The words did not leave her head.
Existential threat.
They sounded too large to belong to one person.
Aria stood in the docking bay long after the screens went dark. The other Starborn slowly returned to their duties, but the atmosphere had changed. It was no longer tense in the way of battle. It was heavy in a way that felt personal.
She had not just drawn the Core's attention.
She had been classified.
She looked at Kael.
"Is that normal?" she asked quietly.
"No."
The honesty again.
He never softened truth for comfort.
"What happens to existential threats?" she asked.
"They are erased," he replied.
She let out a slow breath.
"Erased how?"
He held her gaze steadily.
"With everything the Core has."
There it was. No space left for illusion.
She folded her arms around herself, not because she was cold, but because she needed something solid to hold.
"I did not ask for this," she said again, though it sounded weaker now.
Kael's expression shifted slightly.
"You activated a relic. You survived its bonding. You bent a warship. Whether you asked or not is irrelevant to them."
"That is not what I meant."
He paused.
"Then what did you mean?"
She met his eyes, and for the first time since leaving Sector Nine, her composure cracked.
"I did not ask to become a reason for people to die."
Silence settled between them.
The docking bay had mostly cleared now. Only a few remained, giving them distance without fully leaving.
Kael stepped closer, lowering his voice.
"War existed before you," he said calmly. "You did not create it."
"But I accelerated it."
"Yes."
The word hurt more than if he had denied it.
She turned away and walked toward the edge of the docking platform, staring out at the curved interior of the hollowed asteroid station.
Ships moved in quiet preparation.
Defense systems adjusted.
People were mobilizing because of her.
"I fix engines," she said softly. "I was supposed to live small."
Kael came to stand beside her.
"You were hidden," he corrected.
"Stop saying that like it makes this easier."
He did not respond immediately.
After a moment, he said, "The Core labeling you as an existential threat means something very specific."
She looked at him again.
"They do not escalate that classification unless predictive models show future destabilization at systemic levels."
She blinked.
"That is not comforting."
"It should be."
She frowned.
"Explain."
"It means you are not just powerful," he said. "You are unpredictable to them."
She stared at him.
"That sounds worse."
"For the Core, unpredictability is chaos. And chaos is what they fear most."
She thought about the fleet adapting mid-battle. The way the cruiser shifted focus entirely onto them.
"They are learning," she said slowly.
"Yes."
"And they are learning me."
"Yes."
A chill moved down her spine.
"Then they will adapt to counter whatever I do."
"Eventually," he agreed.
She exhaled slowly.
"So what do we do?"
"We evolve faster."
The simplicity of it almost made her laugh.
"You say that like it is easy."
"It is not."
They stood in silence again.
Across the docking bay, the older woman from earlier approached.
Her name, Aria had learned from passing whispers, was Lira Sen.
Lira stopped in front of them.
"The Core has issued internal mobilization orders across three sectors," she said calmly. "They are not retreating. They are repositioning."
"For a second assault?" Aria asked.
"For something more precise," Lira replied.
Kael's jaw tightened slightly.
"Targeted strike."
Lira nodded.
"They will not waste fleet resources again until they understand her limits."
Her.
Aria swallowed.
"So they will test me," she said.
"Yes," Lira answered plainly.
Kael turned toward Lira.
"Prepare inner shield layers. Rotate civilian population deeper into core corridors."
Lira hesitated slightly.
"And the relic?"
Aria looked up sharply.
"The relic bonded," Kael said evenly.
"Yes," Lira replied. "But that does not mean it cannot be studied."
Studied.
Aria felt something inside her tighten defensively.
"I am not a lab subject," she said before she could stop herself.
Lira's gaze sharpened.
"No. You are an asset."
The word hit harder than an existential threat.
Kael stepped slightly between them.
"She is not an object."
"She is the most valuable strategic variable we have," Lira replied.
"And she is a person," he said quietly.
The tension between them was subtle but unmistakable.
Aria looked from one to the other.
"Is this how it works?" she asked. "You rescue me from one system so I can belong to another?"
Kael met her eyes.
"You do not belong to me."
"Then what am I here?"
His answer came without hesitation.
"Because if you were not, you would be dead."
The truth of that silenced her.
Lira studied them both for a moment before speaking again.
"The Core avatar appeared directly to her," she said. "That has never happened before."
Kael's eyes narrowed.
"Yes."
"That means they are prioritizing psychological mapping."
Aria frowned.
"What does that mean?"
"It means," Lira explained calmly, "they are not just measuring your power. They are measuring your responses."
Aria felt exposed suddenly.
"They want to understand what pushes me."
"Yes."
"And then they will use it."
"Yes."
The simplicity of their answers was exhausting.
She turned away again, staring at the interior star map projections along the walls.
She felt it then.
A subtle pulse in her chest.
Not fear.
Not adrenaline.
Something else.
Like a distant echo calling outward.
She pressed her palm lightly over her sternum.
Kael noticed immediately.
"What is it?"
"I do not know," she whispered.
The pulse grew stronger.
A faint pressure, but not painful.
It felt directional.
She turned slowly toward one side of the docking bay.
"That way," she murmured.
"What way?" Lira asked.
"There is something there."
Kael studied her carefully.
"Show me."
They moved together through a corridor branching off from the docking platform. The lights dimmed as they descended deeper into the station's interior.
The further they walked, the stronger the pulse became.
Aria's breathing slowed unconsciously.
It felt familiar.
Recognizable.
They reached a sealed chamber door guarded by two Starborn sentries.
Kael gave a small nod, and the door opened.
Inside, the room was circular and quiet.
In the center floated a structure suspended in a containment field.
Aria stopped in her tracks.
It looked like the relic she had touched.
But larger.
Much larger.
This one was the size of a human torso, its surface marked with flowing luminous lines that shifted slowly like living constellations.
The pulse inside her chest responded immediately, intensifying.
She stepped forward without meaning to.
"This is our core relic," Lira said quietly. "It has not activated in over a century."
Aria's breath caught.
The suspended relic flickered faintly as she approached.
Kael watched her carefully.
"Do not touch it," he warned softly.
She did not plan to.
But the air between her and the relic felt charged.
Alive.
Her own heartbeat synced strangely with its glow.
The containment field shimmered.
"That should not be happening," one of the sentries muttered.
Aria raised her hand slightly.
The relic responded.
Light pulsed outward from its surface.
The containment field flickered violently.
"Step back," Lira ordered.
But Aria could not move.
The pull was not physical.
It was resonance.
The relic's light surged suddenly, and a wave of energy rippled outward.
The entire chamber trembled.
Kael grabbed her shoulders firmly.
"Aria. Focus."
She forced her breathing steady.
The pulse inside her aligned.
The relic stabilized.
The light dimmed back to a steady glow.
Silence filled the chamber.
Lira stared at the relic in disbelief.
"It has been dormant for one hundred and twelve years," she said softly.
Aria lowered her hand slowly.
"I did not activate it," she whispered.
"No," Kael said quietly.
"It recognized you."
The weight of that settled heavily.
Existential threat.
Relic activation.
Fleet assault.
The pieces were aligning into something far bigger than rebellion.
Lira looked at Kael.
"If she can awaken dormant relics…"
Kael finished the thought calmly.
"Then the Core's prediction models were correct."
Aria looked between them.
"About what?"
He met her eyes.
"You are not just a variable in this war."
Her pulse quickened again.
"Then what am I?"
His voice lowered.
"You are a catalyst."
Before she could process that, every light in the chamber flickered.
A new signal forced its way through station defenses.
Not a fleet projection.
Not an avatar. A new transmission forced its way through the station's defenses and filled the air with a single image.
Sector Nine.
Her old dockyard was burning. Flames swallowed the metal platforms she had worked on for years, and Core insignias hovered above the destruction like a signature.
Beneath the image, one line appeared.
Compliance remains an option. Aria's breath left her completely.
They were not escalating randomly.
They were sending her a choice.