Thalyn Ka’el remained in the ancient throne as it returned to its upright state, her breath shallow from the weight of her experience.
Across the chamber, Korr Draven and Dr. Elara Voss leaned over a strange artifact, their voices like sharp blades cutting through the quiet. Korr, in his worn suit, turned the device over in his hands, his beady eyes bright with an almost feverish intensity. “It’s a scanner,” he muttered, as he ran his fingers along its edges, feeling for hidden seams, a scavenger with a prize. “It diagnoses something, but what?”
Elara watched him with a slight smile, her misty blue face a mask of calm, her fingers tapping lightly against her thigh. “We’ll figure it out,” she said softly. The earlier scans had been a mess, a jumble of data, unreadable even to Korr’s keen eyes.
Thalyn pushed herself up from the throne, wincing as the familiar ache pulsed through her legs, her muscles tight and unyielding. She moved closer, drawn by the hum of the device in Korr’s hands, the low drone filling the space between them. Korr glanced up, eyes flicking over her face as if searching for answers in her expression.
“Thalyn, let me try this on you,” he said, holding the scanner out, his fingers twitching, eager.
She hesitated, looking at the dark screen, then nodded. “Go ahead,” she said, hoping her steady voice didn’t show unease. The scanner clicked, a thin line of light tracing her form.
“Something’s different.” Korr’s brow furrowed, his focus narrowing to a point, eyes locked on the shifting glyphs. “Your scan… it’s not like ours.” He turned slightly, not fully away, muttering as he adjusted the device, mind still engaged.
Thalyn took a step back and let her eyes roam the chamber.
A hiss broke the silence.
The sealed door behind them, groaned and came open. Ancient mechanisms shuddered to life with the sound of grinding stone and pneumatic breath. The sentinel drone stood in the opening, haloed by dim light. It had not moved since when they fled the guardian.
Now it moved. Its head tilted. Optics flared.
“You are welcome to remain, mistress,” it said. “As long as you wish.”
Then, with a grace at odds with its frame, it turned and retreated into the shadows of the corridor beyond, vanishing from sight as the door drew closed behind it with a soft hiss.
Before any of them could speak, footsteps came fast on stone.
Commander Hurst burst in, his breath ragged, mask hanging loose at his belt. “What happened, Elara? Why the call?”
Elara pointed to the door. “The droid. It opened the way. Spoke to her.”
He looked at Thalyn. “Spoke to you?”
“Said we were welcome. Called me mistress.”
He stared at her. Then stepped to the door, opened it. Darkness beyond. He leaned in, looked as if expecting something to look back. Then stepped away and shut it.
“Well?”
“I don’t know,” she said.
Korr had straightened, the old scanner hanging loose in his hand. “Maybe the scan triggered it.”
“The droid didn’t move until you pointed that thing at Thalyn,” Elara said. Arms folded. Her eyes sharp. “Maybe it recognized something in her.”
Thalyn shook her head. “Doesn’t matter. It happened.” Her jaw set, then eased. “I’m fine.”
The silence that followed was brittle.
She stepped from them. The droid’s voice still echoing in her mind. She looked at the throne, to the cascade of memories Arvie had poured into her mind.
“Whatever,” she said. “Arvie filled me in after I woke.”
“Top-tier upgrades, it seems,” she continued. “Fast healing, heightened senses, adapting to that damn fog out there. But she couldn’t pin down my race. Said I didn’t match anything in her database.”
Elara’s brow lifted. “Not in her database?”
Thalyn shrugged. “Arvie’s wired into my skull. She can control droids, hack systems, but she needs Neurolink repaired to be at full strength. And there’s a diary in my head, recording everything since I woke up, full sensory playback.” Her lips twitched, a brief smile. “Like me now,” she added, her voice softening.
Hurst moved off, muttering. Set down his gear with a clatter on the shelf. “I’m getting some sleep.”
He glanced at Thalyn once more. Then slipped behind the curtain into the makeshift restroom and was gone.
She watched him go. Her face unreadable. Then turned to Elara.
“I saw him,” she murmured. “In the mirror. Tall, lean. Hair like smoke in twilight.”
She paused.
“His face, sharp, calculating. Edges clean. Skin with a kind of glow. But the eyes… green like mine, but deeper, like they could see through you, see everything.” Her voice dropped lower, almost a whisper. “Nothing like the Ezollaid.”
Korr’s head jerked up, his face suddenly animated. “I might’ve heard of a race like that,” he said. “Tall, ethereal, revered by the divines. Druvvak, they’re called. Almost mythical, barely more than a rumor.”
Elara’s violet lips curled into a thoughtful smile. “A race so rare, yet treasured by the divines. There’s a kind of poetry to that, isn’t there?”
Korr’s eyes flickered. “If Echo was Druvvak... then everything changes. Why was he there?”
Thalyn felt the chill slide beneath her skin. She turned, looked again at the throne, its metal frame still gleaming with an otherworldly light.
“Only one way to know,” she said, stepping forward.
She eased herself into the throne’s embrace, felt its cold touch spread across her back. The crown hovered nearby, waiting. With a deep breath, she set it on her head, the cold metal pressing into her temples.
As the chamber dissolved into darkness, Arvie’s voice slipped into her thoughts, light and teasing. “Be ready,” it whispered, a laugh lingering at the edges. “To be captured, interrogated, and abducted.”Thalyn closed her eyes as the world began to fall away, the present slipping like water through her fingers. She felt the pull of the past, its grip tightening as it began to come alive again. With a final breath, she let herself go.
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