Kara sat in the command chair, her boots braced against the supports in the Driftknight's microgravity. Her gaze locked on the data stream pouring from Akiko's suit, telemetry lines dancing like fire across her screen.

It had taken an hour of hell, but the dragonlings were finally peeling off, drawn to the Sovereign's bulk and gunfire like moths to a flame.

This was their window.

"Quinn, adjust heading—122.4 by 36.8," Kara ordered, voice clipped and calm. "Smooth. I don't want us kissing an asteroid because someone sneezed."

"Copy that, Captain," Quinn replied, fingers already moving. The RCS hissed gently, easing the Driftknight onto Akiko's path, threadbare and narrow as it was.

Kara's eyes flicked between displays. The route Akiko had mapped through the anomaly was a tightrope. A delicate balance with unknowns on either side.

Her fingers tapped an uneven rhythm against the console. Then she froze.

Red-shift.

"Quinn," she said, sharper now. "Maintain course, but prep for evasives. Akiko's data's showing distortion. Gravitational drift."

He turned. "Grav distortion? What kind?"

"The kind that makes my teeth hurt."

She leaned in. The shifts were dynamic, subtle pulses just wide enough to break a course and snap a ship in two.

Akiko's telemetry hadn't just mapped a corridor. She'd mapped a moving minefield.

"Lila," Kara called, glancing back toward engineering, "how's the frame holding?"

Lila didn't miss a beat. "Still in one piece. But I wouldn't punch it through here unless you're ready to weld the ship back together with prayer and scrap metal."

"Copy," Kara muttered. She didn't need the lecture. The Driftknight wasn't rated for this. No salvage ship was. But Akiko had made it through.

Kara stared at the data stream again. Akiko's suit telemetry was degrading, bits fragmenting at the edges. The deeper they went, the worse the signal got. As if the suit's systems were struggling to comprehend what they were flying through.

She didn't like that.

"Eyes open," Kara ordered. "If these distortions jump mid-course, we jump too."

The bridge lights dimmed slightly as the anomaly's glow filled the viewport, tides of light rippling across the asteroid field. Akiko's route still shimmered on the nav, thin and treacherous. But the deeper they followed it, the more Kara felt...

Something. Watching. Waiting. No, not paranoia. Instinct. Then came the shudder. A low vibration through the deck, followed by a groan in the hull, metal complaining under unfamiliar rules.

"Report," she barked.

"Localized stress," Lila replied. "Still green, but not for long."

Kara's eyes flicked to the empty acceleration couch near the bulkhead. Akiko's seat. Usually occupied, usually infuriating. Empty now.

She stared at it for a beat too long.

"Little fox," she murmured under her breath. "You'd better be staying alive in there."

She turned back to the screen. The anomaly's heart loomed ahead.

"Quinn," she said. "Ease us in. Keep us within retrieval range. If this goes sideways, I want the Driftknight close enough to grab and run."

Quinn nodded, hands steady. "Understood. We're almost through."

Kara didn't respond.

The mountain loomed ahead. Jagged, immense, silhouetted against the anomaly's pulsing light like the ribcage of a buried god. Kara's grip tightened on the chair's armrests as the Driftknight eased forward.

"Bring us in slow," she ordered, voice clipped. "No sudden moves."

"Understood," Quinn replied, hands steady on the thrusters. The RCS hissed in short bursts, guiding the ship into the maw ahead.

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Kara's eyes stayed locked on the viewport. The cavern's entrance swallowed light, black stone glinting with crystalline veins that pulsed like a heartbeat.

Akiko flew through this? Alone?

"Lila," Kara called, "status on the hull?"

"Still holding," Lila answered. "But these surges are twisting our stress thresholds. If they spike again…"

Kara didn't need her to finish.

The ship slid inside.

The moment they breached the threshold, Kara felt it. That tug in her gut, subtle at first, then unmistakable.

"Quinn. Do you feel that?"

"Yeah," he said, fingers twitching over the controls. "Localized gravity field. But it's hugging the floor. Mid-cabin and up, we're still floating."

"What's causing it?"

"No idea," Lila cut in. "There's no planetary mass here, but it's acting like one. Could be another effect of the anomaly, or the mountain itself."

The Driftknight dipped low to clear a jagged outcropping, and the pull intensified. The hull groaned.

"Compensating," Quinn muttered, then fired the dorsal thrusters in a sharp pulse. The ship jolted upward, just enough to pull them free from the creeping drag below.

"Keep us above that shell," Kara said. "Whatever that is, we can't afford to test how deep it goes."

The interior unfolded in fragments, shards of glittering crystal jutting like teeth, mana veins casting eerie light across jagged stone. Shadows shifted as the ship moved, as if the cavern itself watched.

"Keep it tight," Kara said. "Watch for debris. Or worse."

The words had barely left her mouth when the hull jolted. The ship shuddered hard. Alarms blared.

"Report!" Kara barked, already swiveling toward Lila.

"Dragonling. Big one. It's latched onto the aft, tearing into the plating."

Kara's pulse spiked. "Quinn, evasive. Lila, keep that section intact."

The Driftknight lurched violently as Quinn angled hard to throw the beast. The walls spun across the viewscreen, glittering teeth rushing by. The dragonling clung tight. Wings flared in the dark, claws raking down the hull.

"Lila, how bad?"

"Minor for now, but if it breaches the plating, we lose engine control."

Not here. Not this close.

Then came Quinn's voice, low and urgent: "Captain. Movement ahead. Three more. Bigger."

Kara's gaze snapped to the forward display.

They were circling. Dragonlings, each larger than the ones outside, moving like sharks through sacred water.

Her eyes flicked to the acceleration couch across the bridge. Empty.

Akiko should've been there.

"Damn it," Kara muttered. "Where are you?"

The ship jolted again, another slam from the one on their back. She clenched the armrests tighter, decision forming in real time.

"Lila, reroute power. Rear thrusters. Now."

"On it," Lila called, already working.

A surge of flame erupted from the aft. The ship bucked, and the dragonling lost its grip. It tumbled off, screeching silently as it slammed into a cavern wall.

"Target neutralized," Lila said grimly. "But the others are still inbound."

Kara didn't flinch. "Quinn, keep us moving. We're getting to that hoard. Whatever else is waiting in there? It doesn't scare me yet."

The Driftknight crept deeper into the mountain's heart, its forward lights casting warped shadows across the jagged interior. Mana veins pulsed faintly across the walls, their glow refracting off broken hulls and half-melted wreckage. Kara leaned forward in her chair, eyes fixed on the screen.

There was no turning back now.

Ahead, the cavern widened, revealing the hoard in full. The light from the anomaly reflected off scattered artifacts: shattered ship parts, warped cores, relics stacked in chaotic reverence. It looked like a museum built by tectonic violence.

Quinn's voice broke the silence. "Captain. Picking up something massive. Stationary, but the readouts are... fragmented."

Kara glanced at the data. Gravitational distortion. No clean signature, just pressure.

"Visual?"

Quinn swept the external cameras. At first, only the glinting hoard. Piles of debris and treasure, shapes distorted by energy haze. Then the lens adjusted. A shadow moved in the distance.

The dragon resolved in silhouette, curled around the central mound like a continent at rest. Its wings were folded tight, translucent membranes flickering with internal glow. Scales absorbed the cavern light, their facets pulsing in sync with the anomaly's rhythm.

Kara exhaled sharply. Her knuckles whitened around the armrests.

Its head rested atop a pile of wreckage, horns curled like a crown. Regal. Unmoving. Then the eyes opened. Twin shards of light, fixed on a single figure in the cavern.

Akiko.

Kara's heart skipped.

The fox stood still, tail low, head high. Alone before the dragon's gaze.

"Damn it," Kara whispered.

She didn't need magnification to read the tension in Akiko's posture. Every hair on her body stood on end, her shoulders stiff with practiced calm. The feed captured none of the heat, none of the voice, but still, the moment vibrated.

"She's trying to talk to it," Kara said, incredulous.

The dragon stirred. Its coils tightened, tail sweeping across the hoard like a glacier shifting in place. Its massive form moved with soundless purpose. The head lifted. The mouth opened.

No sound reached them, but Kara felt the weight of it through the screen. A presence pressing against the senses.

Akiko didn't move. Only her ears twitched, tail flicking once. Her entire body taut as a wire.

"Captain…" Quinn said, voice low. "If that thing decides she's not worth—"

"I know," Kara snapped. Her eyes flicked to the sensors. Gravitational anomalies spiked around the dragon. The entire cavern was a pressure chamber. A single wrong move, and they were all dust.

"Lila," Kara called. "I want every scrap of power on standby. If we have to punch out or light this thing up, I want the systems primed."

"Already warming the coils," Lila said.

Kara turned back to the feed. Akiko hadn't flinched. Her movements were careful. Measured. Bluffing.

The dragon shifted again, claws curling through wreckage. The tail swept back, tossing a slab of twisted metal with casual strength. Debris fell like confetti.

Kara stood. "Quinn. Closer. Quiet."

"Captain—"

"Do it. We might get one shot to pull her out, and I'm not leaving her to face that thing alone."

He didn't argue again. The RCS thrusters fired in short, controlled bursts. The Driftknight glided forward.

Kara kept her eyes on Akiko. "Come on, little fox," she whispered. "Talk your way out of this."

But even as she said it, a chill settled in her chest. If Akiko couldn't talk herself out of this mess, did they have a chance?

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