The evac ship rumbled steady beneath their boots—rising through the lower atmosphere, engine hum a low growl like a sleeping beast.
The trio sat in silence for a while.
Not out of discomfort.
But ritual.
Warmachines were made to breathe quiet between wars. Let the noise live in the battlefield. Let silence keep you alive after.
Mitus broke it first.
MITUS (hesitant):
"You ever… I mean—when you were younger…
Did you ever wonder if it'd be like this?"
Maverick didn't respond immediately.
He sat across from Mitus, resting a massive arm across one knee, helmet clutched loosely in his grip.
MAVERICK (low, even):
"Didn't have time to wonder.
Was born into fire.
Trained in shadow.
Deployed before I knew the meaning of silence."
MITUS (quietly):
"I still dream of peace.
Even if I've never seen it."
Maverick tilted his head. A breath escaped him—not quite a sigh, but a sound carved from memory.
MAVERICK:
"I used to.
But the longer you live in war, the more peace starts to look like death wearing a mask."
Mitus looked down.
MITUS:
"So what do we fight for?"
Maverick stared at him for a moment longer. Then leaned forward just slightly.
MAVERICK:
"We fight…
So you can ask that question again tomorrow."
Mitus didn't reply. But his eyes said enough.
It wasn't clarity.
It was acceptance.
⸻
Valkar stood at the far side of the transport bay, arms crossed, visor darkened, but listening.
He turned finally, speaking without drama.
VALKAR:
"Still remember your first kill, Maverick?"
MAVERICK (dry):
"Which century?"
VALKAR (almost smiles):
"I mean the one that made you realize this wasn't just survival.
That you were made for this."
Maverick leaned back slightly, eyes narrowing.
MAVERICK:
"Eastern trench line. Forty miles from home.
Beast twice my size.
It grabbed my commander. Ripped his legs off mid-sentence.
I charged with a half-burnt blade, no ammo left.
Didn't stop until the thing's face was paste."
He paused.
MAVERICK (softly):
"When it died…
I didn't feel triumph.
Didn't feel fear."
VALKAR:
"What did you feel?"
Maverick stared at the floor a long moment.
Then looked up.
MAVERICK:
"Nothing."
Valkar nodded like he understood.
VALKAR:
"That's when you knew."
Maverick gave the faintest nod.
MAVERICK:
"That I wasn't human anymore."
The hum of the engines deepened—reentry initiated.
SYSTEM VOICE:
"Touchdown in T-minus thirty seconds."
Mitus looked between them both.
MITUS:
"Do you ever miss it?"
Maverick turned his head.
MAVERICK:
"Miss what?"
MITUS (shrugging):
"Being human."
Maverick stood slowly. His massive frame creaked with scarred steel.
MAVERICK:
"No."
He walked to the ramp doors.
MAVERICK (flat):
"But I miss what it felt like to care about it."
⸻
The ship began its descent.
Lights flickered. Dust swirled.
Maverick stood at the ready, helmet locking into place.
Behind him, Valkar and Mitus rose as well.
No more questions.
Only the storm they carried with them.
___________________________________
The war-table room was darker than usual.
Only the central hololith glowed—pulsing dimly like a heartbeat in the dark. The curved walls around it were lined with cracked stone and scripture lit faintly from below, casting long shadows across the chamber.
Maverick stepped inside.
His boots echoed.
Behind him, Valkar and Mitus followed—silent, armored, scarred from battle. The weight of their most recent mission still clung to them like soot. Fitus had not joined them this time. He was still in the training halls, burning rage into repetition.
The Primortals stood around the war-table in their usual ring, half-machine, half-memory. Their robes swayed in invisible wind, the tubes from their backs whispering secrets into their spines. And at the center of the table, projected in jagged detail:
Nothing.
The hololith was blank.
For now.
Maverick stopped before it. His helmet retracted, revealing eyes like burned steel—calm, but storm-hidden.
Primortal Sovel stepped forward, his voice a metallic thread wrapped in formality.
"Report."
Maverick's tone was blunt.
"No intelligence recovered. Mission site was a failed research facility. Technology stripped. Nothing worth extraction."
Sovel tilted his head. "Nothing?"
Maverick's eyes narrowed. "That's what I said."
Behind him, Valkar crossed his arms. Mitus shifted slightly, glancing at the Primortals.
Another Primortal—Primortal Veyris—spoke, his tone less ceremonial, more pointed.
"And yet… something returned with you."
The war-table flickered.
And then it displayed it.
A projection of the orb.
Small. Obsidian. Etched with faint runes that shifted when looked at directly. It spun slowly in midair above the table, rotating like a dark planet around a gravity only it understood.
Maverick's jaw locked.
He did not speak for a long moment.
Then:
"That orb wasn't recovered on this mission."
Sovel nodded, slowly. "We know."
Maverick turned his head. "Then you know where it came from."
Veyris took a step closer to the table. "We retrieved it from your quarters."
Valkar stiffened. Mitus's head snapped toward Maverick.
"You entered my room," Maverick said coldly.
"It was necessary," Sovel replied.
"It was theft."
"It was prophecy," Veyris said.
Maverick stepped closer to the table, the muscles in his shoulders tense. His voice was quiet but iron-hardened.
"You sent me to die on Xorta. And now you claim prophecy for stealing what I bled to retrieve?"
"We didn't send you to die," Sovel said.
"You carved my name in the memorial before I returned," Maverick replied. "Don't insult my intelligence."
Mitus moved slightly, his voice soft, uncertain. "That orb… is from Xorta? The one you spoke of?"
Maverick didn't look at him.
Valkar spoke instead, his voice heavy. "I've seen relics. That's not just data. That's memory. Pain wrapped in shape."
"It is more than memory," Veyris said.
The orb flared.
A sound—like voices trying to scream through water—filled the chamber. Brief flashes of light danced across the walls: images of slaughter, of black fires, of a massive shape in the void turning slowly toward something smaller.
Then silence.
Sovel's voice lowered.
"Maverick… we placed that orb on Xorta centuries ago."
Everything stopped.
Maverick's breath caught—not from fear. From recognition.
Mitus stared, horrified. "You… what?"
"We seeded it there," Sovel continued. "Long ago. Before even you were deployed. The planet was lost, but the orb was left. A memory trigger. A failsafe."
"Failsafe for what?" Valkar asked, his tone dark.
"For him," Veyris said. "For Maverick."
A long silence followed.
Maverick's voice was a low growl.
"What… did you intend it to do?"
Sovel's answer was measured. "To awaken what you buried."
Maverick slammed his palm into the war-table.
The entire structure shook. The orb projection blinked out. Several Primortals recoiled as the stone beneath the table cracked slightly.
"You know nothing of what I buried."
Sovel didn't blink. "We know enough."
Maverick leaned forward, eyes burning into him.
"Say it."
Sovel didn't speak.
Veyris did.
"You left a brother behind once."
The words struck like gunfire in silence.
Maverick said nothing.
Valkar turned his head, stunned.
Mitus looked between them, lost. "What—what do they mean?"
The war-table flared again—this time not with images, but with a name.
"ARMATUS – UNIT 000"
Maverick's hands curled into fists.
"He was the first," Sovel said. "Your first true comrade. The original Warmachine, before the protocols stabilized. You were his second. And when he fell, you…"
"Enough," Maverick said.
"You left him," Veyris pressed. "And we believe that orb, in proximity to the horrors of Xorta, has begun to awaken those… suppressed sequences."
Valkar stepped forward, his voice low with warning. "You planted a psychological weapon in our brother's mind. That's not strategy. That's treason."
"We ensured survival," Sovel replied calmly. "We forged him to endure. But even steel must crack before it reforges."
Maverick said nothing.
The room held its breath.
Then, he turned to Mitus.
"I'm fine."
Mitus nodded, but didn't look convinced.
Maverick turned back to the Primortals.
"You took what wasn't yours. You used me without consent. And you dare claim it was prophecy?"
Sovel tilted his head. "Would you deny what it's shown you?"
Maverick's eyes narrowed.
"I've seen ghosts long before your orb tried to whisper them back."
Then he stepped back from the table.
"Do not enter my room again."
He turned.
But as he reached the threshold of the chamber, Sovel's voice followed him:
"Face it, Warmachine. The past you hide will consume you. Better to confront it now—before it bleeds into the field."
Maverick stopped.
Then said nothing.
And walked out.
Mitus and Valkar followed, silent.
The chamber remained still.
And the orb, though deactivated—
—still pulsed in the minds of those who dared look too long.