The Cobalt Fleet Command Station hangs motionless in space—
a colossus of steel, crouched in silent anticipation, like some ancient beast waiting to strike.
Its innards twist into a labyrinth of metallic veins, where each corridor pulses with the breath of forbidden knowledge.
The cold that lingers isn't physical.
It's the cold of defeat—of dread worming its way beneath the skin.
In one of the laboratories, silence reigns—
a shrine to experimentation.
Two capsules, held in place by magnetic clamps, encase the motionless forms of Ragnar and Veronika.
Their bodies lie still, but somewhere inside, a final spark of will still flickers.
Their minds—
the last bastion of resistance.
The scientists wear black gloves and no faces.
They move like phantoms—efficient, surgical.
Their fingers dance across panels, triggering pulses, adjusting settings.
Attempt after attempt—
to erase memory,
to dissolve the self,
to blur the soul until all that remains is obedience.
But again and again—
failure.
Something within those biomechanical bodies refuses to break.
A glimmer of rebellion glows beneath the ash.
They cannot be overwritten.
They cannot be made to kneel.
This isn't just machinery.
It's belief.
It's memory.
It's love.
Things no algorithm can touch.
And just when it seems that all thought is lost—
that only shells remain—
Ragnar and Veronika plummet downward,
into the abyss.
And the worlds of Osori's vault consume them once again.
Reality vanishes.
**
They stand in the heart of a city—
alien, towering, majestic, like the dream of some ancient titan.
The sky is dark, and the stars do not flicker.
The buildings rise like river stones carved into curves, polished by time.
They stretch toward the heavens—
where space itself begins to throb with cold.
Figures drift between the structures—
beings with silver skin, clad in tarnished bronze armor.
Their movements are slow, almost ritualistic—each step steeped in centuries, in forgetting, in power.
This place does not belong to them.
It is too old.
Too distant.
Its scent is the dust of epochs,
and the echo of a dead star.
Ragnar stands taut. His eyes scan the alien skyline but find no anchor.
What is this place?
A prison?
An illusion?
A message?
"This isn't the way," he mutters, voice low and raw. His fists clench until the joints creak.
"We're trapped in shadows. We need a sign. Someone alive. Someone who remembers who we are."
Veronika is beside him.
Her voice is like ash brushed across glass—fragile, but threaded with hope.
"Then call for them.
Call someone who walked with us.
Someone who wouldn't run."
Call?
In Ragnar's mind, faces flare and fade—charred silhouettes of comrades lost in solar fire.
All is darkness.
All dissolving.
He almost lets go.
Almost reaches for the void—
Then—
a flash.
A face, breaking through the curtain of untime.
Captain Manuel.
The one who resisted.
Who turned his ship away.
Who plunged into fire.
Ragnar's head snaps up—
and the space around them shudders.
He appears.
Alive.
Solid.
Staggered—like a child waking in the wrong body.
Manuel turns in place, drinking in the cityscape.
His gaze darts, unfocused, frightened.
The gold of the towers reflects in his eyes like fire caught in glass.
"Where am I…?" His voice is hoarse, as though it had weathered a storm.
"I… ran. Someone… someone was calling me..."
Ragnar smirks—lopsided, bitter, relieved.
"Do you recognize me, Captain?"
He steps forward.
Not a threat.
A challenge.
Manuel blinks.
And then—recognition.
Slow, like sunrise after a sleepless night.
"You… you're the Inquisitor. Now the Admiral..."
He exhales.
"You tried to take my ergon."
Ragnar shrugs.
"Times change. Ergon's just dust now."
He grabs Manuel by the shoulders, pulls him close.
"What matters now is survival. Together."
Manuel flinches.
His face tightens, eyes reflecting the shape of ancient fears.
"Why am I here?" he whispers.
"Because we need you," Ragnar says firmly.
"We attacked the station. They captured us.
They're trying to rewrite us.
Erase us."
Manuel freezes.
His lips tremble.
His eyes glaze over.
"That's… impossible. You should have died."
"We're holding on," Veronika interjects. Her voice burns with solar fire.
"But we won't last long."
Ragnar meets Manuel's gaze.
"Send word.
To Vikar.
To Jamal.
Tell them we're still here.
We didn't surrender."
Manuel says nothing.
His face contorts with silent war.
Something gnaws at him.
Doubt?
Fear?
Guilt?
"They… they're aboard my ship," he says finally, voice low, heavy.
"What's left of the fleet.
We saved them."
Ragnar's expression flickers.
Hope.
But in the very next moment, Manuel steps back—
as if terrified by his own truth.
"No!" he shouts, suddenly. "I won't tell you anything!"
His voice cracks like a gunshot.
The air around him turns cold.
Ragnar freezes—
as if struck in the chest.
The world pauses.
"Why…?" His voice is low, barely believing.
"Because I don't know who you are anymore!" Manuel stumbles backward, eyes wide with fear. "What if you've already been rewritten? What if this is all a trap?!"
He doesn't believe me…
He's afraid of me.
"You've lost your mind!" Ragnar takes a step forward, heartbeat pounding in his temples.
"Stay back!" Manuel shrieks. Panic crashes over him like a wave. His face twists, paralyzed by fear.
It's all unraveling so fast...
Veronika grabs Ragnar's arm—tight—keeping him from taking another step.
"He's leaving!" she whispers, trembling, her voice heavy with despair.
Ragnar's body coils like a predator before the leap.
Inside—rage, sorrow, a scream with nowhere to go.
"Tell them!" he roars.
His voice tolls like a bell above an abyss.
"We can link our minds! We can build an army inside the worlds of Khanaris!"
But it's too late.
Manuel vanishes—
melts into the shimmering haze.
The world collapses like a house of cards,
leaving them alone again—
in silence.
In nothingness.
**
A jolt.
A gasp.
Manuel snaps awake—back in the captain's chair aboard the Skif.
Everything is familiar: the consoles, the lighting, the soft hum of the ship.
But he—he is no longer the same.
Something inside him is burning.
He leaps up, as if struck by lightning.
His eyes blaze, his heart hammering.
"I saw them!" he shouts.
Loud—almost cracking his voice.
Pietro and Maria turn.
Their faces are tense, wary.
"Who did you see, Captain?" Maria steps forward, her voice taut.
Manuel struggles to find the words.
"Admiral Ragnar," he rasps. "And his team. They're alive.
They're prisoners."
At that moment, the door bursts open.
Chairman Vikar storms into the bridge.
His face tight with tension, eyes blazing.
He looms over Manuel—
a shadow cast by an eclipse.
"Where?!" he growls.
"Where are they?!"
"They called me," Manuel stammers. "In the realm of Khanaris. But I… I panicked. I broke the link…"
Silence.
Thick.
Absolute.
Vikar stares at him.
His eyes—ice.
Then, without looking away, he turns to Pietro.
"Lies," he hisses.
But Pietro doesn't blink.
He stands like a wall.
"No," he says firmly. "We can prove it."
Maria steps closer.
Gently—almost with a mother's touch—she takes Vikar's hand.
Her gesture carries confidence, but no pressure.
"Trust us," she whispers. "We'll teach you how to enter.
You'll see them for yourself."
Vikar doesn't respond.
His expression is clouded with skepticism.
But inside—
hope coils.
Flickers.
Struggles to surface.
At last, he nods.
Slowly—
like an android stepping into flame,
but without fear.
Maria guides him softly into the chair.
Her voice becomes a hypnotic thread, weaving into the depths of his mind.
"Relax…" she says.
"Let go of the fear…"
And somewhere deep beneath the steel vaults of the station,
an ancient beast holds its breath once more.
It senses something vast approaching.
This is only the beginning.