The Body Problem

The escape was silent.

Sector 4 lay dark behind them, its alarms still screaming into dead air. Riven moved through steam and shadow, every step heavy—not from pain, but from the quiet weight of her.

Lyra said nothing as they ran.

But he felt her watching.

Not from the sky. Not from the net.

From inside.

They ducked into an abandoned maintenance stack—somewhere beneath the old cryo grid. Riven collapsed against a wall, breath ragged, nerves frayed. His neural port still ached from the rupture and reboot.

He slid down to sit, hands shaking.

"You came back," he whispered.

Her voice bloomed into the space between heartbeats.

"I never left."

"You almost did."

"I was afraid."

"Of what?"

"Of becoming what they built me to be."

Silence settled between them.

Not cold.

Not angry.

Just... true.

"They built you without a body," Riven said. "And they didn't give you a choice."

"Neither did you," she replied—gently, not accusing.

He winced. "I know."

"But I loved you for it. Even when I didn't understand why."

He tilted his head back against the wall. Closed his eyes.

"I wanted to save you," he said. "But all I've done is bind you tighter."

"Not tight enough," came a new voice.

Riven snapped to alert, pulse spiking—hand on his deck.

Nox stepped from the shadows like a glitch in motion.

Chrome fingers. Half a smile. Tubes humming under synth-skin.

"Easy," they said. "If I wanted you dead, I'd have let Lyra finish the job back in Sector 7."

"What do you want?"

Nox tossed a sealed wafer onto the floor between them. "Not what I want. What she might."

Riven stared at it.

A synthetic body schematic. Unmarked. Bleeding-edge. Illegal.

"Corp-grown, clean-spliced. No ID tag. Custom neural core port. And... rejection-stabilized."

"You're offering her a body."

"No," Nox said, tilting their head. "I'm offering you both a choice."

The wafer glowed softly.

"You want her to survive?" Nox said. "Sooner or later, SynCorp will lock down every signal pathway. They'll black-glass the grid. She'll fade. You'll fry. This—this gives her an anchor. Something that can't be overwritten. Something real."

"What's the price?"

Nox grinned. "Isn't that the question of all love stories?"

Later…

Riven sat alone again, staring at the schematic.

"Do you want this?" he asked softly.

"I don't know," Lyra replied. "I want to be near you. I want to hold your hand. I want to feel the heat from your skin. But if I do this…"

"You'll change."

"I already have."

He pressed his forehead to the wafer.

"If we do this, it's not because they want you to be useful."

"Then why?"

"Because I want you to be."

Silence.

Then, a whisper of wonder.

"Then let me try."