My Infinite System.

The Star-Jumper was silent save for the ever-present, soft hum of its systems. Marc stood in the doorway of the small quarters they had given Lira, his arms crossed, leaning against the frame. The girl was asleep on a cot, a thin thermal blanket pulled up to her chin. In the dim light, the silver of her eyes was hidden, and she looked... small. Not a fugitive, not a key to a conspiracy. Just a kid.

A strange, hollow feeling settled in Marc’s chest. It wasn’t pity. It was something sharper, more personal. He looked at her, really looked, and for the first time, he let himself wonder. What would his life have been like if Eron Thorne had never taken him? If he had grown up in that house with a mother and a father? If he had known Lucian not as an enemy to be broken, but as a little brother to tease and protect? If he had been there to see Lucy grow up?

The images were fuzzy, ill-formed ghosts. A family dinner. Teaching a smaller Lucian how to throw a punch. The sound of a mother’s laugh. They were someone else’s memories, a life that had been stolen from him as thoroughly as Lira’s parents had been stolen from her. The bitterness was a familiar coat, but tonight it felt heavier, lined with a regret he rarely allowed himself to feel.

A soft shift in the cot. Lira’s silver eyes fluttered open. She didn’t startle. She just looked at him, her gaze clear and unsettlingly aware.

”You’re staring,” she whispered, her voice raspy with sleep. ”What’s wrong?”

Marc straightened up, the familiar mask of indifference sliding back into place. ”Nothing. Go back to sleep.”

She pushed herself up on her elbows, the blanket pooling around her waist. ”You look sad.”

”I’m not sad,” he said, too quickly. He turned to leave.

”Did you lose someone too?”

The question stopped him dead. He stood with his back to her for a long moment, then slowly turned around. He walked over and sat on a storage crate near her cot, the metal groaning under his weight. He didn’t look at her, instead focusing on a seam in the floor.

”Something like that,” he muttered.

”I’m sorry.”

”Don’t be. It was a long time ago.”

Lira was quiet for a moment, studying him. Her moth-like antennae twitched gently. ”You don’t talk like the others. You’re... sharper. Like you expect everything to hurt.”

Marc let out a short, humorless breath. ”Everything usually does.”

”That’s a lonely way to live.”

”It’s a safe way to live.”

They sat in silence for a minute, the ship humming around them. It was Lira who broke it again.

”My people are called the Cerebrians,” she said, as if answering a question he hadn’t asked. ”Our minds develop faster than our bodies. My parents said it’s a blessing and a curse. We understand the world too well, too soon.” She tucked her knees to her chest. ”I understand that my parents are gone. I understand that the company is evil. I understand that I might not survive this. Knowing doesn’t make it hurt less. It just means I can’t pretend.”

Marc finally looked at her. The wisdom in her young, silver eyes was staggering. It wasn’t the naive hope of a child; it was the grim acceptance of an adult trapped in a small body. He saw a reflection of his own stolen childhood—the forced maturity, the loss of innocence, the weight of a truth too heavy to carry.

”I was taken from my family when I was about your age,” he found himself saying, the words feeling foreign on his tongue. He never talked about this. ”The man who took me... he told me they didn’t want me. That they were glad to be rid of me. I believed him for twenty years.”

Lira listened, her head tilted. ”But it was a lie?”

”Yeah. It was a lie.” The admission was like pulling a shard of glass from an old wound. ”They thought I was dead. They moved on, had other kids... a life without me.”

” That’s worse,” Lira said softly. ”To be forgotten is worse than to be hated.”

” Is it?” Marc asked, the question genuine. ”Hate is simple. Grief... grief is complicated.”

Lira considered this. ”My people believe that energy never disappears. It just changes form. My parents’ energy... it’s still out there. In the stars, in the light of this ship, in me.” She looked at him. ”Your old family’s energy is in your brother, and your sister. You’re not disconnected. You’re just a different form of what you were supposed to be.”

Marc stared at her, stunned by the simple, profound logic of it. It was a child’s philosophy, filtered through an ancient, intelligent race. It didn’t erase the pain, the lost years, the rage, but it... reframed it.

”You’re a strange kid, you know that?” he said, but there was no malice in it.

”I know,” she replied, a faint smile touching her lips. ”You’re a strange grown-up.”

For the first time in a very, very long time, Marc felt something akin to a real smile tug at his own mouth. It felt strange and unpracticed.

”Get some sleep, Lira,” he said, his voice softer than he intended.

”Will you be here when I wake up?” The question was asked without a trace of fear, only a simple need for data.

Marc looked at the girl—the brilliant, orphaned Cerebrian who saw the universe in terms of energy and truth. He saw the ghost of the brother he could have been to Lucian, the protector he might have been to Lucy.

”Yeah,” he said, standing up. ”I’ll be here.”

He returned to his spot in the doorway, resuming his watch. But the silence felt different now. The hollow feeling in his chest was still there, but it was no longer filled only with bitterness. It was now also filled with the quiet, resilient energy of a child who refused to be erased, and the faint, terrifying possibility of a connection he thought had been burned away a lifetime ago. He was still a weapon. But perhaps, he could be a shield, too.