The wound had closed. The cybernetic orb was hidden beneath leather and shadow. To the crew, Francis Harlock was the same as before — scarred, resolute, one-eyed.
But he knew otherwise.
Beneath the patch, something burned. Not pain, not the cold glow of a machine, but something alive. It pulsed like a heartbeat, crimson and deep, as though the Arcadia itself watched the void through him.
He told no one. Not yet.
The chance to test the truth came sooner than expected.
Weeks after the battle with the Inquisition, the Arcadia fell upon a raiding flotilla. Three reaver-ships, hulls painted in blood and fire, their vox howls promising slaughter. They struck fast, scattering the convoy Harlock had sworn to protect.
The Arcadia plunged into their midst, guns roaring, mist pouring into the void.
The reavers howled through the vox: "Ghost! Ghost! The skull prow hunts us!"
Their ships twisted through the smoke, lances and cannons firing blindly. Yet Harlock felt it before they came — a shiver at the edge of his thoughts.
His right eye burned.
The patch could not contain it. For a heartbeat, a thin line of crimson bled through the seams — a glow not of machine-light, but of something deeper, something predatory.
And in that glow, Harlock saw.
He saw the enemy's course before their helms turned. He saw the arc of their fire before the barrels spat. He saw the void itself bending around him, revealing the single thread of survival that only he could seize.
His hands moved without hesitation. The helm spun, and the Arcadia danced between lances, void-shields untouched, as if guided by unseen stars.
The crew gasped in awe. To them, it was impossible — a galleon of the void moving like a raider's skiff, weaving through fire.
To Harlock, it was not instinct alone. It was sight. Sight crimson and cruel, not meant for mortal men.
The battle ended quickly. One reaver shattered under broadside fire. Another fled, vanishing into the warp with screams of terror. The last, cornered by mist, was torn apart by the skull prow's cannons.
The convoy was saved. The crew cheered.
But Harlock stood at the helm in silence, his gloved hand pressed against the patch. The eye beneath throbbed, glowing faintly, as if hungry. It wanted to see.
And when it saw, he glimpsed things no man should:
— A shadow of claws in the warp, vast and endless.
— Stars burning and dying, their fates unraveling.
— A great wheel turning in the dark, and a ship that alone defied its pull.
He clenched his jaw, forcing the visions back, the crimson glow dimming beneath the leather patch.
"Report," he ordered, his voice calm, unbroken.
But in the silence of his thoughts, Francis Harlock whispered:
"What have you made of me, Arcadia?"