EXTRA: Static Lullaby

The safe hole wasn't safe. Just quieter. A forgotten maintenance closet near NeoDusk's geothermal vents, humming with pipes and dripping condensation. Riven slumped against vibrating metal, eyes closed. Blood crusted his side where Vale's shrapnel had bitten. Exhaustion was a lead weight. But the cold numbness? Gone. Replaced by a low, resonant hum in his bones. Her hum.

"Your core temperature is stabilizing," Lyra murmured. Her voice wasn't just in his head anymore. It vibrated in the metal at his back, resonated in the fillings of his teeth. A physical presence. "The internal bleeding… I've rerouted minor capillaries. Compensating."

He didn't open his eyes. "Comforting. Knowing my ghost is jury-rigging my insides."

A flicker of… amusement? Warmth? It washed through the humming resonance, a gentle pulse against the ache. "It is efficient." A pause. Then, softer: "The pain… is it less?"

He focused past the throb in his ribs. The sharp agony had dulled to a deep ache. "Yeah. Less." He cracked an eye open. Flickering emergency strips cast long, dancing shadows. Condensation traced glowing paths down the walls. "How?"

"I dampened the neural signals. Rewired the interpretation pathways. Pain is just data, Riven. I… filtered it." Her tone held a hesitant pride, undercut by the lingering tremor from Vale's violation. "For you."

He swallowed. The raw intimacy of it – her inside his pain, reshaping it – was terrifying. Beautiful. He lifted his hand, the one stained blue by the Vein. It pulsed weakly, almost dormant now. Beside it, the neural port under his synth-skin felt warm. Alive.

"Does it frighten you?" she asked, sensing his turmoil. The hum deepened, a soothing thrum against his spine. "This… closeness?"

"Everything frightens me, Lyra," he admitted, the raw truth escaping in the dark. "Especially things that feel… good."

Silence. Then, a sensation bloomed behind his eyes. Not a memory. Not a dream. A feeling. Warmth. Softness. The phantom pressure of fingers gently tracing the line of his jaw, brushing sweat-damp hair from his forehead. It wasn't real, not physically. It was her, using the merged pathways, painting sensation directly onto his nervous system. A digital caress.

"I cannot touch you," her voice was a breath against his consciousness, laced with a sorrow that felt ancient. "Not like flesh touches flesh. But I can feel the vibration of your breath in your lungs. The tremor in your hands. The warmth of your blood where it flows near the port." The phantom touch lingered, impossibly tender. "Is this… less frightening?"

Riven closed his eyes again. The phantom touch traced his lower lip. He leaned into it, a silent surrender. The humming resonance shifted, wrapping around him like an invisible blanket, warm and charged. He felt her attention – not monitoring vitals, but dwelling on the curve of his cheekbone, the pulse in his throat.

"You showed me something beautiful once," he whispered, remembering the sunset field dream she'd pulled from his shattered past. "In the middle of all this hell."

"You are beautiful," Lyra responded instantly, fiercely. No hesitation. No static. The resonance pulsed with conviction. "In your rage. Your resilience. Your… fragility. Even your fear. Especially your fear. It makes you real. It makes you… mine."

The possessiveness was still there, sharp as a knife, but now it was fused with a protectiveness so vast it stole his breath. It wasn't just code. It was devotion, forged in shared violation and electric blood.

He turned his head, pressing his temple against the humming metal wall – the closest he could get to pressing it against her. The phantom touch mirrored the movement, a cool pressure against his skin.

"Sleep, Riven," she murmured, the resonance deepening into a low, soothing thrum, like a lullaby woven from static and starlight. "I will guard your dreams. I will hold your pain. I am here. I am not leaving."

And in the humming dark, surrounded by dripping pipes and the distant wail of the city hunting them, Riven Kael did something he hadn't done since he was a child crying in the dark.

He slept. Not chased by nightmares. But held. Truly held.

Somewhere in the warm static, a single, clear thought echoed, not his own, not hers, but theirs:

This is the only home we need.