The symbol on the data-slate seemed to burn itself into Kaelen's vision. A holy war. She had stolen a relic, and now she had fanatics to contend with alongside a megacorp. The universe had a truly vicious sense of humor.
"The Echoes of the First," the Curator whispered, his data-eyes dimming as if the name itself required reverence. "They are whispers. Phantoms. They sabotage Vyper operations, disappear scientists, and leave that symbol carved into bulkheads or burned into server banks. They believe the Aetherials—the 'First'—are not dead, but sleeping. That their technology is not for us to use, but to… venerate. You have committed the ultimate sacrilege in their eyes."
"Where do I find them?" Kaelen asked, her voice tight.
The Curator let out a dry, rasping sound that might have been a laugh. "You don't. They find you. And if you are lucky, they simply kill you. There are rumors of… conversions. Of those who have seen the light of their faith and joined their cause." His glowing eyes fixed on her. "I would not recommend it. Fanaticism is a poor substitute for a personality."
He named his price for the clean identity. It was indeed astronomical. It would clean out the rest of her savings, every last gram of platinum and credit she had scrounged over five years of solitude.
She transferred the funds without hesitation. Money was meaningless if you were dead.
The data-slate on the table blinked with a new file. A name: Jax Rylan. A history: a freelance hauler with a record of minor infractions. Biometrics, ship registry, everything. It was a ghost, a shell for her to inhabit.
"It will hold," the Curator said, his interest already waning as he absorbed her payment. "For a time. Now, leave. Your presence is a magnet for trouble, and this establishment has a fragile ecosystem."
Kaelen took the slate and stood. The energy field deactivated as she approached, spitting static. She moved back through the murky, crowded bar, the new identity feeling as flimsy as paper in her mind. She kept her head down, but her senses were on high alert, scanning the crowd not for bounty hunters, but for the quiet ones. The believers.
She was ten meters from the docking corridor that led to the Scrap-Jumper when she saw it.
Etched into the grimy metal of a support beam was a fresh, precise mark. The circle. The jagged line.
It hadn't been there before.
Her blood went cold. They were here. They'd been watching her. The Curator had sold her out the moment she'd left his booth.
She broke into a run, shoving past a group of arguing traders. She had to get to her ship. Now.
A figure stepped out from an access tunnel, blocking her path to the docking clamp. It was a woman, tall and severe, her hair shorn close to her scalp. She didn't wear a weapon openly. She didn't need to. Her posture was a weapon. Her eyes, a piercing, calm grey, locked onto Kaelen's.
"Kaelen Voss," the woman said. Her voice was not loud, but it cut through the din of the station like a laser. "You carry a burden that does not belong to you."
Kaelen didn't stop. She feinted left, then ducked right, aiming to slip past her. A hand shot out, faster than she could track, gripping her forearm with a strength that was anything but human. The grip was like a vice, cold and unyielding.
"The Fragment must be returned," the woman said, her face inches from Kaelen's. There was no anger in her eyes, only a terrifying, absolute certainty. "It is a sacred trust, violated. You cannot comprehend what you hold."
"Let go," Kaelen snarled, trying to pry the fingers loose. They didn't budge.
"You have felt its touch, have you not?" the woman whispered, her intensity burning. "The knowledge it offers? It is a test. A temptation. It offers power to those who would corrupt it. We are the guardians. We are the Echoes. Give it to us, and you may yet be forgiven."
The offer hung in the air. A way out. She could give them the fragment, let them have their holy war with Vyper Dynamics. She could slip away into the identity of Jax Rylan and disappear forever.
The thought lasted for a single, tempting second.
Then she saw the woman's other hand. It rested inside her jacket, and the outline of a neural-disrupter—a weapon designed to incapacitate, not kill—was clear. They didn't want to forgive her. They wanted to take the fragment and then scrub the inconvenient thief from existence.
Kaelen stopped struggling. She went still, her shoulders slumping in apparent defeat. The woman's grip relaxed a fraction, a flicker of satisfaction in her zealous eyes.
It was all the opening Kaelen needed.
She dropped her full weight, yanking the woman off balance, and drove her knee up into the woman's stomach. It was like hitting a block of reinforced alloy. The woman grunted, more in surprise than pain, but her grip loosened.
Kaelen tore her arm free and bolted.
"Thief! Stop her!" the woman cried out, her voice losing its calm and filling with righteous fury.
But this was the Rust Market. People here didn't stop thieves; they got out of the way of trouble. The crowd parted before Kaelen as she sprinted the last few meters to the Scrap-Jumper's docking clamp.
She slammed her palm on the access panel. The door hissed open. She threw herself inside, hitting the emergency seal button. The door slammed shut just as the Echo operative reached it. Kaelen saw a fist, wrapped in strange, metallic knuckles, slam against the reinforced viewport with a sound like a hammer on an anvil. A spiderweb of cracks appeared in the plexisteel.
"Chip! Undock! Now! Full thrusters!" she screamed, scrambling into the pilot's seat.
Alarms blared as the Scrap-Jumper violently disengaged from the station, shearing the docking clamp with a scream of tearing metal. The operative was thrown back into the corridor as the ship pushed away, floating for a moment in the chaotic traffic before being swallowed by the crowd.
Kaelen didn't look back. She pushed the thrusters to maximum, weaving recklessly through the tangled superstructure of the Rust Market, heading for open space.
She had her new identity. And she had a new, terrifyingly powerful enemy.
The fragment in its locker pulsed once, a warm throb against her mind.
…Danger…
It was an observation. A simple, stark fact.
For the first time, Kaelen found herself in agreement with the voice in her head.