Tynrax
We set up two kilometers from the ruins.
That puts us one and a half kilometers past the relay station, as far as we can get while still having access to the equipment.
The equipment sprawls across portable tables.
Power conduits. Diagnostic scanners. Fabrication tools.
Everything we need to repair the coupling system.
Everything except certainty that I can maintain control long enough to complete the work.
“Ready?” Aris asks. She’s standing next to me, scanner in hand. Watching me instead of the equipment.
“As ready as I’ll be.”
I can already feel the pull. Faint but present. Like a frequency just at the edge of hearing that grows louder the more I focus on it.
“Talk to me if you start feeling it,” Aris says. “Don’t wait until it’s bad. Tell me immediately.”
“I will.”
“Promise me.”
I look at her. She’s serious. Eyes locked on mine. Determined. “I promise.”
She nods. Steps back to give me space. “Okay. Let’s see if distance helps.”
I focused on the relay diagnostics, pulling up the schematics on my datapad. The primary coupling needs complete replacement. Secondary coupling requires reinforcement. Three support struts need stabilization before we can safely channel power through the system.
Standard repair work. I’ve done more complex tasks in worse conditions.
But never while fighting an amplification field that wants to tear my consciousness apart.
I start with the diagnostic assessment, my hands moving with practiced familiarity over the controls. The work is a comfortable rhythm, a shield against the low hum building in the back of my skull. But the shield is thin.
Before long, my hands begin to shake. Just slightly at first, but it’s enough. The pressure behind my eyes intensifies, a physical weight pushing against the inside of my skull.
“Tynrax.” Aris is suddenly closer, her voice sharp. “Your markings are pulsing irregularly.”
I glance at my hands. She’s right. Violet traces snake across my skin, brighter than they should be. “I’m managing it.”
“Talk to me. What are you feeling?”
“Pressure,” I force out, my focus locked on the fabrication readings. The coupling is nearing completion, and I can’t stop now. “Like something’s trying to push into my head.”
My hands shake harder. I grip the edge of my tablet to steady them as the pressure spikes, sharp enough that I flinch. My markings flare, a burning heat along my temples.
“Your eyes are starting to glow,” Aris warns.
“‘I know.’ The word came out distorted, my voice not my own. “I can finish this.”
Suddenly, the coupling assembly makes a high-pitched whine. Wrong. The power regulator is overheating. If it fails, the component is ruined.
My vision fragments—the equipment, the ruins, the interface that shattered me—all overlaid in a dizzying cascade. I reach for the controls, my hand shaking too badly to grip the tool.
“Tynrax, stop!” Aris’s voice cuts through the chaos. “Stop right now!”
“Can’t,” I rasp. “Component will fail.”
Then her hands are on my shoulders, forcing me to look away from the equipment and at her.
“Look at me. Focus on my voice.” Her face fills my vision. Real. Solid. “You’re here with me. Aris. Stay with Aris.”
The pressure doesn’t stop. It builds, cracking the walls of my training. My markings blaze so bright they hurt, my eyes burning with violet light.
“I can’t...” The words barely form. “It’s too strong.”
“Yes, you can.” Her hands frame my face, palms against my cheeks. Warm. Grounding. “Stay with me. Right here. Don’t let it take you.”
Her touch. The pressure of her hands, the warmth of her skin.
It cuts through the interference from the ruins, a focal point to hold onto as everything else fragments.
I focus on the details of her face: the freckles across her nose, the red highlights in her hair, the way she’s biting her lip because she’s worried but trying not to show it.
“That’s it,” she says quietly. “Stay here. With me.”
My hands find her wrists, gripping too tight. An anchor. The only thing solid enough to keep me from dissolving into instinct.
Slowly, the glow in my vision fades. The pressure recedes, humming at the edges but manageable again. My eyes clear. The violet light dims, my markings settling to a faint glow.
Aris is still holding my face, and I’m still gripping her wrists. We were so close I could feel the warmth from her skin, see the frantic pulse in her throat. She’s scared.
But she didn’t run.
“That was too close,” she says, her voice shaking slightly.
“You brought me back,” I say, my voice rough. Scraped raw. “You anchored me.”
“I don’t know if I can do that again. That was...” She trails off, her thumb moving slightly against my cheekbone. “You were almost gone.”
We’re still holding each other, neither of us pulling away yet.
I should let go, maintain professional distance. But her touch is the only thing keeping the pressure at bay, the only point of stability in the chaos.
“Aris.”
“Yeah?” I almost don’t catch her whisper.
“Thank you.”
She nods, then slowly pulls her hands away. I release her wrists. We step apart.
The space between us feels wrong. The pressure immediately builds again, though not as intensely as before.
I turn back to the fabrication unit. The coupling is complete, but the power regulator is partially damaged. We’ll need to repair it.
“I couldn’t maintain control long enough,” I say, stating the obvious. “The pull from the ruins is too strong.”
“Then we need a different solution.”
“Yes.” She closes her scanner, not looking at me. “We do.”
We gather the equipment in silence, the failure hanging between us. My wrists still feel warm where she held them. My face still remembered her touch.
This is dangerous. Not just the ruins, but this. The growing awareness. The way my markings respond to her, the way her touch grounds me in a way that has nothing to do with science.
We’re professionals. That’s all this can be.
But as she bends over a supply case, hair falling from its knot, I remember waking with her head on my shoulder. How calm my markings were. How right it felt.
“Ready?” she asks, straightening.
“Yes.”
We walk back to the ship, the relay unrepaired, the colony’s power dropping. Christmas is in two days, and we’re no closer to a solution.
Back at the ship, Aris heads for the medical bay and the database. I should inventory our supplies, but instead I sit across from her and watch her work.
“It can’t be this hopeless,” she mutters, scrolling frantically. “Some method I’m missing.”
“Aris.”
“Not now. I’m close. I can feel it.” Her voice is strained, exhausted. “Empathic anchoring, neural patterns, physical proximity... I have to find it.”
I stand and place my hand over hers on the interface, stopping her. She looks up, her eyes red from the screen.
“You need rest,” I say.
“I need answers.”
“You need rest first,” I insist. “The answers will come when your mind is clear. We’ll be useless in thirty-six hours if we don’t rest now.”
She wants to argue, but she’s too tired to fight. “Fine. Three hours.”
“Deal.”
She stands, swaying slightly, and I steady her with a hand on her elbow. The contact is brief, professional, but the connection is still there. That sense of rightness.
She feels it too. I can tell by the way she looks at my hand before pulling away.
“Three hours,” she says. “Then we figure it out.”
She disappears into her cabin. I stand alone in the medical bay. The data screens offer no solutions, only silence. The ruins might kill me. But this thing growing between us might be more dangerous.
I can fight the ruins’ influence. Fighting the ruins’ influence was one thing; the pull toward Aris was a different kind of force, one I had no training to resist.
And I don’t know if I want to.