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1. A Labyrinth of Numbers, and a Soft Restraint
"...The math still isn't working."
The Silver Anchor's small living area. Ledea Mace had her holographic terminal open in front of her and was regarding the household accounts with the focused displeasure she usually reserved for difficult asteroid approaches.
The numbers floating in the air were not being cooperative. The multi-function high-power cutting laser from Comet Center. Fuel. Dock fees. After subtracting all of it, what remained was not a figure that inspired confidence.
"Sis, you've been staring at those numbers for a while now. It's very cute. Sis with a furrowed brow is still the galaxy's finest work of art."
The voice came from behind her, warm and entirely untroubled by the financial situation. Shutia set a fresh cup of herbal tea on the table and considered the matter closed.
"...I'm not doing this for entertainment. We just upgraded to a high-performance laser — it would make sense to also upgrade the scanner and the auxiliary power unit to match. But..."
Ledea flicked the hologram with one finger. The numbers didn't improve.
"The current balance doesn't support it. I've been a little extravagant."
"Oh, is that all? I'll figure out some way to earn it — don't worry about it. More importantly—"
Shutia's eyes lit up with the specific quality that preceded something Ledea had learned to brace for.
"Excuse me a moment, sis."
"Wha—"
Before Ledea had finished processing the warning, her perspective shifted upward. Shutia had lifted her — the motion practiced and unhurried, the way someone picks up a favorite cushion they've moved a hundred times — and sat down in the vacated chair. Then, with the air of someone completing a natural sequence of events, she settled Ledea into her lap.
Ledea did not protest loudly. She did not struggle.
There had been a time when this would have produced a red-faced "what do you think you're doing." That time had passed. The forced relocation to Shutia's lap had become, somewhere along the way, a recurring feature of their domestic life — something between a habit and a ceremony.
"...Again."
She said it with mild resignation, and leaned back against Shutia's chest.
Shutia's arms came around her waist — firm, but careful, the way you'd hold something you were afraid of breaking. The warmth at her back. The breath near her neck. Ledea, fifteen, fitting entirely within Shutia's reach. Shutia, twenty-four, wrapping around her without effort.
"This is fine, isn't it? When we're like this, I have complete access to sis's heartbeat and sis's scent, and my operational efficiency goes up about three hundred percent."
"My operational efficiency goes down. I can't move properly. Let me use the terminal, Shutia."
"Sis's hands should be used for stroking my arms right now."
"...Denied."
Ledea exhaled once, did not remove the arms from around her waist, and pulled the holographic terminal back into position in the air in front of them.
"It's inconvenient, admittedly. But — I'll look for available work from here. Keep up."
"Understood, sis! I'll follow you anywhere!"
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2. A Street Corner, Reversed
The commercial district of Subaru Station.
Walking through the crowd, Ledea glanced up at Shutia beside her. Shutia had taken Ledea's right hand in both of hers and was swinging it with the contentment of someone who had arranged things exactly as they wanted them. She had the look of a guardian making sure her charge didn't wander off.
"Isn't this nice, sis! Job-hunting with a date atmosphere. Oh — that ice cream place over there has a new flavor that would suit you perfectly. Should we stop on the way back?"
"Work first. And I'm a lady, so ice cream isn't really—"
"Don't say that — if you'll let me watch you eat it, I'll work twice as hard on the next job!"
They were still exchanging this when a large man in loud work clothes stopped in front of them.
"Well, well. Don't see this often." He looked at them with an affable smile — first at Shutia, then at Ledea. "Quite a pair, you two. The elder one there — real beauty. Composed. Looks like she knows what she's doing."
His attention had settled on Shutia: tall, calm, the slight smile of someone at ease in themselves.
Then he looked at Ledea, and his expression softened further.
"And the little one — pretty as a doll, isn't she. All curled up next to her big sister like that, it's enough to warm the heart. Listen — I run a mining operation nearby, and if you're looking for something, we could use a girl like you at the front desk. Good bonus if you're willing."
Shutia went still for just a moment.
"My, how perceptive." Her voice came out warm and easy. "That's right — this is my dear little sister."
She drew Ledea in against her side, her cheek briefly touching Ledea's hair.
"She's so adorable I genuinely cannot take my eyes off her for a second. So while I appreciate the offer, I'm afraid I can't let her out of my sight."
The man laughed — "Well, can't argue with that!" — and went on his way with a wave.
"......"
Ledea looked at the arm around her shoulders without speaking.
The姉妹-in-reverse mistake. It had happened before. It would happen again. Ledea understood that her appearance was what it was, and she was not at an age where such things required dramatic correction.
"...Shutia. You did it again."
"Hm? Did what?"
"You didn't correct him. The elder one is me, as a matter of fact."
She said it with a slight set to her mouth — not quite a pout, but adjacent. Shutia stopped walking, stepped around to face her, and crouched down to bring their eyes level.
The smile she offered was open and uncomplicated on the surface, and bottomless underneath.
"It doesn't matter, sis."
"Doesn't matter?"
"No. It doesn't matter what anyone around us sees, or what they say. In my world, sis is sis. However the rest of the universe chooses to categorize things — what's between us doesn't change."
There was no hesitation in it. An arrogance, almost — a unilateral declaration. And yet it was also the most complete acceptance Ledea had ever received from anyone.
She lowered her silver lashes and said, quietly, "...Is that so."
It wasn't that she had no answer. It was that Shutia's eyes were so direct, and the depth behind the easy smile was something that Ledea, at this particular moment, found she did not want to look away from.
"...Then as your elder sister, I'm giving you an order. Turn right at the next intersection. And have that expression back to normal before we reach the guild branch."
"Yes, sis! Your orders are my pleasure!"
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3. A Point of Pride, and a Small Return
The job on the guild board turned out to be exactly what the new laser needed — precision sampling from a high-density asteroid, the kind of work other crews had been avoiding because the accuracy requirements were steep.
Paperwork done, they headed back toward the Silver Anchor.
"...Hehe. Sis always picks so well. The reason everyone else was passing on that one is because the precision requirements are severe, right? But for sis's piloting, it's nothing."
"It's contingent on your anchor work holding the target steady. I'm counting on you."
"Obviously! For sis, I'd anchor the sun in place if I had to."
Their footsteps fell together through the noise of the station.
The姉妹 reversal happened a few more times on the walk back. Ledea stopped registering it.
They passed the ice cream shop near the station entrance.
"...Shutia."
"Mm? What is it, sis?"
"...One. It goes in the budget. Buy it."
She pointed — bluntly, without looking directly at what she was pointing at — at the new flavor Shutia had mentioned earlier.
Shutia blinked. Then her face did what it does when something genuinely surprises her into happiness.
"Sis — for me?! Was the 'sis is sis' line really that good?! Did it actually get through?!"
"...It didn't. This is to mark securing a job. Morale purposes."
"You're flustered! Sis is flustered right now! So cute! Should I feed it to you? Or give you a bite of mine?!"
"...Please just buy it. I'm leaving without you."
Ledea walked ahead at a pace that communicated finality.
Behind her, Shutia followed with the expression of someone who had been handed everything they wanted and was still slightly in disbelief about it.
In the amber-tinted artificial light of the station, their two shadows moved together — one ahead, one following close behind. Which was the elder and which the younger: a question the shadows didn't answer, and didn't need to. Two people belonging to the same orbit, disappearing together into the dark.