Chapter 20 Rhea
RHEA
I’m three sips into a lukewarm stimbrew when the galaxy cracks open again.
It starts with a chime. Just one. Soft, innocuous. My compad pings like it’s got a weather alert, maybe a storm cell rolling through a dead zone. But my gut—the same one that told me Argus’s file wasn’t noise—twists hard. I glance at the screen and freeze.
Trending: Blastaar’s Secret Romance?
Photo: Galactic Gladiator Caught Cuddling Mystery Child
My stimbrew clatters onto the console. Splashes across my thigh. I don’t feel it.
Because right there, plastered in ten thousand pixel clarity, is Valtron.
In his arena casuals. Shirt tight enough to worship his biceps, a synth-wrapped box of sweet cubes in one hand, and in the other—Ripley.
My daughter. Our daughter. Her tiny arm looped around his neck, her face buried in the curve of his collarbone like that’s where she’s always belonged.
The caption under it reads: “Who’s the little mystery girl? Fans speculate on Blastaar’s softer side.”
I bite my knuckle to keep from screaming.
“Rhea?” Kaelor leans in from the other room, one cybernetic eye blinking a slow diagnostic blue. “You okay in there?”
I don’t answer.
I can’t.
I pull up the source. Some junior producer with more ambition than brain cells had clearly been lurking outside the sweets vendor. Probably waiting for Valtron to flex or curse or give them something juicy. Instead, he picked Ripley up like she was spun sugar and kissed the top of her head.
And now the whole fucking Holonet knows.
I’m on my feet before my brain catches up. The room spins, but I shove my legs forward, pacing the narrow corridor of the bunker like I can outrun the fallout.
My anonymity—gone.
I grab the compad and open my emergency contacts. Third one down: Marla Vex, ex-fed, now doing private security consulting for those of us who didn’t plan to be famous.
She answers in half a ring.
“Rhea Hart. Never thought I’d see your name pop up again. Trouble?”
“Code Cyan. I need extraction protocols for a minor.”
A pause. “Jesus. That serious?”
“Worse. Someone found Ripley.”
Her breath hitches. “I’ll start scrambling. Any location I need to scrub?”
“Daycare,” I rasp. “She’s at StellarSprouts off of Fifth. Her ID’s under ‘Keely Hart.’ Pull her. Now.”
“I’m on it.”
I hang up. My hands shake so hard I almost drop the compad.
Footsteps thunder down the metal hallway. Then Valtron’s there, filling the doorway like a walking war crime in sweats and a half-zipped tactical vest.
“I saw,” he says, breath ragged. “I was on a maintenance call when it hit the net.”
“You held her in public.” My voice comes out strangled. “You—you let someone see her face.”
His jaw ticks. “She asked for sweets. She begged. I didn’t think—”
“No,” I cut in, hands slicing through the air. “You didn’t think. You never think. You just react. Claws first, questions later. You promised me—we agreed—no photos, no slipups, no shows of affection in public!”
“I didn’t think it was affection,” he growls. “I thought it was normal.”
I want to hit him. I want to kiss him. I want to crawl out of my own skin and scream until the vacuum of space takes me whole.
“She’s not normal, Valtron. She’s mine. Ours. And now her face is plastered across every datafeed from here to the fucking Trade Spiral.”
He flinches like I shot him. “I didn’t mean to—”
“I don’t care what you meant.”
Silence coils between us. Thick. Acidic.
Kaelor peeks in. “Not to break up the very spicy domestic, but the arena execs are pinging. Hard. Management wants a sit-down interview to ‘shape the narrative.’”
Valtron snarls. “They can go suck my tail.”
Kaelor glances at me. “You?”
I’m already pacing again. “If we don’t get ahead of it, they’ll spin it for us. You think they won’t turn Ripley into some sob story or a goddamn merchandising opportunity?”
Valtron shakes his head. “They can’t force us—”
“They won’t have to. Public opinion will. You’re a celebrity. And I…” I trail off. “I was the anchor who vanished. They’ll dig. They’ll sniff. And when they find out I’m not just your ex-fling—when they find out she’s your kid—”
He’s across the room in two strides. His hand lands heavy and warm on my shoulder.
“Then let them find out,” he says low. “Let them try. Let them know I have something worth fighting for.”
I shove him off me. “You don’t get to be noble now.”
His voice hardens. “You think I don’t care? That I haven’t had to stand on a stage and flex and smile and pretend like I wasn’t wondering every second if you were alive? If she existed? If I made it all up?”
I blink fast. My throat closes.
Kaelor slinks out, muttering something about “too many feelings” and “needing a stronger firewall.”
I sit hard on the edge of the cot. My knees buckle too fast to argue.
“She was safe,” I whisper. “She was safe until today.”
Valtron crouches in front of me. His hands don’t touch me, but they hover. Ready.
“She still is.”
I shake my head. “You don’t know that.”
“I do.”
The silence drips down the walls like oil.
I press my palms to my eyes. “We’ll do the interview. Keep it calm. Keep it vague. No names. No details. Just... enough to stop the wolves from howling.”
He nods once.
Then stands.
And just like that, we’re moving again.
The studio’s private room smells like nerves and sanitizer.
I tug the collar of my blouse up. Smooth the wrinkles. A stylist offers powder, and I wave her off.
Valtron sits beside me, dressed down. No armor. No theatrics. Just a plain black shirt and the faint bruising on his temple from training drills.
Ripley is with Marla. Guarded. Safe.
For now.
The interviewer, some overly polished android with a voice like syrup and a smile tuned for maximum empathy, leans in.
“We understand there’s been speculation. Can you clarify the relationship between yourself and Gladiator Blastaar?”
Valtron’s shoulders flex. I speak before he can open that beautiful, infuriating mouth.
“Yes. We had a past. Years ago. We were involved. It was brief, intense... complicated.”
“And the child?”
I inhale. Let it out slow.
“Her name is Ripley. She’s my daughter.”
A pause.
“Is Blastaar her father?”
Another breath. “We’re... figuring things out. There’s a lot of history there. But our priority is her safety. Not spectacle.”
The android tilts her head. “You vanished from media. Was that related?”
I blink. “No comment.”
She smiles like I just told her where the bodies are buried.
“Understood.”
The rest is noise. PR talking points. Carefully chosen language about boundaries, family, and the difference between public lives and private truths.
We finish in fifteen minutes.
Valtron doesn’t say a single word.
He just holds my hand under the table, his thumb tracing circles over my knuckles.
When we walk out of the studio, he squeezes once.
I let go.
And I try to believe the worst is over.
But I know better.
It happens three hours later.
My compad glitches.
Not the normal kind. Not the drunk-UI kind.
The Combine kind.
A line of text flashes before the screen darkens:
“Query accepted. Target profile match: R. Hart. Unauthorized offspring confirmed.”
My blood runs ice cold.
They know.
The Combine knows.
And now they’re hunting again.