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Brnine came to, tugged from the place between sleeping and waking to the sound of someone calling for them. Hey. Routine’s voice was rumbling over their earpiece, which they often slept with in case they were needed. You awake?
“Barely,” they mumbled. They had been dreaming, but the memory of it melted away as they sat up. “D’ya need something?”
Nah, Valence buzzed looking for you. You might wanna check your signal, they said they’ve been getting static. Routine paused, waiting for a response, but Brnine had frozen mid-stretch. Sorry to wake you, captain.
For a dizzying moment, they felt as if they were outside their body, watching their mind sputter and whir, turning around that sentence in their head. And then, slowly, Brnine smiled. Valence was looking for them. “It’s fine Routine, I should be getting up anyway. Thanks.”
In the years since they had first connected, their mental bond with Valence had only richened. It would be frightening if Valence had been anyone else. But they were Valence, affable and never-pushing, with a way about them that made Brnine feel like giving in, like having fun with it all.
Once Brnine had sat in a separate room and transmitted an entire movie as they watched it. Valence had come to them, laughing in amazement, and held Brnine’s head in their hands, calling them a miracle. Brnine, flustered, had joked that they should try to bottle it.
Yo! - They started, wanting to tease them, to say: I know you know where my room is, Valence, and rearing back at the harsh buzz of mental feedback, a sharp pain igniting behind their ears.
Brnine frowned and tried to tap into their private channel. Static. They’d have to find Valence themself.
An Asepsis drone was clattering at its tank as Brnine passed, and they scarcely gave it a glance, clucking their tongue in disapproval of the noise and sparing its fidgeting body a pat. They fiddled with their communicator as they stepped over the threshold, and so intently focused were they on it, that they hardly noticed they had traveled until their shoulder brushed a door frame, and in that room was Routine.
He was dressed finely — for no perceivable reason, as he was won’t to be— and looked up from where he had been at work in a sketchbook. “Did you reach them?”
“Nah.” They put the earpiece back in their ear, and tapped into their channel again. Static. “Might be busted.”
“That’s rough,” he said sympathetically, absently reaching into his vest pocket, and pulling out a cigarette.
Brnine had been that person, more than once, so they couldn’t judge, but their surprise must have shown on their face. Routine shrugged. “Phrygian–“
Ringing in their head, dull and loud. Everything brightened, and cold dread tangled inside like they had been strung up by wires, so sharp and sudden that they staggered under it.
“Are you alright, Brnine?” It must have been a concerning sight for him not to call them captain. He held out a handkerchief from the same pocket the cigarettes were in.
“Yeah, I- what did you say about Phrygian?”
“I said, Phrygian likes it.”
Routine flipped his book towards them and their eyes were drawn to what he had been sketching. It was a melting ship, long rivulets of metal dripping down its walls into nothing. They blinked hard to keep their vision clear. The ground began to feel loose and shifting beneath their feet again until they saw what was written under it in a precise, looping script.
“It's true. I do like it. He chooses interesting flavors."
This room was Phyrgian, Brnine realized. And thus they were safe, enfolded, and enveloped. They relaxed to know it.
“Thank you,” Routine told the book, and wrote it as well for good measure.
“Right,” said Brnine in a daze, for they had taken the handkerchief to their nose, and had not expected it to come away so marred with their blood.
“Keep it,” said Routine. “Maybe go see Septet later.”
“Right.” They looked at his face, seeing how there was nothing mocking in the proud set to his face, just a kind concern, and felt terribly sad without cause, a rolling ache that slipped through their fingers before they could understand it. They began to lift their other hand to reach out to touch him in some way, but stayed the impulse and left it hovering gawkily. “Thanks, Routine.”
“No problem, captain.” He put his pencil back to page.“Valence was in Thisbe’s garden when they called.”
Turning to leave, Brnine paused. “Did they say why they needed me?”
“Kind of. They said it weird though. Vague and pretty-like. I don’t remember exactly how.” Routine shrugged. “They just need to talk to you.”
Wincing in the glare of the greenhouse’s false sunlight, Brnine found Thisbe as she was wrapping a long strand around two skinny poles sticking out of the dirt. “What’s that?” Brnine asked.
“A trellis for our tomatoes,” Thisbe answered, as she made a precise cut on the end of a tied cord. “Operant Valence is looking for you.”
“Yeah, I heard. Is the sun in here always this bright?” They asked, squinting trying to look up at Thisbe, only able to see along her tapered mouth, the branching silver scar on her forehead. The area where her horns were was vague, veiled in shadow by the sunlight.
“Yes,” said Thisbe.
“Oh, okay.” They tried harder to look at her this time, to no additional success. “Did you, like, do something with your horns?”
“I’ve changed nothing about myself,” said Thisbe.
“That’s cool,” Brnine said to the two-thirds of her head that they could see. The two lingered for a while in one of those silences that Thisbe seemed content to live in for hours on end but made Brnine feel dry and itchy. “What’s a trellis for?”
“A trellis has multiple purposes. It guides the plant into growing upwards. It conserves space. It keeps the vines from becoming bent or broken.”
Hard job, Brnine thought, as they rubbed a fuzzy leaf between their fingers. “They seem pretty small to need all that.”
“They will grow larger,” Thisbe said, and spent a couple minutes weaving twine through the stems while Brnine sat back on their heels and watched her hands. “Operant Valence is concerned about the weather. They say there’s a storm coming.”
“A real storm?” Brnine asked dubiously. Hunting and his souped-up weathervane had a reliable streak of accuracy, and just last night had declared skies would be clear for the next week. “Or like a metaphor?”
“Real enough to disrupt tomatoes.”
Thisbe said this seriously when, with Bontive taken, the cause was not wanting for food. A few fallen tomatoes would be no great loss, yet here Thisbe was tucking vibes across wires and being careful not to disturb the roots. She would make a good captain. A great one even, with time and confidence. Instead of saying that aloud, Brnine smiled. “It's nice hearing you talk about plants.”
Thisbe looked at Brnine. Intently enough that Brnine thought they could see a dull glow to her eyes. “The trellis is almost finished. I will send a picture. Operant Valence might enjoy it.”
“I’m sure. I’ll show them when I find them,” said Brnine. “Do you know where they went after this?”
“No,” Thisbe said. “But considering that you’re here, the wrong way.”
The day went on like this; Brnine spun from room to room of the Blue Channel, trying again, and again to reach out mentally, and being barred by a wall of static each time.
Their feeling of wrongness that had been following them persisted and was intensifying, a vague panic suffusing them. A headache started pounding at their temples, souring their mood and distracting them such that they did not hear Jesset’s voice at first, ringing out from their scouter. “Paging captain Brnine! Captain my captain!”
Brnine felt a helpless smile break out at his sing-song call. "Yes sir, commander Jesset.”
“Oh, honorifics today,” he said wryly – but pleased, they could tell. “What’s the occasion?”
“Yeah, yeah,” they mumbled, rolling their eyes. “Hey, you heard from Valence
“No? Should I have?”
“Just checking. I’m trying to find them.”
“Brnine, you live with them.” Jesset sounded bemused.
“I don't—“They felt embarrassed. “I live with a lot of people.”
“Mmm,” Jesset hummed. “Speaking of— have a minute? I've got more details on upcoming deployment. You’ll need the whole crew on this one.”
“I always do,” Brnine said, thoughtlessly or the bald honesty of the statement might have kept them from voicing it. They refocused on their concern. “But I need to find them. This ship really isn’t that big, it shouldn’t be this hard.” They were feeling a little angry amidst their fear. Didn't Valence know they didn’t like ominous emotional shit? They’d been close for long enough.
Before they could say more, a new voice rolled in. Gucci Garantine, co-commander of the Blue Channel, voice dry as a dust storm. “Must the two of you take personal calls on the shared channel? I’ve told you it's disruptive.”
“This is a command issue,” Jesset said seriously, his grin blatant in his voice.
“Hi, Gucci, hey.” Brnine jumped in, sensing Gucci’s building annoyance. “It started as a work call! Mission details, y’know.” They had grown used to being a mediator between the Blue Channel’s handlers. Gucci could wield passive aggressiveness like a knife, and Jesset was unafraid to duel.
“It’s fine,” she sighed. “Check in later on the supply drop?”
“Yes ma’am,” they assented, saluting to nothing.
“Don’t be smart,” Gucci said flatly.
“No promises Commander,” Brnine said gravely. It was hard to resist poking the bear with Gucci. These days, their relationship involved much less stealing, and a good deal more respect, but only a modicum more warmth. Despite this, Brnine found themselves often grappling with strange urges to act a little closer than they were. Stranger than that, Gucci let them.
“I’m leaving. But Brnine... have you tried just staying in one place?” Something about the timbre of her voice made them feel like they were close enough to touch the waves coming off it. Brnine’s fingers splayed across the comm without thinking at the sound of it. “It’s Valence. They’ll get to you eventually.”
It began to rain, drumming on the walls of the Blue Channel. Thisbe sent the photo of the trellis. Brnine sent back “Wow!” and three tomato emojis.
Despite Gucci’s advice, they kept going, darting from corridor to corridor. If Brnine had to say why: they would say instinct. She’d probably call them hardheaded.
They looked again, as they had throughout the day, at Asepsis’ live map of the Blue Channel and its own appendages. All day it had looked the same as it always had, the little gray drone dots patrolling where Brnine had bid them. Now though as they stared hard and unyielding at it, it began to look different, to change, to keep changing. The halls of the ship were shifting. The placement of the doors made no sense. The size of it. It wasn’t right. They knew their Blue Channel and the steps they had taken. None of it was right.
They wanted to hear Valence’s voice. Static.
Brnine put their hand on their scouter and let the familiar surface ground them. “Come to me,” they whispered, typing the message as they spoke. “All of you, I need you.”
At once the restless dots began to move with speed but much less precision than usual. They stalled at dead ends that shouldn’t exist, got turned around in circles; but within a few minutes, the vent next to Brnine burst open, and three drones clattered out, pressing in close to their feet.
From all angles, Asepsis ran to them. Not caterwauling like it had this morning, the warning Brnine should have heeded, but with careful quick steps, scanning every inch around them, clouding around them fully— like they were protecting them from something.
With Asepsis by their side, they felt more certain and began again to move. They rounded a corner, drones following, and there, leaning on a wall, looking out a long window up to the faint light of stars through the drifting storm clouds, was Figure. Brnine was shocked at the darkness, its finality. Another day slipped through their fingers.
A drone dashed forward and knocked into Figure’s feet clumsily, still off-kilter, and began scanning him. It lingered on the purple sprays of sage shooting from his head, still wary of the new addition and the divinity that clung to it. He looked down at it, and then looked at them. “Hey Brnine.”
“Uh, hey Figure.” Brnine tried to seem less harried than they felt, wiping their palms on their pants and shoving them into their pockets. “What are you doing out here?”
“Nothing really. The rain woke me up. It makes me restless.”
“I didn’t realize it was so late,” Brnine said sheepishly, and then added: “You probably haven’t seen Valence, huh?”
“Not since the movie yesterday,” Figure said apologetically.
Brnine huffed a tired breath, waving off the tone. Their headache was getting worse, but Brnine still noticed the tension in Figure’s frame. “You okay?”
“I don’t know. I’m feeling weird, I guess.” He was silent a while, but a silence that had potential for fruit, so they waited. Figure had always cut an imposing figure; tall and strong, having been past the final threshold and brought back half-monument, half-vassal. Otherworldly. Even more so now, with his new permissive tether, the one called devil, the one that trailed a sweet scent across the whole ship. When he spoke again, his voice thrummed like storm clouds gathering on the wind. “It feels like… my life is just beginning. Again. But the world is more precarious than ever. we’re on a knife’s edge every other day. I can’t do enough.”
“I get that,” Brnine said. “I- Yeah. I get that.” The headache had condensed to a sharp point between their eyes. They didn’t want to think about the things they couldn’t do, the whole awful book of them. “The stars are nice tonight.”
“They are,” Figure agreed, seemingly unruffled by their trouble with keeping the thread. “Cori told me once that the skies in the Mirage put these to shame. That they were blessed.” The two of them gazed together at their ordinary galaxies, vast and silent. “You ever play basketball, captain?”
“Nah. Never really been an athletics guy.” They kneaded fingers on their forehead. The throb was stubborn. “I’ve seen Partial go some rounds.”
“He’s very good,” Figure attested, then paused, tilting their head. “Weren’t you in the Summer Passage?”
“That was… with more of a mental sport.”
“Right, right.” Figure’s voice was warm with amusement, but it turned thoughtful as he spoke on, and ever more serious. “I was dreaming about it. Dreaming it was my first life again, playing ball with my students. I woke up crying.” They put their hand to their chest and grasped their shirt in their fist. “I don’t know if I've ever done that. I don’t really have any of those memories.”
“Maybe that was one,” Brnine offered. “Dreams are weird.”
“Dreams are weird,” they agreed, and sighed. “I've been feeling rather mortal lately. Again, I suppose. It’s an adjustment.”
‘Mortal is good, I think. Growth. Like—” they tapped their own head in the place where Figure’s bloomed. “She’s all about cycles and shit. Returns. You can die, yeah, and that sucks, but we won’t let anything happen to you anyway. And now you can cry again too. It’s kinda like going home.”
Brnine had no clue if they were making any sense, but Figure laughed, sudden and barking. The sound surprised them both. “You’re right, you know. You're right.” They chuckled again, tiredly. “I should get to sleep. Maybe I'll dream proper this time.”
“Good. You’ll need the rest, we’ll have a new mission soon enough.” Brnine’s eyes were tired too, tender from a day of strain and searching. They scrubbed at them, and their hands came away wet.
Figure saw. “Are you okay?”
Slowly, they shook their head, feeling helpless and finally ready to admit it. “This whole day I've felt like I've been chasing shadows. Like a dream. I don't know why.”
Figure’s face did not allow for the type of articulation most did, but Brnine could see it shift in fondness. See an exasperated smile. “Come on, Brnine. You can’t see it?”
See what? They almost asked, but found themselves instead drawn to the window. The clouds had dissipated. The stars were brilliant now. When Brnine had first arrived on Palisade, one of their favorite things to do was watch them. The Principality had laid its cold hands on this planet, but not on its stars. It was free of the satellite constellations crafted by empire, cold and haunted. Palisade’s stars were raw. Living. People made their stories, not power. Brnine had stargazed often on the nights they felt hollow and regretful, lonely and angry, the nights they couldn't sleep from– from–
The thought slipped away. They knew this though: the stars were brilliant now, and entirely too many.
“This is wrong,” Brnine said quietly. Their headache was dwarfed by the tight ache in their chest. “This isn’t my sky.”
Figure pulled himself off the wall, and walked the last few feet towards them, drones parting at his feet. He clapped their shoulder and said, “That’s my captain.” And kept walking past Brnine, down the long corridor, sage rustling with their steps, until Figure was gone.
There is a door at the end of the hall that had not been there before. Brnine girded their bravery, put a hand to the pulsing pain in their sternum, and opened it.
The air smelt sweet. Their eyes began to burn like they had been pressed up against cut onion. In the dim room was a wolf’s silhouette.
“Valence.” Brnine croaked, and out of their mouth came no sound at all.
“No,” said Dust. “We’re not.”
And the world crashed around them.
“This isn’t real,” Brnine said, voice tight.
A gentle smile. Valence’s smile. “We’ve been trying to find you. To tell you.”
Brnine felt queasy. They pushed their cup forward, closer to the side of the table where the affliction Dust sat. Was this real tea, or would they wake up with sand in their mouth? It smelled good. They didn’t try it.
Dust was still smiling. “We tried to make it easy on you. You wanted to talk.”
“I wanted to talk. I still do it just– Could you be someone else, maybe?”
“Your memories indicate that our form is one that is important to you. We thought it might be pleasant. We did this a lot, once.”
Brnine stared hard at the form. Dust had brightened the room, and in that light and the faded prominence of false memory, they could see that Valence's body was changed. Instead of scrap metal, the frame was made of what looked like obsidian, though it was impossibly flexible. The mist of their true form was still exposed to the eye, swirling amaranthine haze.
The pain of Brnine’s brain rebelling from their reality had ceased, but still they ached, heart beating hard and afraid– of this feeling, looking at them again, whole in front of their eyes, but still gone; of this false place of living ghosts and broken corridors, and the knowing that they would never have it again. “They look different.”
“You don’t remember?”
And Brnine did, when they dug for the life layered under reality. They remembered how Valence had killed Crysanth and survived, gotten back to them days later as just a wisp, only heard when they curled around Thisbe’s sensors. Of how Brnine had wept with relief, and a joy they had never before felt with such fierceness; how they had built them a new body and held them close. How since that day they had been as one in the mouths of Millennium Break, Captain Brnine, and their wolf pilot.
They stared into their cup, vision wobbling dangerously. “That's a nice dream,” they said finally.
“You mind was having trouble with it. It was both rejecting me and holding on.”
“Huh,” they half-grunted, feeling embarrassed and peeled open. “You could’ve just sent me a letter, or something.”
“Letters are not our way. I should have been able to walk to you easily and break the illusion.” They leaned in, snout shining in the dreamlight of the forged world. “But you changed the hallways. You took the reins without even knowing. You are very interesting, Captain Brnine.”
“So I’ve heard.” Dust even sounded like them. But before their eyes, they began to change, like a sandcastle crumbling at the tide, this Valence they had never known washed away, leaving a coarsely crafted robot with russet fox ears. Another Nobel. Dust must have been fond of them.
“Alright then.” Brnine took a breath and propped their elbows on the table. This was what they were meant for. This was the life they had chosen. They hoped those that had been lost could forgive them. “Let’s talk.”