The Foxfire Saga

Akiko lingered at the edge of the group, still shackled, her presence marked by the faint clink of the cuffs at her wrists. She leaned against a piece of salvaged machinery, watching.

Cassandra stepped closer to the Iron Reclaimer who'd introduced herself as Kara. The tension between the two leaders was palpable. Controlled, but dense as coiled wire. Their conversation unfolded in low, firm tones: quiet negotiation wrapped in steel.

They were setting boundaries. Trying not to draw blood.

The Reclaimer camp buzzed with purposeful movement. Makeshift defenses. Rushed repairs. It had the feel of a fortress built in the middle of an earthquake, every wall braced against collapse.

Akiko's eyes drifted. Habit. Instinct. To the side, she caught a smaller scene unfolding.

Lila was speaking with Mark.

The two stood slightly apart from the others, their voices low. Akiko couldn't hear the words, but body language said enough. Lila's gestures were small but emphatic. Mark's posture was stiff, shoulders tight beneath his suit.

His visor dipped, avoiding eye contact, but there was a familiarity to the way they stood, like two people who'd once shared space they didn't want anyone else to know about.

Then Lila reached out, brushing Mark's forearm in what might've been a comforting gesture.

He flinched, barely, but enough. His gaze flicked toward the Sovereign crew, then back to Lila.

Akiko smirked faintly.

Looks like someone's got secrets.

She said nothing, but filed it away.

A sharp word from Cassandra pulled her attention back. The leaders were finishing up. Kara's stance had shifted. Still wary, but less hostile.

Cassandra turned and returned to the group, her tone clipped and resolute.

"Kara's agreed to let us access the deeper parts of the station," she announced. "But there are terms."

Hayes crossed his arms, visor angled down. "Terms?"

"They're claiming the ore and mining equipment as salvage," Cassandra said. "No matter what happens with the entity, the Reclaimers want a payday."

Hayes stiffened. "They're planning to steal SSC property? Command's going to love that. We'll be the ones answering for letting scavengers walk off with corporate assets."

Cassandra's gaze turned sharp. "Drop it, Hayes. This mine's abandoned. I'm not starting a fight over salvage rights when we've got bigger things to worry about."

"It's still Haven property," Hayes muttered. "Our superiors—"

"—will let the lawyers sort it out later," she cut in. "Right now, our priority is Tomas and whatever's happening deeper in the station. If we don't deal with that, there won't be anything left to argue about."

Hayes exhaled sharply, lips pressed tight behind his helmet. "This is going to come back to bite us."

Akiko raised an eyebrow.

Lawyers, lords, leeches in different skins. Always eager to squabble over ruins, never ready to bleed for what lie beneath.

Let them bicker. When the station swallowed them whole, it wouldn't matter who held the deed.

She kept the thought to herself.

Cassandra swept her gaze across the group.

"We move out as soon as we're ready. Stay sharp. Don't give them a reason to rethink letting us through."

Her eyes lingered on Hayes. Then she turned, already shifting her focus to the next objective.

Akiko followed, her cuffs clicking with every step.

The truce would hold. For now.

But with Tomas lurking in the dark, and the entity watching from behind every wall...

It wouldn't take much to shatter it.

They moved cautiously through the Iron Reclaimers' camp, weaving between makeshift barricades and clusters of salvaged equipment.

The camp buzzed with subdued tension, like an engine left running too long.

A younger Reclaimer stepped forward, helmet tucked under one arm, light brown skin catching the station's pale light, hazel eyes fixed on Cassandra.

Her short black hair was matted from the helmet but did little to soften the determined set of her jaw.

"Excuse me," she said, voice quiet but steady. "Are you heading deeper into the station?"

Cassandra stopped. "That's the plan. Why?"

The woman shifted, her grip tightening on the strap of her pack. "One of the people who went missing… he was my friend. If you're going down there, I want to come. I need to try to find him."

Hayes immediately stepped forward, tone sharp. "Absolutely not. We're not taking on civilians. This isn't a scavenger hunt."

One more wouldn't hurt their odds of survival. And if she wasn't part of the Sovereign's crew…

Akiko kept her expression light, almost bored. "Oh, come on. What's the harm? She can't make the group any more of a liability than I already am."

That meant an opportunity. Someone who might look the other way when the time came. Someone who might help her disappear.

Hayes turned on her, scowling. "You're not exactly helping your case."

"That's the point," Akiko said, lifting her cuffed wrists. "If you can drag me along, I don't see why she can't come."

"Enough," Cassandra said, cutting off the argument. Her attention shifted back to the woman. "What's your name?"

"Raya," the woman replied quickly. "Raya Solvi."

Cassandra studied her. Then, evenly: "If you're coming, carry your weight. No hesitation. No slowing us down. Understood?"

Raya nodded, relief flickering across her face. "Understood."

Hayes looked ready to object again, but Cassandra silenced him with a glance. "We don't have time to argue. Let's move."

They moved through dim corridors, the air thick with heat and old circuitry. The mining equipment loomed at odd angles, hulking silhouettes of forgotten industry.

Akiko drifted closer to Raya, watching her sidelong. The girl's nervousness showed in the way her hands flexed against the pack strap, the flickering glances she cast toward Akiko's cuffs.

Akiko slowed her pace until they walked side by side.

"You don't seem as rough as the rest of the Reclaimers," she said lightly. "How'd they rope you into this rust bucket?"

Raya blinked. "I, uh… It's not exactly a glamorous story."

Akiko smirked. "Lucky for you, I'm not here for glamor. Lay it on me."

Raya hesitated, then gave a small, sheepish smile. "I grew up on a water reclamation station in the outer colonies. Boring work. After it shut down, I drifted between jobs. Salvage gigs. One thing led to another…"

"And here you are," Akiko finished. "Chasing ghosts in a haunted station."

Raya laughed softly. "Something like that. I'm not just here for the salvage. The guy who went missing, he was a friend. I couldn't just… stay behind."

Akiko's voice softened. "You're braver than you look."

Raya shrugged. "Doesn't feel brave. Just feels… necessary."

Akiko opened her mouth to respond.

A metallic scrape echoed down the corridor.

Raya stiffened. Akiko's hands tensed, cuffs clinking.

Cassandra's voice came over comms, low and firm. "Stay close. We're not alone up here."

A cold whisper slid through Akiko's thoughts, faint but unmistakable.

"Progress. Adaptation. Success."

She glanced at the others. No one else reacted.

Only me, then.

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Another metallic scrape. Louder this time. A figure emerged from the shadows.

It moved with a jerky gait, dragging a jagged strip of metal behind it. Makeshift blade or torn conduit, it was hard to say. The thing screeched with every step, grating against the floor like an open wound.

Akiko froze.

The suit was patched and torn, runes scrawled across it in erratic patterns, glowing faintly with inner light. The helmet's visor was cracked, reflecting the group in warped, broken fragments.

The figure tilted its head. Watching.

Raya gasped. "No…"

She stepped forward. "Darin?"

Akiko's head snapped toward her.

Raya took another step. "Darin, it's me! It's Raya! You're okay, right? Say something!"

The figure paused. The jagged weapon lifted slightly.

Then the voice came. Layered. Hollow. Not Darin.

"Resource. Function. Complete."

The last word echoed.

Raya's hope crumpled. "No…"

The figure stepped forward. No longer a person. Just a vessel.

Akiko's jaw clenched. "Cassandra. We've got a problem."

The figure's grip tightened on the jagged blade.

Then it lunged. Unnatural speed closed the distance in a heartbeat. If any trace of Darin remained, it didn't recognize Raya, or anyone else.

"Get back!" Cassandra barked. Her rifle flared with a precision shot. Direct hit to the chest.

But the runes flared brighter, and the blast evaporated against a shimmering shield.

Chaos erupted. The team scattered into defensive positions. Weapons up. Fire coordinated.

But Akiko was already backing away, heart pounding as the corrupted figure's fractured visor turned toward her. She felt the entity's attention like a cold needle threading into her mind; peeling back thoughts, studying.

The blade sang through the air. Akiko twisted sideways, the edge missing her by inches. Its earlier mechanical movement replaced with smooth, unnatural precision.

She barely had time to react before it came again. Each movement surgical, deliberate. The creature was locked on her, and the others couldn't risk a clear shot.

"Keep it away from her!" Cassandra ordered, voice tight.

Pulses of gunfire struck the shield, each shot shimmering uselessly.

"We can't get a clean hit with you in the way!" Hayes shouted.

"I'm trying!" Akiko snapped, dodging again.

The magboots clinging her to the floor dragged with every move. She felt like a dancer forced to perform in chains.

No more.

"This is too slow," she muttered.

In one motion, she reached down and disabled the magboots. The faint hum cut off, and suddenly she was weightless.

The next attack came.

Akiko rose. She pushed off the floor, twisting midair. The blade whooshed beneath her as she pivoted in freefall, catching a bulkhead and launching sideways.

The corrupted figure faltered, blade slicing only air.

She moved, with grace, with speed, with freedom. No longer restricted to the metal floor. Every twist, every push, every pivot sent her dancing through the corridor in all three dimensions.

Cassandra didn't hesitate. "Focus fire! Keep it busy, she'll keep clear."

Akiko kicked off another wall, spinning just out of range. The whispers deepened.

"Dynamic. Observe. Test."

"Oh, I'm testing you," she muttered, spinning again. "Let's see if you pass."

The corrupted figure lunged, but Akiko was already gone, twisting beyond its reach. She caught a glimpse of Raya frozen, shaking, eyes wide with horror.

The figure's strikes grew sharper. Each swing came closer.

It's learning, Akiko realized. Adapting.

The blade screamed through the air. Akiko's lungs burned, heart hammering. The others fired. Useless. Their attacks sparked against the shield, doing little more than a slow war of attrition

Then, the blade came again.

She raised her hands uselessly. Not to block, just to protect.

Steel met steel.

The cuffs shattered with a metallic crack.

Her hands were free.

For the briefest moment, she felt relief. Relief that didn't last.

Pain followed.

The jagged blade tore through her suit, slicing across her chest. Not deep, but deep enough. The weave slowed it, saved her, but not without cost.

Akiko cried out, twisting away, clutching the tear. The HUD flashed red.

"Akiko, fall back!" Cassandra shouted. "Get clear!"

"I'm fine," Akiko bit out.

She pushed off the wall, momentum carrying her clear, but the figure followed. It wouldn't stop.

They've got to have a weakness, she thought, spinning away from another strike.

But so far, nothing worked.

She spared a glance at the others. Cassandra and Hayes moved with disciplined precision, firing only when they had a clean shot. Weston tried to flank the figure, but his movements were sluggish in the zero-g environment.

But the corrupted figure didn't stop. It didn't falter. Whatever Darin had once been was gone, replaced by something faster, colder, crueler.

Akiko clenched her teeth as the blade tore through the air again, close enough to tug at the torn edge of her suit. Her movements were slowing. Her breathing was getting ragged.

They still hadn't figured out how to hurt this thing.

"I can't keep this up forever," she muttered, dodging a sweep that would've gutted her. The entity wasn't trying to kill her quickly. It was testing her. Studying her. Pushing her toward exhaustion.

And it wasn't finished yet.

She twisted, muscles taut, adrenaline sharp, just ahead of another blow. Her eyes caught something. Jagged debris, a shard of metal broken from the wall.

No time to hesitate.

She kicked off the nearest surface, tucking beneath the blade and snatching the fragment mid-flight. She caught herself on a protruding pipe, and reoriented toward the threat.

"Two can play that game," she muttered, brandishing the makeshift dagger.

She pushed off in a forward lunge, driving it into the corrupted figure's side. The edge barely penetrated, but it scraped, grinding into the runes etched across its suit.

One of the glowing sigils stuttered, its light dimming. It wasn't much. But it was something.

Her chest burned, every breath a knife. But she moved again, faster now, slicing and feinting, carving at the runes. The shard was crude. Her strikes were wild.

But the figure reacted. It learned.

This isn't enough, she thought. It was adapting to every rhythm, every angle.

She needed more.

"Any help you can give me?" she snapped aloud.

Her HUD flickered.

Then a voice crackled through her audio. Stilted, strained, but unmistakably belonging to her AI.

"No...connection."

Akiko grimaced. She remembered the frigate. How the AI had hijacked the enemy systems to help her. But here, on neutral ground, the link was weaker.

"Great," she muttered, sidestepping another swing with a careful touch, skewing herself to the side. "No connection. Weak magic. No problem."

The voice returned, more urgent:

"Solution...possible."

Diagrams flooded her HUD. Dense schematics, data points, overlays spinning too fast to process. Akiko's eyes darted between the chaos on her screen and the chaos around her.

"I don't think we have time to build anything!" she hissed. "Unless you've got a miracle, we're—"

The diagrams shifted. Simplified.

An overlay appeared: the figure's body, marked with glowing highlights. Weak points. Runes with flickering stability. Cracks in the armor of perfection.

Akiko's grip tightened on the shard. A wicked grin split her face.

"That," she whispered, "I can work with."

She moved again, her mind racing back to Cassandra's trials. The tutorials, the diagrams, the math. Reaction mass. Vectors. Inertia. Every lesson burned into her synapses.

"I just... need a little boost."

Her breath slowed. Her body focused. She reached inward.

Even in this strange world, her magic was still hers.

Foxfire ignited soft and blue, blooming behind her like a flame jet. She compressed it into a concentrated burst, a thruster of pure will.

And then she flew. Weightless. Untethered. Free.

She twisted midair, the corrupted blade slicing harmlessly through the space she'd just vacated. The shard in her hand shimmered, blue light licking along its edge, no longer crude, but enchanted.

The blade came again.

Akiko dove, spinning inside its guard, she drove her dagger into the highlighted rune on its chest. The impact sparked blue light, foxfire searing through the unstable glyph.

The rune shattered. The shield sputtered, weak and inconsistent.

The figure recoiled, stunned.

But its retaliation was instant. The blade came sweeping low, forcing her to kick off and twist away. She slammed into a wall, gasping as her chest flared with pain. Her vision swam.

And Hayes didn't hesitate.

Crack.

A rifle round slammed into its side.

The figure staggered. But didn't fall.

Akiko cursed under her breath. "Still not enough."

Her foxfire flickered. Her arms shook. Her makeshift blade was cracked from the impact.

I'm not Kaede, she thought bitterly. Her sister would've had the endurance. The control. The unflinching focus to see this through without breaking.

Akiko had always been fire and instinct. Now she was running out of both.

Her foxfire sputtered. The balance she'd relied on vanished. Her spin carried her too far, too fast. And before she could correct, the corrupted figure struck.

Its hand locked around the reinforced collar of her suit, jerking her off balance like a doll. Her eyes went wide.

She clawed at its wrist, legs kicking uselessly as it pulled her close.

Then came the presence.

Cold. Invasive. It pressed against the edge of her thoughts, searching for cracks. A thousand icy tendrils probing into the corners of her mind, scraping against the fragile boundary where self ends and system begins.

Her struggles weakened.

The whispers surged, deafening now.

"Dynamic. Absorb. Consume."

"Akiko!"

Cassandra's voice cut through the storm, sharp and urgent.

Akiko couldn't answer. Her vision blurred. She felt herself slipping. Not just body, but will. Identity.

For the briefest moment, she thought this was it.

Not like this.

Her grip firmed on the makeshift dagger in her hand. She brought it around in a single motion, sloppy, desperate, and jammed it into the exposed rune near the figure's hip.

The rune cracked. Energy flared and sputtered. Then died. Its shield failed entirely.

Then...

Crack.

A gunshot, sharp and singular.

The corrupted figure's head snapped back, a hole punched through its shattered visor. A heartbeat passed in silence.

Its grip slackened.

Akiko tore herself free, gasping, kicking back into weightlessness as the body collapsed. The runes across its suit flared, sputtered, and went dark.

She clutched her neck, breath ragged, vision slowly clearing.

A few meters away, Raya stood with her pistol still raised. Her hands shook, but her eyes were steady.

"Darin..." Her voice cracked, small and broken. "I'm sorry."

The figure floated, lifeless now. The eerie glow in its armor faded, leaving nothing but a hollow shell.

Akiko's breath still came in strained gulps, but she managed a nod toward Raya.

The younger woman slowly lowered her weapon.

Hayes grunted, voice quieter than usual. "Good shot."

Cassandra drifted forward, weapon still raised, her eyes sweeping the corridor. "We need to regroup. That wasn't the last of them."

Akiko floated to a nearby bulkhead, gripping it for stability. Her chest ached. Her limbs trembled.

Her gaze drifted to Raya, who hadn't moved. Her eyes were locked on Darin's body.

"I couldn't save him," she whispered, barely audible.

Akiko looked at her. At the grief in her eyes, the guilt etched in her expression.

"No one could," she said softly. "But you saved me."

Raya blinked, lips parting. Then she nodded.

The faint chittering of countless legs echoed down the corridor. Rapid, relentless, drawing closer by the second. The sound scraped against Akiko's nerves, unmistakable now.

More spider bots. And from the noise alone, a lot of them.

Cassandra's gaze swept the team. Her expression hardened.

"We're falling back to the Reclaimer camp," she announced, voice cutting clean through the rising tension. "We need a plan. If we stay out here and get overrun, we're done."

Akiko exhaled a breath she hadn't realized she was holding.

Her chest still burned from the wound, and every muscle trembled from the drain of foxfire and adrenaline. The thought of retreat, just for now, felt like mercy.

Cassandra moved toward her, hand steady as she reached out and touched Akiko's arm, guiding her gently downward.

"Re-engage your magboots," she said quietly, voice low but firm.

Akiko nodded. Her fingers moved slowly, clumsily, until the magnets clicked back on. She settled onto the floor, boots anchoring her once more.

Her body felt heavier than before.

Cassandra's voice came over a private channel, clipped but carrying a strange softness beneath the steel.

"Good job back there," she said. "But don't let your newfound freedom go to your head. You're still on probation."

Akiko blinked. For a heartbeat, she wasn't sure she'd heard right.

Being useful had its benefits, but she had no intention to give them another chance to chain her down.

Her lips curved into the faintest smirk. "Noted."

Cassandra didn't respond. Her visor revealed nothing.

A second later, her voice snapped back across the team channel, crisp and commanding.

"Fall back. Now. Stick together. Stay alert."

The team moved in formation, urgency contained beneath practiced control.

Akiko followed, her steps careful, every breath measured.

She cast one final glance over her shoulder. Back toward the corridor, where the ruined body of the corrupted figure still floated in dim shadow.

The whispers were gone. But the feeling they left behind still clung to her skin like frost.