Beneath The Silence Of Stars

Chapter 28 – Beneath the Silence of Stars

We drifted through the dark like a wounded bird, wings smoldering and breath shallow. Mira worked silently at the console, her fingers gliding over controls, recalibrating power flow and redirecting cooling systems. I sat beside her, numb. The words from Voss haunted me.

You designed the system.

It made no sense. My memories were jagged at best—patches of war, escape, silence. But this? An entire security vault hidden on Velmara-9, locked with my neural imprint?

"How's the hull?" I asked quietly.

Mira didn't look up. "Stabilized. We lost 13% shielding on the port side, but I've rerouted emergency reserves."

"You always make it work."

A faint smile touched her lips. "You keep giving me reasons to."

I leaned back into my seat, watching the stars. They used to be a comfort—distant, calm, untouched. Now they felt like observers, cold witnesses to the unraveling of my past.

"What if he's right?" I asked after a long silence.

Mira glanced at me. "About what?"

"That I was part of something bigger. That I helped create whatever's buried on Velmara-9."

She paused. "Does it matter?"

"It should. If I had a hand in building some ancient weapon or trap, I need to take responsibility."

"But we don't even know what it is," she said. "And whatever you did—whoever you were then—you aren't him anymore."

I wanted to believe her. But doubt clung to me like a second skin.

Velmara-9 appeared on our scopes six hours later. A gray-blue marble swirling with ice storms and jagged mountain ridges. There were no settlements, no signals—just one set of old imperial coordinates embedded in the central ridge.

I took the controls and guided us into the atmosphere, the ship groaning as we pierced layers of wind and cold. Frost bloomed along the windows. The planet didn't welcome visitors.

As we landed, I noticed something odd—a shallow trench leading away from the ridge. It looked too straight, too deliberate to be natural.

"We're not the first ones here," I murmured.

Mira ran a scan. "I'm picking up a small power signature. Low. Could be a relay node."

I suited up, the chill in the air already seeping into the cockpit. Mira followed, blaster at her side. We moved carefully through the snowdrift, our boots crunching the frozen surface.

The wind was sharp, but the silence was worse. No creatures. No motion. Just the endless howl of emptiness.

The entrance to the vault was buried beneath layers of compacted snow and rock, but the scanner guided us to it—a metallic panel beneath the ice. I brushed off the snow, revealing a biometric pad.

"Ready?" Mira asked.

I nodded and placed my hand against the pad.

Nothing.

Then a soft pulse. Blue light flickered, followed by a voice—faint, robotic, and cold.

"Kael Riven. Authorization confirmed."

Mira stepped back. Her eyes were wide. I didn't say anything. I couldn't.

The door unlatched with a low hiss, revealing a narrow passageway. Warm air rushed out—filtered, artificial. The lights inside blinked on one by one, as if the facility had been waiting for us.

We stepped inside, boots echoing on smooth floors. The architecture was imperial—sharp lines, dark metal, efficient.

At the end of the corridor was a circular chamber filled with old terminals and a single central pod—sealed, glowing faintly from within.

A hologram flared to life above the pod.

My voice.

My face.

I froze.

The recording began to speak.

"If you're watching this, I'm likely dead—or you're me, but changed. My name is Commander Kael Riven. And this… this is the Remnant Protocol."

The image blinked slightly, then continued.

"We created this vault to hold what couldn't be destroyed—information, blueprints, memories. What's inside this pod isn't a weapon. It's a map. A record of everything the empire erased. Places, people, knowledge."

The image leaned forward.

"If you walked away from it all—good. That means something in you still resisted. But this vault… this is your choice. Destroy it and bury the past. Or unlock it, and face everything we did."

The hologram disappeared. The pod remained.

Mira looked at me. "What are you going to do?"

I stepped forward slowly. My reflection shimmered on the pod's surface. I remembered brief flashes—archive rooms, command halls, long discussions about ethics with people who wore silver and black.

"I think I need to know," I said finally.

I placed my palm on the pod's control. A small prick—blood. Then a hum as the seal disengaged.

Inside was a small crystal data core, glowing faintly.

I picked it up, the weight of it heavier than it should've been. Not just in my hand, but in my mind.

"This might change everything," I whispered.

Mira stepped beside me. "Then let's change it. Together."