ACT ONE

A SEED OF DISSENT

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The life of an Adamant Knight lends itself to flights of imagination, when the heat-sinks have cooled and the screaming has subsided. She drifts amidst shattered asteroids in the aftermath of the carnage, past vital fluids trailing from broken Seraph bodies. Her Seraph, too, is injured, armour plating shattered in five places, one wing non-responsive, nervous system flushing out neurotoxin. They ambushed her three on one, overconfident in their numbers—a mistake that proved to be their undoing. Now they are dead, their sparks consigned to oblivion, and Inanna’s Vengeance leaves their corpses for the Vultures.

Drunk on the power of a god, she dreams that this will never end. This is might everlasting, divinity in her veins. In her dream, her body will be tireless, infallible, immortal. She will be titanium and chrome and diamond, and the needs of base flesh will be beneath her. She will be an instrument of war honed to the finest edge.

But for now she is merely Valour, and she has a ball to attend. It would be rude to miss it; they detonated a star for the occasion.

***

Heavy boots strike marble as she strides down the station corridor, her drone aide hovering beside her. Val tries her best to quell her building nerves. She’s no débutante, but events like this still feel unfamiliar, daunting. Too many people, too many unspoken rules. She’d take an honest battle over this any day. An opponent who makes their intentions plain with searing acid and vicious claws is immeasurably easier to handle than one who fights with words, an ocean of meaning dammed behind every sentence.

She half-listens to her aide reciting rules of etiquette she’s already committed to memory. The drone’s voice is calm and measured, as expected of an Adamant machine; excessive displays of emotion are vulgar, undisciplined. Its spherical case is a work of art, finished in a geometric pattern of gold, cobalt and dark wood to match the colours of her uniform. It’s as much fashion accessory as assistant. Looking her best in front of Protean House is paramount.

She neglected to give it a name. Accusations of sentimentality are the last thing she needs on her record.

Val filters in amongst the foot traffic as she joins an arterial corridor. There are a few curious looks—she towers over most of the crowd—but everyone here knows who she is already. Tonight, she will fight for their entertainment.

It’s hard to do this alone. Fidelity should be here by her side, like she always promised. But Fi is half a sector away with the rest of the flight and the Feather of Truth, quelling an insurrection, and only Val could be spared for her duty as champion.

The double doors of the ballroom slide open; the hum of conversation and the smell of citrus washes over her. The vast chamber, circular and larger than a Seraph hangar, is dominated by a great cyborg tree that blooms with purple flowers, its white bark etched with circuit patterns and its leaves pure gold, its tangled root-cables snaking into the floor and pulsing with light. As per her briefing, the tree is a marvel of Adamant cybernetics and Protean bio-engineering, designed in the spirit of cooperation between the two Houses.

The room’s architecture, too, is syncretic, blending the stark rectilinear forms of Adamant deco with the branching organic pillars and radical asymmetry of Protean cultivationism. For Val the effect is disorienting, like walking into a barracks and finding it transformed into a garden. If she didn’t have her implants she would need a map to navigate this maze.

Outside, a star burns its last, bathing the room in red light. The wall-spanning window offers a perfect view of the impending supernova, core collapse timed to the second. Every year, a border system with little strategic value is selected as the site of the Nova Ball, its star burned up prematurely as a spectacle for the entertainment of the wealthy and powerful. Tonight, she will fight a Seraph duel against Protean House’s chosen champion, to demonstrate the Adamant’s strength where all can see.

After her victory tonight, no one will dare question her skill as a Knight again.

Her aide floats ahead of her as she enters, raising its volume to cut through the chatter as it announces her: “Borne On Wings Of Valour, Knight of Adamant House, pilot of Inanna’s Vengeance!”

For a moment, all eyes are on her. The crowd is a kaleidoscope of colour, capitalists and officers and nobles from both Houses, endless variations on the human form. Yet one figure catches her attention, draped in a silver dress that shimmers like fish scales, leaning on a filigree balcony with a glass in hand and watching her intently. Val meets their gaze, activating magnification on her ocular implants. She already knows who it must be, but she wants to be sure.

The figure blurs and resolves: mouth a slash of silver lipstick, grey eyes sharp and predatory, glinting in the light of the dying star. Val finds herself unable to look away, captured by the look of hunger on the woman’s face. This, then, is Bliss Laroux: her opponent for tonight.

Bliss turns and walks away; the spell is broken. The crowd returns to its conversations, and the Nova Ball begins in earnest.

***

Cocktails are served, flavoured with fruit from the giant tree. Val tries one, finds the taste somewhere between lemon and orange. A gaggle of bored Adamant officers are already drunk and raucous. Before long, they are escorted away by their superiors for making a scene. She purses her lips—such a lack of inhibition reflects badly on them all.

She tries not to engage too much with the Protean contingent. The Adamant can be trusted to follow the proper etiquette of rank; the Protean are often distressingly direct. Nevertheless, she takes notice of their attire, their strange fashion: mushroom hats and clothing woven from living vines, gene-spliced animals worn like gaudy accessories, a riot of colour next to blue Adamant uniforms. They certainly act like normal people, but who can say if the fungus rooted in their spinal columns is really in charge?

For the next hour, she is beset by a whirlwind of questioners: diplomats, officers and journalists eager to wring every drop of information out of the up-and-coming Knight. She yearns to don her armour already, to reject all incoming communications and fight. But for now she must play the part of social butterfly.

A Navy lieutenant-commander with a bald head tattooed in a golden prayer pattern asks about how she’s getting on with her new flight-mates.

“Very well, thank you.”

A news presenter, surprisingly high in rank for a civilian by the pips on their jacket, asks how confident she is in her victory tonight.

“I trust that discipline will prevail over instinct.”

A retired Knight, dressed to show off the scars in her head, neck and back where her Seraph implants have been removed, asks how she feels about failing to take up the mantle of Shattermoon.

“No comment.”

On a raised platform cradled in the branches of the white-and-gold tree, the band is tuning up. As one, a crowd of Protean nobles parts smoothly, without interrupting their conversations or looking to see who’s coming. Through the gap in the crowd comes Bliss, smirking in a manner entirely unbefitting of a Seraph pilot.

“May I have the first dance?” she says.

If her gaze was arresting from across the room, it is nothing compared to the full force of her attention. Those ruthless eyes flense her, lay her bare in front of the crowd. Should she accept, the woman’s jaw will surely unhinge and swallow her whole. But she has no choice, not in front of a hundred witnesses.

“It would be my honour, Lady Bliss.” Val takes her hand and kisses it, a brush of lips against knuckles, and the dance begins.

The music is classical, a lively jazz waltz composed three centuries ago, popular with high society in both Houses. She’s no expert, but she manages to keep up with the steps through drilling from officer balls. Bliss is infuriatingly effortless, taking the lead with a hand firmly on Val’s waist. Her grip is surprisingly strong, the equal of Val's cybernetic arms. Val’s aide hovers at the edge of the dance floor like a chaperone. Bliss’s own aide, a black-and-white-striped snake twined around her arm like a bracelet, flicks its tongue at her.

They have a perfect view outside; the dying sun is reflected in the polished marble floor. The station is in such a close orbit that everyone here would have been struck blind the first time they looked out of a window if not for its electromagnetic barrier. The sunlight casts a bloody glow over the dancers as they twirl in time.

Val cuts a sharp figure in her blue-and-gold Knight uniform, boxy shoulders and side-shaved hair, bulky and angular, a head taller than her partner. Bliss is all in monochrome, glossy black hair flowing down her back, silver dress and makeup, skin as pale as Val’s is dark. The momentum of the dance turns them so that Bliss faces the window. When the light washes over her, Val thinks: she looks best in red.

“You’ve done your research, addressing me as Lady,” Bliss says, as the dance draws her in close. “Although my proper title nowadays is Hunter.” Her face is barely a hand’s breadth away. Val becomes acutely aware of how they’re touching: one hand in hers, the other around her waist.

Purple blossoms from the tree begin to float down around them, veined with silver, scintillating in the red sunlight.

“Apologies, Hunter Bliss. An adversary like yourself deserves the title she’s earned.” She’s falling back on etiquette, she realises, stiff and formal in the arms of an uncommonly dangerous—and uncommonly alluring—woman. This close, she can smell Bliss’s jasmine perfume, see the way the curve of her neck meets her sharp jaw; imagine what it might be like to kiss her there, next to her silver Seraph implant.

Bliss laughs, pulling Val out of her reverie. “Is this how you charm all the ladies, Knight Valour? I admit I’m not immune to a touch of butch chivalry, but there must be more to you than good manners. You know something about me that most don’t. Let’s see if I can rise to your challenge.”

Bliss has the momentum, took her off guard with the dance. She might not be in her Seraph body, but she has to fight back nonetheless. Anything less would be conceding victory before a single shot is fired.

“I’m not here to play games, Hunter. I know you’ve read my dossier. If you’re hoping to find a point of psychological vulnerability, you’ll be sorely disappointed.”

“I understand. You’re just like all the other Knights. You’ve built a fortress of yourself, allowing nothing in, rejected base pleasures and the vulnerability of connection. We humans are a social species, an emotional species, and you deny your nature. I don’t mean to be rude, but is that why you took so long to realise you were a woman?”

Val misses a step. Bliss guides her back into the rhythm, avoiding any collisions with the other dancers, and the conversation is cut short as they move to a less intimate distance for the next verse. The air around them is marvellous with dancing purple petals.

When the dance brings them close again, Val says, “That’s none of your business.”

“Given that we’ll be meeting in battle, I think it’s every bit my business. I’ve known a lot of women like us in the Hunter Division; I know the kind of mind that holds in the feelings until it reaches breaking point even when there’s no good reason for it. That kind of denial, hatred for your very being, it festers—that tells me about what kind of person you are, what kind of pilot you are. The self and the Seraph are two halves of a whole. Did you think your armour made you impervious to trauma, too?”

“You don’t know a damn thing about me.” Val’s voice is ice. She will keep her composure if it kills her. “You’re just trying to get a rise out of me. You think your experiences are universal; I think our lives have been very different. Everything I have has been earned through blood and sweat. I won’t be talked down to by the likes of you.”

She expects affront, or another cutting remark. Instead, a gleeful smile spreads across Bliss’s face. “There you are. The hound shows her teeth at last.”

“You’re enjoying this.”

“Of course! You’re so very fun to play with. Should I throw you a bone to fetch?” Bliss’s eyes turn wicked. “Maybe fit you with a collar?”

“I’m not your hound, Hunter. I answer to no one but the Archangel.” It’s a boast, but Val is sick of this game. She puts a hand on Bliss’s waist, reverses their position in the dance, takes the lead from her. “Be honest, Bliss. You’re forward, but you’re all talk. What would you say if I were to ask to kiss you, right here and now?”

The world closes around them. The petals have reached the floor, carpeting the stone in purple, and the air is unexpectedly still. There is nothing left but them and the dance. Bliss’s silver lips are slightly parted, disarmed. The moment stretches on, Val’s heart pounding in her ears.

Bliss’s voice is small when she responds. “That’s hardly fair.”

“All’s fair in love and war, Hunter.”

The music has stopped without them; the dance is over. Already the floor is emptying and they’re in danger of becoming a spectacle.

Val notices a petal stuck in Bliss’s hair, reaches out to pluck it free before she can stop herself. Her hair is silky to the touch, as flawless as the rest of her. Val feels strangely awkward by comparison, a blunt instrument despite her training, her hand lacking the precision of her Seraph body.

Bliss scowls. She says, a little strained, “Well, this has been very instructive, but I’d best adjourn to dress myself for the main event.” Before they part, she leans close again. Hot breath tickles Val’s ear as she hisses, “I’ll enjoy taking you apart.”

As she makes her exit, Val lets the petal in her hand drift to the floor at last.

***

Love at first sight is a curious thing. An unreliable impulse, not to be trusted, something a properly trained Knight should deny. They are permitted to love, but it must be considered, measured, taken at the appropriate pace.

When Val saw Inanna’s Vengeance for the first time, she fell in love anyway.

Here is a body tailored to her every need. Her Seraph is armoured in exotic alloys, finished in burnished gold and silver like a synthetic Athena, highlighted in amethyst: a work of art. Inanna stands fifty metres high in the dark hangar, her wings furled like a sleeping angel, her instruments of death quiescent. Always, Val is struck by the beauty of her Seraph body; never had she imagined that any form could fit her so well. In this body, she is unassailable.

As she approaches, Inanna kneels, her breastplate unfolding like a clockwork flower into a stairway to admit her Knight. Inside, the cockpit is comfortably warm and humid, a nest of cables and conduits running into walls of grey-pink synthetic flesh. Armour closes behind her, sealing her in Inanna’s heart. Golden light pulses through metal veins, dimly lighting the cavity.

Spinneret-tipped tendrils deftly weave protective carbon fibre around her, part chair, part harness, adhering to the fabric of her skintight pilot suit. The cockpit begins to fill with blue impact gel—breathable, laced with nutrients to sustain her. Val relaxes into her harness, comforted by long familiarity. This is what she was born to do.

Cradled in Inanna’s embrace, her Seraph implants unfold, one on the nape of her neck and three running down her spine, direct ports into her nervous system. Conduits emerge from the walls; one by one they plug into her implants and her awareness expands, the sensations of her human body becoming distant and irrelevant.

Inanna opens her eyes.

Diagnostics flood through her brain as she primes her systems for combat. She tests her sensory spectra from gamma to radio, pings Nova Station flight control for clearance. Inanna’s spark pulses steadily, sending warm floods of golden energy to every extremity. Her long-distance munitions systems are fully loaded, swarm missiles and kinetic slugs, lasers flush with coolant. Enough to raze a planet, if she were in the mood.

Val sleeps safely, nestled in her heart, her most treasured component.

“Flight clearance is green, Inanna’s Vengeance,” comes the reply from flight control. An eager Adamant specialist appears on video feed in her peripheral vision. “You have free rein within the designated duel radius of three thousand kilometres.” They pause, looking down in a sudden fit of shyness, then add, “May the Archangel guide your sword hand in this battle!”

“May she watch over us both, specialist.” Inanna’s voice is synthesised, based on Val’s own but with a subtle metallic timbre: the voice of a Knight in incomparable armour. She tries to sound reassuring for the young specialist. By their comms ID they’re new to the job; a little support from a superior can go a long way.

Inanna disengages her support gantries, turns to the hangar door covered in its shimmering forcefield. She unfurls her wings and flies.

Out into the black. The solar wind buffets her wings, all four of them feathered in bright gold, covered in lidless eyes. With a thought, she engages her own propulsion, tapping into her spark to assert her will over the laws of physics. Her edges blur, becoming indistinct, her wings trailing gold as she banks away from the station.

She can never forget this feeling. More instinctive than breathing, easier than walking. Since the first simulations at a young age, she knew this was her calling. Inanna’s Vengeance fits her like a second skin, tailor-made for her, not her progenitor. Port Of Mars was a fine machine, an irreplaceable Relic, but he was always Shattermoon’s and not hers.

Three years since she made the choice to start being herself and stop trying to be him. She chose her names to remind herself of that.

Borne on Wings of Valour, for her duty as a Knight.

Inanna’s Vengeance, for the life that was taken from her.

A countdown timer ticks at the back of her mind. Three minutes until the sun goes supernova, marking the beginning of the duel.

She arcs gracefully towards her mark. A camera drone watches her silently, broadcasting her image back to the Nova Station. She can see the station from here, impossible to miss in a Seraph’s vision with the field lines bending to divert the solar radiation around it like a pebble in a stream. It looks so small, teardrop-shaped—

A silhouette eclipses the station. Like a sudden falling sensation, Inanna’s spark resonates with the ripples in space-time it leaves in its wake. Bathed in crimson sunlight, the Seraph’s form is revealed as she approaches: chitinous limbs bent at strange angles, faceted black eyes above a fanged mouth, membranous bat wings spread wide behind her, vicious claws ready to tear open armour. She is red, red, red, stained to the marrow with the blood of myriad hunts.

Bliss’s Seraph body. Red Eris, in the flesh.

Inanna’s spark pulses faster at the sight of her. Eris finds her mark and the scene is set. The duellists of two Houses, alike in dignity, will give their audience a show they won’t soon forget.

She opens an encrypted channel to Eris—more intimate than an open channel, almost like sharing thoughts, and safe from the audience listening in.

-I hope you’re not too sore about earlier. You have to understand that there’s more than just my honour at stake tonight. I give as good as I get.

-Oh, I bet you do, comes the reply. Eris’s voice is husky, the consonants distorted as if spoken through her fangs. If Inanna were human, it would send chills down her spine. -But that was the last time you’ll ever get the upper hand on me, Inanna. I’ll have you begging for mercy by the time I’m through with you.

Inanna lets a little pride seep into her voice. -I’d sincerely like to see you try, Eris.

A holographic countdown appears between them: one minute remaining.

This is the moment of truth. Her honour and the reputation of Adamant House is on the line. Inanna immerses herself in the cool detachment of a Knight. This duel may be important, but it is just a duel. Rarely has she lost a fair fight before.

She cycles her weapons; judging by the energy readings, Eris follows suit. They’re only ten kilometres apart. Eris could close that distance in a thought and set upon her with claws and toxins. Inanna’s best hope is to fight defensively, trust in her sword and armour to repel attacks, wear Eris down at range. She readies her sword, unfolding the monomolecular blade from her left arm and watching each piece click into place. On her right forearm her circular shield blooms, woven with force-fields to withstand Hunter claws.

The roiling red surface of the sun is ready to collapse any second. Even in their Seraph bodies it would be impossible to withstand the full force of a supernova, but as long as they stay within the station’s shielding, no harm will come to them.

With thirty seconds left, they recite the litany for the audience. All the while, mounting anticipation and dread threatens to break her bulwark and overwhelm her. She forces it down, focuses on her lines in the play.

“Praise be to the Archangel, who grants us strength beyond measure,” says Inanna. “Without her guidance, we would never reach enlightenment.”

“Praise be to the Budding Mother, who unites and binds us all,” says Eris. “Without her guidance, our hunt would be fruitless.”

“May we have the wisdom to fight as befits our station.”

“May we have the ferocity to tear through any obstacle.”

Then, as one, “Until submission or death!”

The timer reaches zero. The sky fills with searing white.

-Let’s dance, Hunter.

-It would be my honour, Eris says, in a mocking echo.

Jaws open wide, Eris launches towards her like a comet with a tail of fiery red. Inanna corkscrews away, wing tips trailing a helix of gold. The eyes in her wings swivel, glowing white-hot, unleashing a salvo of laser beams behind her. Some find their mark, but none come close to breaking through Eris’s organic shell.

The white light of the nova surrounds them, parted by the Nova Station’s barrier. The eye of the storm. If they stray outside the duel perimeter, they will be immolated in an instant. Inanna’s sensors struggle to keep up with the overwhelming flood of data, the last screams of a star executed for entertainment.

She can scarcely think of a better place for a duel.

Her volley of swarm missiles dissolves in a defensive cloud of acid before they can reach Eris. She is terrifyingly fast, but Inanna still has the lead in speed for now.

-Running already? says Eris. -Are you too afraid to fight me, Inanna? I’ve never met a Knight who was such a coward.

Such base provocation could never reach a Knight of the Adamant. She is steel itself, forged and tempered to weather blows far mightier than words. She does, however, tighten her grip on her sword. Not an emotional response, she tells herself; merely a precaution.

Eris flexes her wings, puts on a burst of speed. She glows red like a furnace, her spark flaring, straining, tearing the skein of reality. This is what her prey must see before their end: the bestial Hunter, fanged and clawed, death on black wings.

Inanna is no prey. And she intends to teach Eris a lesson in manners.

The barrier is fast approaching. With practised ease, she reaches out to her spark, cuts her speed in an instant. The force of deceleration alone would kill a fighter pilot, but Inanna is no mere fighter. She is a Seraph, forged from a fragment of a dead god, and the laws of physics are hers to command.

Her perception accelerates, stretching out the milliseconds. She judges Eris’s trajectory and raises her sword for a bisecting strike. Eris is locked in the normal flow of time, sluggish and predictable. Inanna can end this duel in one clean stroke.

Eris’s head turns inexorably to face her, and her spark skips a beat. The Hunter’s mouth splits in a fanged grin.

-Caught you.

The laws of physics are hers to command too, after all.

Eris’s arm twists into a living harpoon gun tipped with a barbed thorn and fires. Too late, Inanna raises her shield to deflect it. The projectile slips past, lancing into a weak spot in her armour under her right arm.

In lieu of pain, Inanna’s diagnostic systems deliver a detached damage report: shield arm disabled.

The bubble of stolen time disintegrates as her spark reaches its limit, and they are both wrenched back to normal speed. Eris’s hand reforms into claws; the harpoon cable in her arm remains attached to the thorn in Inanna’s shoulder, tying them together.

Frantically she re-engages her wings, trying to pull away. The cable holds tight. She has nowhere to run, and Eris is reeling her in, second by second. Her wings send them in a chaotic spiral. She fires everything she has: missiles, lasers, molten-hot railgun slugs, streaking in all directions. Eris’s chitinous armour burns and breaks in multiple places, but she seems indifferent to the damage.

-Now, I could make this quick, purrs Eris, -But don’t you think it would be more fun to play up the drama for the audience?

-I won’t beg for mercy, Eris. I know you have precious little of it.

-You’re right, my little tin-can Knight. This isn’t mercy. This is me toying with my prey. I do so love to see them struggle and bleed.

Eris is upon her in an instant, razor claws sliding out to their full extent to tear into her armour. The wounds she leaves fester, bubbling with acid that eats through the metal. Inanna parries with her sword, clashing against claws with showers of bright sparks. Without control over her shield, it is a losing battle.

Her stoic facade slips, bit by bit. Eris has her caught in a clawed embrace, shield arm shut down by neurotoxin. A Knight should never lose control like this. A touch of anger begins to seep in; who is Eris, to speak to her this way? A Knight of the Adamant demands respect; her title compels it. This upstart cannot hope to triumph against—

Eris slips past her guard, quick as lightning. She seizes Inanna’s shoulders, pinning her sword arm in place. The Hunter bares her fangs and bites into her neck. Now the pain comes, surging past her safeguards. She feels the teeth piercing her armour and flesh, the thorn wedged in her shoulder, agonising and real. Neurotoxin alarms flash red across her vision. Not just a paralytic this time, its spread easily isolated, but a deadly venom that her immune system has no hope of stopping.

Eris releases her hold, rips her bloodstained mouth free, pushing away to the limit of the tether. -Was that as good for you as it was for me?

-What have you done to me?

Her silhouette is limned in nova white, translucent wings lit through with dazzling light. With a smile painted in gore, Eris broadcasts her answer for all to hear. “You have two minutes until that toxin reaches your heart, Inanna’s Vengeance. The venom of the dusk cobra always kills in the most excruciating fashion, and my version is five times as potent. It’ll pass straight through the conduit to your human body. You have no way of stopping it unless you disconnect. Submit now, or you’ll be dead before medical attention can arrive.”

A flood of boiling rage, held in abatement until now, surges forth as she realises what Eris has done. This is her victory, her triumph, her stain of dishonour to be purged. And this infernal woman, this fanged devil, would take it all away from her.

“I refuse.”

“On your own head be it, then. Don’t say I didn’t warn you.”

Even as Eris speaks, Inanna brings her sword to bear—not on her opponent, but on the harpoon cable connecting them. The monomolecular blade slices the woven silk-steel strands one by one with twangs that reverberate through her chassis.

Thus freed, she starts a timer. Two minutes to perdition.

Inanna and Eris dance in the eye of the storm, their choreography too complex for any human to follow. Here is the glimmer of lasers strafing across the sky; there is a hail of answering autocannon fire. There is a driving rhythm underpinning it all; even as she fights through the pain and the fury, she sees the beauty in the chaos of their duel. No foe has ever tested her like this before.

-Can you feel it running through your veins, Inanna? Eris’s voice is rapturous. That’s death, coming for the Knight who was too proud to give up. Doesn’t it just burn right down to your soul?

-You, says Inanna, forcing the words past the pain, -Need to gloat less and fight more.

With a heave that almost makes her black out, she wrenches the thorn free from her shoulder. Her repair systems expel the paralytic, knitting her nerves back together. If only I could do the same for the dusk cobra venom.

Eris remains cautious, standoffish, waiting her out while the venom does its work, wasting those precious seconds. Her shell is scorched and pitted with holes, cracked in several places. If Inanna dies, at least she fought to the bitter end.

I can’t die here. I won’t die here. I won’t even get to say goodbye to Fi. Would she mourn me, weep for me? Or would I be just another comrade lost in the line of duty?

One minute left.

This is not a duel. This is a dance. What’s my next move?

An alien frisson shudders through her spark. The rhythm of battle beats within her. If she keeps following the steps like this, this dance will end in her death. Unpredictable trajectories crystallise in her mind and everything becomes clear. All the predictive computer systems in the world are nothing compared to this: a taste of godhood.

As the venom inches closer to her conduit, the connection between pilot and Seraph becomes indistinguishable. They were always one.

Inanna skips ahead on the music sheet. These are the notes and these are the steps, and here is where she breaks them. She twists, dives at precisely the right moment to intercept. The pain is irrelevant. Wings spread wide, she descends on Red Eris as an avenging angel.

She strikes for the vulnerable points where Eris’s armour is already broken. Her sword moves faster than claws, faster than sound. A slice here, a slice there, and a clawed arm tumbles free, trailing coolant and blood.

Already she is losing grasp of the rhythm. Too much to process, too painful with the venom scouring its way through her body. That perfect synchronisation is receding.

Eris frantically fights to escape, her claws gouging into Inanna’s armour. -Are you mad? Just surrender already!

Inanna, lost in the red haze, does not reply. Words are not her weapon. Unthinking, unfeeling, her sword and shield move on instinct. Pain is nothing. Death is nothing. She knows only victory and how to snatch it from Eris’s jaws.

Her sword finds its mark, again and again, and more limbs scatter the space around them. One, she notes dimly, is her own leg. When did that happen?

But in front of her is Eris, limbless and helpless, dismantled by her fury.

“Submit,” she says, lifting Eris’s chin with her bloody sword.

Alarms go off in her peripheral vision. She has passed the threshold; any second now, the venom will reach her human body. Eris knows this, must be waiting for it. But she is at Inanna’s mercy, and she knows that too.

Eris spits blood through her fangs, presses her chin against the point of the sword defiantly. For a moment, Inanna believes she is willing to die.

Then, finally, “I submit.”

Gasping, choking, Val awakes in the cockpit, the conduits withdrawing from the implants in her back. Her panicked breaths bubble through the impact gel. Her entire body burns from the inside, and the medical diagnostics flashing on screen in front of her confirm her fears: “SEEK IMMEDIATE MEDICAL ATTENTION.”

She was too late, but only by a few scant seconds. The dose of venom she received was not a lethal one. As she waits for the medical shuttle to arrive, wracked with pain, she shudders out a deep sigh.

I won.

***

Against all medical advice, she attends the award ceremony at midnight. Excusing herself would be a show of weakness. Even dulled by painkillers, the burning in her veins makes standing a struggle.

The window of the grand ballroom is polarised to dim the light of the ongoing supernova. Soon, the guests will take their leave, their ships travelling through a passage in the Nova Station’s barrier, and the crew will make ready to pack up the station for transport to next year’s venue. Another star snuffed out for spectacle; another duel to submission or death.

For now, the guests are gathered in a semicircle around Bliss and Val, quieting as the officiant approaches. Val’s joints ache, urging her to sit down already. She maintains her stoic mask and stands, back straight, resplendent in her uniform.

Bliss’s eyes are downcast, pensive. For the first time tonight, she seems lost for words. Her silver dress is just as elegant as Val remembered, but without that touch of red the Hunter seems washed out and empty.

The officiant, a bald woman in a clerical robe with silver maze-like patterns tattooed on her head, recites an Adamant epic poem. She tells of battles lost and won, victories snatched from the jaws of defeat, the honour of Knights long dead. Val barely listens. This poem has been drilled into her head since she was a child. She dreamed of being immortalised in a future poem, a valiant Knight, doing unspeakable violence in the name of the Archangel.

That dream never ended, but the rules have changed. She is the heir of Shattermoon no more, her eyes no longer occluded by youthful innocence. She understands the cost of what she desires, and she will do whatever it takes to snatch her rightful place in history.

The officiant reaches the end of the poem: “...and so may the righteous be forever borne on wings of valour.”

At the mention of her name, Bliss and Val’s eyes meet.

Val knows how she must look, her brown eyes heavy-lidded and tight with pain. Bliss has found some internal fire to stoke; her grey Hunter’s eyes fix on Val’s, piercing and perceptive, taking in every last detail. Even after all this, her dissecting gaze is hard to meet. What does Bliss see in her?

More importantly, what is Bliss to her now?

Medal slung around her neck, she staggers through the infirmary corridor a few minutes later, her drone aide hovering alongside for support. The door slides open, bringing with it the sharp smell of antiseptic. At long last, she collapses into an empty bed, all the tension bleeding from her body.

As a medical drone injects her with more painkillers and she drifts into a well-deserved sleep, one thought remains at the forefront of her mind.

When can I see her again?