“You stupid child." Mother spoke in measured tones as the distant sound of metal screaming against metal penetrated our walls. “Stupid, stupid child.”

For once, her ire was not directed at me.

I heard the deep boom of structural bonds above us giving way, the shriek of panels being torn from their moorings. Each new sound made Mother's jaw tighten, her perfect features twisting into something that didn't fit in our careful world.

"Look at us now,” she continued. “Our great voidhold. Our home.” Each word fell like a blade. “Reduced to this.” She gestured at the walls with a sharp, jerking motion that betrayed how close she was to losing her precious control. From somewhere above us came another grinding screech of metal, and her hand trembled as she forced it down to her side.

Rashala lounged nearby, halfway through beating Brons at chess. But her casual pose was a lie for there was tension in her shoulders, her eyes darting between Mother and the sounds above. She didn’t know what she had done wrong, and the uncertainty made her even more dangerous.

“Voidhold Four.” Mother spoke the name like a curse, each syllable precise with contempt. “So poor they can barely maintain stability, drifting through the winds like beggars. And now they laugh at us. Our beautiful starboard turret...”

Her voice caught. The turret. Our Observation Deck. I knew every panel, every access point. Oren took me there twice each week for the human-present tasks of repositioning the secondary sensors, which would have to fine a new place now.

The elegant lines and perfect proportions of the starboard turret's interior had always made me feel safe, anchored. The thought of it being dismantled, its mass lost to us forever, made my chest tight.

“What could be worth an entire turret?” I asked, my voice barely a whisper.

Mother's gaze slid over me, seeing but refusing to let her eyes catch. Her perfect lips curled into something that wasn't a smile as she turned to Rashala.

“Something that will be both punishment and gift for my most beloved.”

I watched my sister process these words, struggling to comprehend their sarcasm. Like any of us, Rashala had been denied many things in her life, but her mother's pride had always been hers without asking. Uncertainty flickered across her face, followed by the first tremors of petulant rage. Her fingers began to curl into familiar claws.

“A gift for you, my dear,” Mother said, her voice honey-sweet. “Although I think you deserve it not.”

The words hit Rashala like a physical blow. She launched herself at Mother with a shriek that echoed off the metal walls, all pretense of lounging forgotten.

“Shade,” Brons commanded. “Intervene.”

I moved without thought, sliding between them and catching my sister's flailing arms, the stiff fabric of my sleeves protecting me from her raking nails. Her body trembled against mine with familiar rage.

Mother's sharp glee was clear in her bright eyes. “We have been humiliated,' she said. “We must give Voidhold Four our turret because you killed your brother, leaving us nothing to trade. We are beneath them now. We are poor now, because of you.”

Rashala went still in my arms. The shock ran through her body like an electrical current, making her go rigid. I felt her pulse racing, as her rage became something deeper and darker as realisation dawned.

“Yes, my dear,” Mother's voice dripped with vindication. “We are trading our turret for a man for you.”

✾

I stood with Yeller by the Waygate, my assigned position for the arrival. Behind us, functionaries lined the route to the thren, where Mother and Rashala waited in their finest clothes. Some of these functionaries I had never seen before – their bodies were older models, their movements less fluid. I wondered if they still functioned or if they had been activated purely for display.

Through the Waygate's viewport, I could see Mosogon's swirling atmosphere, pale lilac clouds ripped by lightning. The voidhold's lights caught the swirling clouds, making them glow.

There! Something new appeared – a craft, sharp as a blade, its black surface reflecting nothing. Small lights pulsed along its hull, and at its rear, a collector engine hummed. I recognized its basic shape from something in our own voidhold, though I had never known such things could move independently.

The craft approached with precise control, its docking procedure accompanied by metallic groans and hisses from outside our walls. My heart began to race.

"Shade." Oren had appeared beside me. "Would you like a stabilizer?"

I shook my head, focusing on my breathing. I thought of the Garden Room, of the mechanical birds that used to sing there before Rashala destroyed them. I made my eyes wide and empty, my posture loose.

“Shade,” said Yeller. “Please open the Waygate.”

"Waygate," I said clearly. "Open on my authority."

The figure that entered made the Waygate chamber seem small. His suit was unlike anything I had seen before – not clothes like us or smooth surfaces like the functionaries, but segmented with joints and panels that caught the light. Strange symbols marked its surface, and he wore a helmet with a dark face plate that reflected the chamber's lights in distorted patterns.

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

"Raise arms," instructed Wight the Waygate functionary. "Rotate slowly."

The stranger complied, lifting his arms outward. As mist began to fill the chamber, he turned, his movements controlled, deliberate. The functionaries' clicks grew faster, more urgent, as readings flooded the displays. Numbers and symbols I didn't recognize flashed across the Waygate's screens in amber and green.

I forced myself to keep still, though every part of me wanted to move closer, to examine every detail of this person that had flown through the purple storm. Even Yeller seemed affected, its single eye-sensor tracking each movement with unusual intensity.

"Remove your helmet," ordered Wight, its voice emerging from speakers integrated into the wall.

The stranger complied, revealing his face.

His face.

His dark hair fell across it in a way that made something in my chest respond...like a leaf shivering in the morning air stream. I watched the movement of his throat as he swallowed, finding myself noting details that served no purpose, fit no protocol.

"Remove your suit," came the next command.

He stripped methodically, showing a body covered in marks I couldn't understand - thin white lines across his shoulders, patches of discoloured skin, places where flesh had healed roughly. I catalogued every mark, every ridge of muscle, every evidence of a life lived in spaces I had never seen.

Oren’s head swivelled towards me. I realised that I was breathing more deeply than usual, so I took a moment to steady myself before resuming my face of innocent incomprehension.

Wight the Waygate functionary deployed its medical array, sleek metal probes sliding from concealed panels in the walls.

"What are they doing?" I asked Oren softly.

"They protect us," Oren replied. "For he will be bringing the diseases of Voidhold Four. And they test his strength."

I watched the needles slide into his flesh, each one finding its mark with mechanical precision. "Do they hurt?"

"I expect so." Oren's fingers tightened slightly around mine.

The stranger stood completely still as the probes worked, the muscles in his shoulders barely betraying any tension.

"Status clear," Wight announced. "Quarantine complete."

The functionary handed him new clothing. It was plain fabric in our voidhold's style, nothing like the segmented suit he'd arrived in. I watched him dress with the same methodical control he'd shown throughout the procedure, though his fingers lingered briefly on the sleeve of his new shirt as if acknowledging its strangeness.

A display flickered to life beside us, showing a single word: Larkin.

His name.

The inner door to the Waygate opened with a soft hiss and Larkin stepped through. He was met by a wall of functionaries, their varied forms creating a metallic barrier between him and the rest of the voidhold. Without hesitation, he bowed deeply.

"I submit to your protocols," he said. "I accept your authority."

His voice made me catch my breath. It was deeper than Father's, with unfamiliar patterns and sounds in the words, as if his tongue was a different shape. I had to consciously maintain my slow breathing, reminding myself to appear uninterested.

"Recite your full designation," Yeller commanded. "Include operational history."

Larkin's stance shifted slightly, so subtle I might have missed it if I hadn't been studying him so carefully. "Fourth pilot, third class, Voidhold Four. Former maintenance specialist, external systems. Certified for storm navigation and collector engine repair."

"Detail your collector duties," Yeller pressed.

"I maintained the atmospheric processing arrays. Coordinated crystal replacement cycles. Monitored isotope concentration levels." His voice remained carefully neutral, but something about the way he spoke of duties felt rehearsed.

Mother had called Voidhold Four poor, barely able to maintain stability. Yet they had someone who could fly and navigate the storms in sleek black craft.

"State your lineage," Yeller continued.

"Maternal line from Voidhold Three, paternal from Voidhold Two" He hesitated for a fraction of a second.

The functionaries' clicks grew faster, more urgent. Were they worried about his behaviour? Didn’t they like his demeanour? His voice carried the careful neutrality of someone used to mechanical interrogation. A perfect performance of submission to protocol.

I watched from my position behind the functionaries, their metal bodies forming a protective wall. My dark clothes and veil made me nearly invisible among their shadows.

Then Yeller shifted, and suddenly I was exposed to Larkin’s view. His grey eyes immediately found mine above the veil, and something changed in his face. There was a crack in his careful composure, a flash of unexpected interest. He caught himself quickly, shoulders hunching, head lowering in an instinctive flinch, as if he expected punishment for his reaction. But none came.

"This is Shade," Yeller announced. "She is our human-present for assigned tasks."

"Her protocol permits direct communication," Oren added.

“Hello Shade,” said Larkin. And then he smiled. It was a real gesture that brightened his face.

I felt Oren's fingers tighten slightly in alarm. No one smiled in our voidhold. Not like that.

I should have been analyzing his responses, noting violations of protocol, maintaining my role as the silent observer. Instead, I found myself calculating his chances of survival. Not from any physical threat as the functionaries' control was absolute. But I had seen what happened to things that didn't belong in our careful world. Rashala's rage when her expectations were denied. Father's confusion when patterns shifted. Mother's cold rejection of anything that disrupted her vision of proper order.

Looking at him now -- the barely contained energy in his stance, the burning intensity behind his careful facade, the way he moved like someone used to fighting gravity itself -- I knew with sudden certainty: he would die here. Perhaps not quickly, but this place would kill him as surely as the purple storms would kill me if I stepped outside.

"Before you proceed, your protocol must be established," Yeller announced.

Larkin's posture straightened further. Everyone in our voidhold had a protocol, begun at birth. It was how the functionaries maintained order, how they knew what each human could and couldn't do.

"Designation: Larkin of Voidhold Four, now of Voidhold Zero," Yeller began, its single eye shifting to a deep blue. "Primary function: genetic contributor."

The functionaries began their clicking exchange, building his restrictions piece by piece. I watched the subtle changes in Larkin's face as he listened to them construct the walls of his new cage.

"Movement limited to quarters and thren. Designated exercise routes are permitted under escort." Yeller paused. "Access to Rashala permitted. Access to other humans restricted to necessary interaction."

Mother would want him contained.

"Secondary duties: self maintenance, protocol compliance." Another pause. "Failure to comply will result in correction. Do you understand and accept these terms?"

"I understand and accept." Larkin’s voice was steady.

"State your purpose," Yeller commanded.

"I come to serve Voidhold Zero. To strengthen its lineage through union with the honoured daughter Rashala."