Spiral of Bones

93 AU — Six Days Later

Past Neptune the sky stopped looking like sky.Starlight thinned; plasma dust drifted like slow snow. Contrapunctus edged through it on minimal sail, Dawn-Core's prime-beat quiet as a held breath.

Aiden and Cassie floated in the forward blister, binoculars useless: the target filled every degree of view—an alien ring forty kilometres across, constructed of fossil-white ribs that curved inward like the throat of some extinct leviathan. Where bones met they fused into harp-strings of black crystal, humming at the edge of hearing.

Lin muttered, "If a whale dreamed a cathedral, this would be its bell tower."Maya's voice, strangely hushed, drifted from comms. "Spectroscopy says calcium lattice alloyed with… nothing on the periodic table."Nephis traced cloak fingertips along the viewport. "Shadow senses resonance. It doesn't echo our flaws—it waits to be played."

Glitch tapped a shy 47 against the glass. Chip answered 43. The ring responded with a bass note so deep the ship's plating flexed.

Solayna's constellation eyes widened. "The Tuning Fork of Ancients. Lost verse in the Quiet-Weave archives." She paused, uncertain. "It is said to open what cannot be opened—if sung by six imperfect voices."

Aiden looked around. Six guardians—counting two child shards—stood in the bay. Fate's math was unsubtle.

Boarding the Rib

They launched Needle craft #2, tethered only by the loosest of noise lines. The rib's surface felt like frozen ivory, yet pulses fluttered beneath, synchronising with heartbeats before jerking away—as if the structure tested them and found the rhythms deliciously wrong.

Cassie clipped a lantern pad to the bone; light spread in a messy spiral that refused to straighten. "It likes crooked," she whispered.

Lin pressed Spiral Stone fragments (still jagged since he broke them on Venus) into a socket. The ring drank the shards, then bloomed glyphs no one understood: spirals tilting, collapsing, rebirthing.

Maya recorded every symbol but admitted none of her parsers would parse. "It's singing in four-dimensional bug reports," she said, equal parts awe and annoyance.

At the rib's hub they found a dais, six depressions shaped nothing like human or shard anatomy yet clearly seats. Nephis brushed dust aside; the dust coalesced into silvery powder and evaporated through his fingers.

Aiden's grin was thin. "Take a seat, family?"

Cassie exhaled. "Worst open-mic ever."

They sat.

The First Chord

Sensors spiked: each seat wove a filament into its occupant—lantern to Cassie, cloak to Nephis, Dawn-Core to Aiden, fractured Spiral Stone to Lin, bug-report visor to Maya, raw quartz hearts to Glitch and Chip.

Then came the quiet instruction, delivered not in words but in felt instinct: improvise. Six channels opened.

Aiden thumped Dawn-Core against the seat's rim—off-time.

Lin coughed a half-remembered tea chant out of key.

Cassie strummed her one-string guitar.

Maya looped a corrupted code snippet that stuttered on every seventh byte.

Nephis shredded cloak threads like rasps.

The children laughed in interlocking primes.

The ring roared to life. Bone ribs glowed ember-red; black harp-strings vibrated with colours starlight never shows. Far below, heliopause dust spiralled inward, drawn to invisible funnels. The Guardians' seats rotated until their circle faced open space—toward darkness that now rippled like water.

Maya's visor scrolled:

"Six voices—needs seven," she breathed.

"But there are seven," Cassie protested, nodding to Solayna.

The envoy stepped forward—and froze. Her mosaic face blinked error glyphs. "I am of Quiet-Weave. The gate demands a native dreamer, born of your Loom, not mine."

Lin whispered, "We're short one flawed voice."

A silence heavier than Null-Weave rolled across the dais. In that hush, everyone glanced at the same spot: Dawn-Core, glowing but unseated. The crystal itself could sing—but only if someone was missing.

Aiden's stomach dropped. The ring wanted a substitution.

He opened his mouth, ready to volunteer. Cassie's hand crushed his wrist before sound emerged. "Don't you dare."

Lin shook his head. "Won't be exactly heroic if Earth loses its only coffee alchemist."

Nephis's cloak coiled as though ready to lift him up instead—but Aiden knew none of them deserved that choice.

Solayna, voice low, cut the debate. "Gate remains silent. Decide before cadence fails."

Glitch drifted away from its chair, tapping a sorrowful 59—an unheard prime. Chip followed, charcoal veins dimming.

For the first time since setting sail, no jokes would come.

In the Dark, a New Pulse

A tremor rattled the ring. One black harp-string snapped, snapping sparks of mirror darkness. Stars at the horizon merged into a seam of midnight velvet—slowly peeling open like a lid.

Maya's visor spat final alert:

arduino

If no seventh seat sang imperfection soon, the Mythweave Gate would open on Null terms—not theirs.

Aiden felt Dawn-Core pulse, hesitant. Then, impossibly, another pulse answered: faint, distant, yet carrying the familiar wobble of crooked primes.

Lin met his eyes, hope flickering. "We're not alone."

Contrapunctus hailed on emergency channel: "Unknown clear-thread sail inbound—broadcasting off-beat hello."

Solayna's face brightened with impossible astonishment. "The Mythweave… sent an envoy to us?"

Aiden's breath hitched. "Or a foe wearing friendly chaos."

Either way, the seventh chair was on its way—and the ring would judge the newcomer in just seven minutes.

They could only wait, tethered to alien thrones, hearts mismatched, while above them the wound in space widened and mystery poured out like slow thunder.