the corridor. "Ship won't wait forever!"

  Sigrun exhaled slowly. Let the bitterness settle back into the place where she kept it, deep and quiet.

  "Coming," she called back.

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  They turned away and kept walking.

  They emerged into a cavern that stopped her cold.

  The dock bay stretched before them like a cathedral. Support pillars rose toward a ceiling lost in shadow, veined with conduits that pulsed faint blue. Maintenance gantries crisscrossed the space at multiple levels, staffed by Alliance Riggers in pressure suits.

  And there, suspended in the cavern's center by magnetic clamps, was the ship.

  Sigrun had seen plenty of vessels in eleven years. Cargo haulers. Mining transports. The occasional military corvette passing through Xing Hong's restricted airspace. She'd learned to assess them the way she assessed everything else—threat potential, escape routes, structural weak points.

  Whatever this ship was called…it was something else.

  Over a hundred meters of angular white-blue hull, its silhouette all sharp edges and modular plating. The design mixed many things together: weapons hardpoints visible beneath sealed covers, armor plating thicker than any cargo ship needed, sensor arrays bristling from the forward section.

  A loading ramp extended from its belly to the cavern floor, where that siege tank Xin and H?kon had piloted during the siege last month—the Genbu—already waited in its transport cradle. The armored transport looked almost small against the vessel that would carry it.

  "Big Sky Fish!"

  H?kon's chirp echoed through the cavern. His scales shifted to brilliant azure, radiating excitement so intense Sigrun could feel the warmth from where she stood.

  "Big Sky Fish! Big Sky Fish!"

  "That's an Orca-class heavy transport," Xin said, his voice strange. Hushed. He'd stopped walking entirely, forcing Jabari to sidestep around him. "I've only ever seen them in schematics. The dual fusion drive configuration. The modular cargo bay system. The magnetic field stabilizers on the hull—you can actually see them from here—"

  "Breathe, Rigger." Jabari clapped him on the shoulder. "Ship's not going anywhere without us."

  "You don't understand." Xin's hands had started moving, gesturing at components Sigrun couldn't identify. "I used to study these designs when I was at ZenFu. Dreamed about working on one someday. The engineering is beautiful. Every system feeds into every other system, redundancy on top of redundancy—"

  Sigrun let him talk. She was busy cataloging other things.

  Exit points. Two visible from here, plus the passage they'd entered through. The gantry workers moved with practiced efficiency, which meant they'd done this before, which meant the Prefect had used this bay for other departures. The Blackcoats at the checkpoint hadn't asked questions. Standard protocol, or something more?

  And the ship itself. Those sealed weapons hardpoints. The armor plating. This wasn't just a transport.

  What else are you prepared for, Prefect?

  "Big Sky Fish," H?kon repeated, as if this settled everything. He'd scrambled from Xin's shoulder to the top of the rolling suitcase, craning his tiny neck to take in the full scope of the vessel. "We go inside Big Sky Fish?"

  "We do," Dilinur confirmed. "All of us. For the next three weeks."

  A man stood at the base of the loading ramp, data pad in hand, running through what looked like a pre-flight checklist.

  Sigrun assessed him automatically. Late thirties. Novian features. Clean-cut in a way that suggested military background or someone who'd learned to imitate it. Dark hair kept regulation-short, strong jaw, brown eyes that tracked their approach with professional calm. His uniform was crisp: dark fabric with gold trim, epaulettes marking certification grade, buttons fastened correctly.

  A man of discipline. The kind of face that made passengers feel safe.

  But Sigrun had learned not to trust faces like that. They were usually hiding something, or they were exactly what they appeared to be. Both required watching.

  "Good to see you, Prefect Altai." The Novian man inclined his head as they approached. "Diego Rodriguez. I'll be flying you to Venus."

  "Mister Rodriguez." Dilinur stopped before him. "The ship is prepared?"

  "Yes, the Polaris is ready when you are. Ran full diagnostics this morning, topped off the Zephyrium reserves, checked the atmospheric seals twice." His accent carried traces of old Earth Spanish softening certain consonants. "Not the newest bird in the fleet, pero she's reliable. Treat her right, she brings you home."

  "That is all we ask."

  Diego's gaze moved across the assembled group, cataloging faces the same way Sigrun had cataloged his. When his eyes reached H?kon, they lingered.

  "Huh," he said. "Don't see many of those. Think the last one I met was on one of Jupiter's moons. Before the Fenris pendejos came."

  "His name is H?kon." Xin's voice carried a defensive edge.

  "Wasn't complaining, amigo. Just observing." Diego made a note on his data pad. "Cargo manifest says we've got one Diabolisk. Wanted to make sure the life support could handle his metabolic requirements." He glanced at Xin. "You're the Rigger, sí? The one who modified the Genbu's targeting systems during the siege?"

  Xin blinked. "You heard about that?"

  "Word gets around. Xing Hong isn't exactly a big city." Something like respect flickered in Diego's eyes. "Good work, though. Kept a lot of people alive that night."

  Sigrun watched the exchange. Diego hadn't looked at her yet. Most men did, sooner or later—the ample woman with sapphire eyes and blonde hair, the figure she'd learned to weaponize, the face and body that had launched a thousand paid sex appointments, the hands that had slain hundreds of monsters and men. And somehow, Diego's attention had gone to H?kon, then to Xin.

  Interesting. Either he was genuinely professional, or he was smart enough to know that looking too long at the wrong woman could get him killed.

  Thomas approached from the direction of the Alliance personnel, his bionic arms gleaming under the cavern lights. Behind him, Sigrun could see the others gathering: Vanguards in white composite armor running equipment checks, Riggers securing cargo containers—and of course, Doctor Nikki directing the loading of medical supplies.

  "We're squared away on our end," Thomas said to Sigrun. "Vanguards are aboard, Riggers have the secondary systems online. Good ol' Doc's got the med bay configured. Ready when you give the word."

  From beside them, Dilinur nodded. "Then let us board."