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1. Training in a Sealed Room, or: A Worshipful Gaze
The Silver Anchor's secondary equipment room — cut off from the noise of Subaru Station, quiet in the particular way of spaces that have been made useful.
At its center sat a high-precision flight simulator, old hardware rebuilt into something else entirely by Shutia's hands.
"...Debris cluster, port side. Three seconds to projected intercept. Minimal rudder adjustment — thrusters full."
Ledea Mace's murmur had taken on the quality of something close to prayer. Silver hair pulled back, headset on, her profile in the console light looked nothing like fifteen — the expression was too precise, too stripped of anything unnecessary. The fingers on the controls moved the way a pianist's do: no wasted motion, no hesitation.
The simulator's main display was showing something that could charitably be called hell.
Difficulty setting: *INFERNO — DEBRIS MAXIMUM.*
A sealed asteroid field, every approach angle closed, rocks incoming at tens of kilometers per second. The kind of configuration designed not to be survived — a stress test of physical limits, not a training scenario.
*(...Sis. How. How is she so beautiful.)*
One step behind her, Shutia was in silent agony.
Ledea's navigation log streamed across her vision in real time. Every adjustment Ledea made threaded the simulated hull through gaps that shouldn't have existed. To Shutia, this was not technique. It was something more like revelation — a single coherent path drawn through chaos, the only correct answer in a universe that didn't offer them.
*(Fifteen years old and already here. She's a genius. I want to hold all of it — her and her talent both — somewhere no one else can reach.)*
Even Ledea had her limits, though. Hit indicators bloomed across the hull. The shield meter bled red with each alarm.
*(If I were beside her right now. An anchor into that cluster there — force the spin to stop — and she'd have the gap she needs in that next instant.)*
Shutia's mind ran the calculation automatically, then ran it again with variations. Billions of support patterns, mapped to Ledea's movements. And alongside them, the other question: what if she took the controls herself?
She could muscle through this. Force her way out of the storm.
But that wasn't the answer.
*(I'm not here to fly. I'm here so that the trajectory sis draws — the most beautiful one possible — gets drawn without interference. That's what I've concluded. That's what all of it has been for.)*
*— SYSTEM FAILURE. SHIP DESTROYED.*
The simulated bridge went dark.
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2. The Quiet After, and a Temptation
"...I'm still short by fractions of a second. The reaction time isn't there yet."
Ledea pulled the headset off and exhaled. There was a thin shine of sweat at her temple. Her shoulders, slight even in the pilot suit, were trembling slightly with the particular tremor of a body that has been pushed past what it had left.
"You were incredible, sis! That reversal in phase four — I'd want every pilot in the galaxy to see that! Though obviously if they saw it I'd have to eliminate them all—"
"...Shutia. Please keep the threats contained. I need the log from this run — the contact points, with correction proposals—"
The sentence didn't finish.
The moment Ledea's concentration released its hold, everything it had been keeping back arrived at once. She made it to the small sofa in the corner of the room on momentum alone, and then the momentum ran out.
"Sis?!"
"...I'm fine. Just — horizontal for a moment. Thirty minutes. Please."
"Understood! Creating optimal sleep conditions is one of my core competencies!"
Shutia moved immediately. A blanket appeared — space silk, highest grade, thermal retention properties that implied it had been sourced for exactly this purpose — and settled over Ledea without a sound. A custom drink followed, nutrition-optimized. A small plate of macarons for sugar. All of it arranged on the side table with the precision of someone who had thought about this before.
"...Thank you. I can't eat all of that..."
"It doesn't matter. What matters is that it's *there* when you wake up."
Ledea nodded slightly, closed her eyes. Her breathing steadied. The soft sound of sleep followed.
Shutia watched her — the particular gaze of a bird of prey, or possibly a very devoted parent, depending on the moment.
"...Right. While sis can't move."
Her fingers extended toward Ledea's collar.
Her work collar, specifically.
"...What are you doing. Shutia."
One eye opened. Consciousness still approximate, but something in Ledea registered the contact anyway.
"Oh, you noticed? I'm just — adjusting your clothes a little, so you can rest more comfortably. This fabric might be restricting your circulation—"
Shutia was holding a garment. Pink lace. Ruffles. The design prioritized one thing, and it was not blood flow.
"...That's not true. You bought that yesterday without asking—"
"Sis, you're so tired you're hallucinating. This is essentially medical equipment. Now, first the ribbon—"
"...Fine. Do what you want. Just — finish in five minutes."
The remaining resistance departed. Ledea's eyes closed again, and she was gone.
*Do what you want* — the most exquisite permission in Shutia's personal universe. Something lit behind her eyes that had no clean name.
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3. The Forbidden Coordinate Session
For the next five minutes, the Silver Anchor held two sounds: a hummed melody, and the soft movement of fabric.
Shutia worked with more precision than the simulator. Ledea's sleep was not disturbed by a single movement — the change of clothes, the unbraiding and resetting of hair, the application of hand cream to each fingertip, all of it executed with the care of someone handling something irreplaceable.
"Hehe... hehehe... today's sis is in the 'silver fairy lost in the candy kingdom' style... so cute. Cute enough to hurt. I want to 3D scan her and enshrine her as a divine object..."
"...What are you muttering about..."
"Oh, you're up? I made fresh tea. Here."
Shutia settled her upright efficiently, a cushion appearing behind her back before she'd finished the motion.
Ledea looked down at herself.
Pastel. Ruffles. Lace. A ribbon on her head the size and shape of a rabbit's ears.
"..."
She accepted the herbal tea and drank from it in silence. The expression on her face was that of someone who has made peace with their circumstances.
"Sis is really so cute. I want to put her in a special case — somewhere no one else can see — and have her here with me always. Dressed in clothes I picked, eating food I made, looking only at me..." Shutia's voice had softened to something that was half the warmth of a wish and half the weight of an intention. "Sis. What if we just... stayed like this? Forever?"
The words had two layers. The top one was light. The one underneath was not.
Ledea set down her teacup. The rabbit-ear ribbon swayed.
"If that's what you want," she said, in her usual register, "start by analyzing the complete log from that run and calculating the anchor deployment timing to compensate for my weak points, down to the second. Until that's finished, there's no time to be in any case."
"...Sis. You're such a workaholic."
Shutia laughed — a little wistful, a little proud, the particular combination that appeared when Ledea redirected her in exactly this way.
Ledea's genius, Shutia had long since concluded, extended to this: she never denied the obsession. She just gave it somewhere to go.
"...The fabric on this, though. It's not uncomfortable."
"Right?! I had it custom made — specified the material myself! Okay, next up is the 'maximum frills gothic lolita bulletproof dress' fitting—"
"I'll pass on that one. I'm going back to the simulator." A pause. "This time, you're on the anchors. Understood?"
"With pleasure, sis! Together, we can evaporate any debris storm with the power of love!"
They went back to the simulator together.
Lace rippling at the edges. The uncompromising geometry of a control panel.
The wrongness of the combination, and the rightness of the two of them in it — that was their ordinary. The most fortunate one in the galaxy, by at least one person's accounting.