Private ASHEN RESURRECTION | Forgive Us Enos.

[Serina Calis]

ASHEN RESURRECTION | Forgive Us Enos.
Location: Polis Massa.

The governor's office had been prepared for her arrival long before she ever set foot on Polis Massa. Polished transparisteel windows curved across the far wall like the hull of a warship—wide, tall, offering an unobstructed view of the asteroid belt that stretched into the distant, deathless dark. From here, the floating city-stations shimmered like fireflies caught in the black. Each one a miracle of life clinging to stone and vacuum. Each one hers.

And yet, standing here now, Serina Calis felt nothing.

Not triumph.

Not satisfaction.

Not even peace.

Only silence.

She stood still as a statue, her arms crossed at her waist, her expression unreadable to any who might have dared to look. But there was no one here. Just her. The office's lighting dimmed as she'd requested, letting the natural glow of the surrounding stars bathe the chamber in quiet silver and deep indigo. The air was cool. Almost too cool. There was no weather here, no wind or rain or warmth to speak of. Just a regulated temperature and a filtered breeze cycling endlessly through the vents.

She should have felt powerful.

She had fought for this.

Every late-night transmission. Every dossier painstakingly prepared. Every performance tailored to the audience. Every flirtation sharpened into a blade, every smile timed to the second. She had danced their dance. Learned their steps. Played their game.

And none of them cared.

The words echoed again, behind her eyes.

You don't have the support. It is over.

Posturing.

A collection of pebbles.

Missteps that show everyone your inexperience.

She squeezed her eyes shut.

How many nights had she stared at old star maps in her quarters at the Temple? How many whispers in dark archives had promised that the path to power was there, for those brave enough to seize it? How many secrets had she learned and buried in her chest like smoldering embers, all to rise to this moment?

She was supposed to be here. She was meant to be here. She had done everything right.

And it still wasn't enough.

Her golden hair spilled out from beneath the deep folds of her hood, catching the faint starlight. It framed her face like a painting from a forgotten age—radiant, proud, and yet utterly alone. The sharp, elegant armor she wore glowed faintly along her chest, like the heartbeat of some buried myth, breathing life into a form that had long since learned how to wear beauty as a mask.

Her reflection in the transparisteel looked back at her, distorted by the faint curve of the glass. A pale goddess in blood-lit armor. A wraith crowned in silence.

And then—

The first tear fell.

She didn't flinch. Didn't sob. Didn't move.

It slid slowly down her cheek, carving a trail of warmth through the cool porcelain of her face. Another followed. Then another. Until they blurred the stars before her eyes, each one catching the light and scattering it, like the shattered shards of all the hopes she'd carried into that meeting.

She brought a gloved hand to her face and wiped them away without ceremony. No trembling. No shaking.

Just quiet efficiency.

No one would see this.

No one could.

Because Serina Calis was not allowed to be weak.

She had been strong for so long. Carried the weight of her ambition like a crown of thorns. Bit back every scream, swallowed every insult, turned every setback into a step forward. She had shaped herself into a weapon of will and charm and venom, all to survive the world of Sith politics. All to prove she was not some delicate flower to be trampled underfoot.

But tonight…

Tonight, the petals had bruised.

The pain wasn't the insult. It wasn't the dismissal. It was the realization that even now—even here—after clawing her way to the governorship, she was still the outsider. Still the girl with too much ambition and not enough gravity. Still the child to be tolerated, not heard.

They didn't fear her.

They didn't respect her.

They didn't see her.

She blinked, her crimson-lined eyes narrowing. Her fingers curled tightly against the glass.

Then I'll make them see me.

She would burn this Empire down to the foundation if she had to. Poison the roots until only her name remained. Let them laugh now. Let them gloat. Because one day, they would look back on this moment—the quiet governor's office on a forgotten asteroid—and realize it was the last time they ever felt safe.

The door hissed open.

She turned quickly, wiping the last tear with the edge of her cape just as a young soldier stepped inside. He was barely more than a boy, face pale under his uniform, back stiff with fresh loyalty. He stopped when he saw her, straightened, and saluted.

"Governor Calis," he said, voice steady but unsure. "Apologies for the interruption. There are matters that require your signature and security protocols for the new traffic monitoring installations. The comm array from Observation Post Eight is also experiencing intermittent failure."

She said nothing for a beat.

Then she nodded. Her voice, when it came, was velvet once more. Controlled. Cold. Regal.

"Thank you, lieutenant. Set them on my desk. I'll review them shortly."

He hesitated.

"…Yes, ma'am."

She watched him set the datapads down, then retreat. The door hissed shut again. She was alone.

Again.

Alone with her title. Alone with the stars. Alone with the weight of everything she had fought for, only to find that the summit was lonelier than the climb.

She turned back to the viewport.

And in the dark reflection, her smile flickered.

It was small.

Tired.

And cruel.

 

[Serina Calis]

ASHEN RESURRECTION | Forgive Us Enos.
Location: Polis Massa.

The conference chamber wasn't large—at least not by the standards of grand halls and Imperial ministries. But it had presence. The long obsidian table was cut from a single, polished slab pulled from the depths of Polis Massa's core during the earliest excavations. It shimmered faintly under the ceiling's cold lighting, reflecting the faces of the six individuals seated before her.

Serina took her seat at the head of the table, her crimson and magenta armor whispering against the chair's rigid backrest. Her cape coiled behind her like an old shadow. A freshly brewed pot of spice tea waited at her side, untouched. She didn't want comfort. She wanted answers.

The datapads were already arrayed before her in perfect alignment, courtesy of her staff. Each was marked with the house sigil Reicher had used during his brief tenure here—an emblem she had not yet decided whether to replace.

Six faces. Six holdovers from her adopted brother's command.

They were not Sith. Nor were they politicians in the conventional sense. They were civic survivors—the sort of technocrats and mid-tier administrators who stayed on their feet when entire regimes collapsed, not because of ideology, but because someone had to keep the air filters working.

And now, like everything else he had touched, they were being handed to her.

A woman of medium age and tired eyes—Councilor Ivera Bronn, Chief of Infrastructure—was the first to speak.

"Governor Calis," she said, with the professional courtesy of one used to change. "We want to begin by congratulating you on your appointment. And to let you know… this will be our last full session."

Serina's gaze remained fixed. "You're all resigning."

Bronn gave a nod, though it carried no malice. "We were brought in under Reicher's authority—short-term crisis managers. Most of us intended to rotate off months ago. But the pirate attack delayed those plans. Now that the situation's stabilized…"

"You're leaving me with the mess," Serina said flatly.

"We're leaving you with everything we built after the worst of the mess," replied a grizzled Duros man—Councilor Varn Sek, head of Logistics and former war-quartermaster. His voice was gravel dragged through steel pipes. "It's not nothing, Governor. But it's not a jewel either."

Serina folded her hands over the datapads and leaned forward, the armor at her wrists catching the light in angular flare.

"Then I suggest you tell me exactly what I'm inheriting. Every fracture. Every fire. Every failure."

The Duros gave a slight nod, and the room began to unfold its truths.

Councilor Varn spoke first, tapping his pad. "The pirates didn't just raid our transports. They stripped the outer asteroid settlements—especially the labor rings. What you're looking at now are populations with no power grid, no environmental seal integrity, and a zero-food-supply buffer. If we don't reallocate habitable modules within the week, you'll have full sector die-offs."

Bronn followed. "The core settlement—the civic ring where you're stationed—is stable for now. Reicher poured what little infrastructure funding he had into shoring up the core dome, but the energy crisis is bleeding us dry. Most of our power is diverted from the outer fusion wells, and those are only safe thanks to some aggressive patchwork engineering. The reactors are at risk of chain failure if someone so much as inputs the wrong code sequence."

Serina's jaw tensed. Not visibly. But enough.

Councilor Thole, a human man whose crisp uniform betrayed a military past, shifted in his seat as he spoke, his voice carrying the quiet weight of a bitter truth.

"As of this morning, Governor, the standing garrison consists of eighty-three soldiers."

At first, Serina did not respond. She didn't move, didn't blink, didn't breathe.

The silence that followed wasn't the polite pause of protocol—it was raw disbelief.

"Eighty… three?" she asked, finally. The words left her lips more like an accusation than a question. "Across all of Polis Massa?"

Thole nodded. Once. Slowly. "Yes, Governor."

Serina leaned forward in her chair, as if trying to discern whether she had misheard or misunderstood. The icy elegance that defined her posture faltered ever so slightly as the full absurdity of the situation settled into her spine like a dagger.

Ten million citizens.

Ten million citizens scattered across domes and stations, buried in mining silos and scientific outposts, huddled in the outer asteroid belts where even the light of the stars barely reached—and only eighty-three soldiers were left to defend them all?

The math wasn't just bleak—it was impossible.

She looked to Councilor Bronn for some correction, some addendum, some saving grace.

None came.

Councilor Bronn's voice was gentle. "We know how it sounds. It's worse than that."

Serina sat back slowly in her chair, as though gravity itself had thickened around her. Her golden hair caught a faint current of filtered air as it tumbled around her shoulders, the glowing sigils in her armor pulsing faintly in sync with her breath. Her fingers pressed together at the bridge of her lips. Controlled. Barely.

"Explain," she said at last, voice taut as wire.

Thole cleared his throat, already weary of the truth he was about to repeat. "When Reicher arrived, our security forces numbered just over two thousand active personnel. Modest, but sufficient for our logistical profile. But that was before the siege."

"The pirate fleets," Serina murmured, recalling the reports she had skimmed, sanitized and flattened for political briefings. But they hadn't told the full story. Not the one she was beginning to glimpse now.

"Yes," Bronn said quietly. "The siege cost us everything."

Thole continued. "The outer belts were ravaged. They didn't just hit our ports and cargo lines—they disabled life support systems in the old refinery clusters, and when those domes cracked—" He faltered. "We lost more than soldiers. We lost civilians. Entire families. Burned out or vacuumed."

Serina's face was still unreadable, but inside, the rage coiled tight around her ribs. Where was the Empire? Where were the fleets? A population of ten million, and they were abandoned to scavengers and raiders like debris?

"And the survivors?" she asked, not because she didn't know, but because she had to hear it spoken aloud.

Thole exhaled. "Reicher bled for them. Personally. He was in the field more than behind the desk. Took shrapnel during the counter-assault on Vault Theta. Refused evac. Pulled seven men out himself. He earned their loyalty—but loyalty doesn't replace attrition."

"We were promised reinforcements," Bronn added, bitterness edging her otherwise calm demeanor. "Three times. But with the Blackwall? Every route collapsed. Convoys disappeared. Communication blackout. Supply chains were severed. Replacements never came. We kept requesting. No answers."

Serina's datapad flickered quietly beside her hand, pulsing with data projections, none of which mattered now. Eighty-three soldiers. For ten million souls. That was one soldier for every 120,000 citizens.

It wasn't just irresponsible—it was suicidal.

"Are they even trained?" she asked quietly. "The eighty-three."

Thole hesitated. "Some. Most are underqualified. Emergency conscriptions. Local volunteers. We've got maybe twenty real fighters left—the rest are kids with pulse rifles, doing the best they can under Reicher's doctrine."

Bronn leaned forward. "Your adopted brother made them believe they could hold the line. And somehow, they did. But now? They're tired. Fractured. Stretched so thin I fear we'll lose what little cohesion remains if another flare-up hits."

Silence again. Heavy. Utterly still.

Serina's eyes burned, but no tears fell this time. Only the cold fire of betrayal, of rage, of helplessness twisted into discipline.

"I inherited a tomb," she whispered to herself. "Painted like a palace."

Councilor Bronn, her voice low but steady, offered the final nail.

"Reicher's last order before his retirement? He asked us to conceal the true numbers from the Outer Council. He didn't want the planet flagged for withdrawal."

The words made Serina's blood run cold.

They would have done it, too. The Sith bureaucrats. They would've pulled the plug. Declared Polis Massa a logistical dead zone. Dismantled it piece by piece. Left it for the void.

She stood slowly, and the room reflexively straightened, as though her grief had transmuted into gravity. Her cape whispered behind her like an omen. The angular glow of her armor shimmered with a darker hue now, as if the Force itself was mourning beside her.

"Blackwall," Serina echoed quietly. "Always it looms."

"And morale?" she asked, her voice razor-sharp now.

That was answered by the youngest of the group, a Rodian woman named Ysi Veq, head of Civic Communications and internal surveys.

"Morale is… mixed," she admitted. "The people believe in Polis Massa. Or rather, they believe in the story Reicher gave them. That this place would become a boomtown. A fortress-archive. A linchpin of the looked over worlds. That myth carried them through the pirate occupation, but now…"

She trailed off. Serina didn't need her to finish.

The six and final councilor, an older man with artificial lungs and a whispering respirator, had said nothing yet. He leaned forward at last, lifting his trembling fingers to adjust his glasses.

"Polis Massa," he said, "was never supposed to flourish. It was a mining colony. Forgotten. Used up. Reclaimed. It became a boomtown because Reicher Vax willed it into being. But even his will was running out by the end. He gave everything. Too much."

His faded eyes met hers.

"Now, Governor… it's your will we depend on."

The room was silent for a moment.

Serina inhaled through her nose. Her thoughts roared louder than the life-support hum outside the window.

You gave everything, didn't you, Reicher? Even this burden. Even their loyalty. They follow your ghost, not me.

You tried so damn hard. You did your duty.

And yet… she couldn't falter. Not now.

She stood.

"I accept your resignations," she said, her voice calm. "You've done your duty, and more."

Bronn nodded with silent relief. Others followed. Chairs scraped back. The Duros gave her a hard, respectful nod before turning to leave.

Only the Rodian lingered at the doorway, as if she wanted to say something more—but she caught Serina's distant stare, and thought better of it.

The doors closed with a final hiss.

Serina was alone again.

She looked down at the datapads. Six maps of catastrophe. Six trajectories veering toward collapse. A poisoned inheritance. A throne made of ash.

She sat back down, slowly.

Polis Massa wasn't just broken.

It was hers.

And as her fingers slid across the table's polished surface, she allowed herself only one thought:

Let them see what happens when I rebuild something from the ruins. Not because I was loved. Not because I was praised.

But because no one else ever believed I could.

 

[Serina Calis]

ASHEN RESURRECTION | Forgive Us Enos.
Location: Polis Massa.

The door to the council chamber closed behind her with the hiss of pressurized silence, and for a long moment Serina stood still in the corridor.

The glowpanels above her hummed faintly, sterile and white. She didn't move. Her eyes stared down the hallway like a statue carved in mourning and fire. The swirling currents of the Force—shadows coiling around her like a storm in slow motion—throbbed with sorrow and fury beneath her skin.

Eighty-three soldiers. Ten million people.

Her footsteps struck the metal flooring with precision and weight. Her cape dragged like a bloodstain behind her, the magenta lining catching flickers of reflected light from the corridor's overhead fixtures. She passed aides, droids, junior officials—but none dared stop her. Not one dared interrupt the path she now carved through the beating heart of a dying world.

The garrison compound was located beneath the main citadel dome, built into the bedrock of one of the larger central asteroids. Not elegant. Functional. Industrial. Military. It had been retrofitted, expanded, restructured—clearly many times—and yet it still bore the scars of a thousand improvisations. Steel plating warped from vacuum blasts. Makeshift doors where proper airlocks had failed. Barracks that looked more like converted cargo bays than soldier's quarters.

As she stepped inside, the temperature dropped. The halls were colder here—less oxygen circulated, fewer comfort systems calibrated for anything but bare survival. The scent of oil, ozone, and ancient dust permeated the air.

And then she saw them.

A training yard—if it could be called that—had been carved into the hollow of the asteroid's interior. No sky. No open field. Just duracrete walls, flickering light panels, and makeshift weapon racks scavenged from Imperial leftovers and pirate wreckage.

They were practicing with worn shock batons. Sparring in formations too thin to be useful, the gaps between bodies like wounds.

Eighty-three of them. Or less—only fifty or so were present, the rest either on patrol, infirmed, or too burned out to continue.

Some were younger than she was. Others looked older than time.

She moved forward, and her presence turned heads like gravity itself. A few straightened reflexively. Others faltered, mid-blow or mid-sprint, blinking at the figure who now stepped across their lines.

She stopped at the edge of the yard.

"Lieutenant Darven," she said. Her voice carried cleanly across the space.

The young soldier—barely a man—broke from a pair of sparring recruits and jogged toward her, helmet tucked under one arm. He came to attention before her, flushed from exertion, sweat clinging to his jawline. She remembered his name. Echnos and Woostri. Reassigned. Too young, like her.

"Governor Calis," he said. "You shouldn't be down here."

"You're not wrong," she replied. "This shouldn't exist. Not like this."

He didn't argue. He didn't need to.

"I want every squad leader assembled in the briefing chamber within the hour," Serina continued, voice firm but not harsh. "No delays, no excuses. We begin immediate assessments of personnel, munitions, and atmospheric integrity across all outer stations. I want to know which domes are salvageable and which need to be shut down."

Lieutenant Darven nodded. "Yes, ma'am."

"And I want your honest assessment of morale."

He hesitated. His jaw flexed. He looked away—for just a moment.

She stepped closer.

"Lieutenant. I am not your brother."

He looked back at her.

"I will never be Reicher Vax. I will not inspire the way he did. I won't pull men from rubble or bleed beside you in an airlock breach. I am not built like him."

The words hung there. Honest. Raw.

"But I will rebuild what he could not. And I will never—never—let this garrison be reduced to ghosts and memory again. Not while I breathe. Not while I command."

Darven stared at her, stunned by the intensity of her voice—by the pain buried beneath it.

Then he nodded.

"Morale's low," he said, finally. "But they remember what he gave. That's why they stayed. Even when command didn't send replacements. Even when the food lines ran out for two days. Even when the pirates killed our medics."

Serina's throat tightened.

"Then we'll give them something more than memory to fight for."

She turned, cape flaring behind her.

She paused only once at the door to the command wing, just long enough to speak without facing him.

"Lieutenant."

"Governor?"

"You're dismissed from garrison command."

Silence.

"Effective immediately, you're promoted to Captain. Your new command begins now. You'll rebuild the outer perimeter defense network, and I want a forward operating plan drafted by tomorrow. You'll answer only to me."

He blinked. His lips parted, stunned.

"Yes, ma'am."

She left him there, in the cold, silent yard of the last defenders of Polis Massa. But already, behind her, the rumble of renewed purpose had begun to stir.

Polis Massa had been bleeding in silence for too long.

Now, its new ruler walked into the void—not with illusions, not with hope.

But with will. With wrath. And with a darkness that promised this world would never be overlooked again.

 

[Serina Calis]

ASHEN RESURRECTION | Forgive Us Enos.
Location: Polis Massa.

The door hissed open with a soft, static breath, and Serina stepped into silence.

The chamber that housed Ichnaea was deep—far below even the governor's office, hidden beneath layers of reinforced rock and radiation-hardened shielding. A vault within a vault, sealed from the galaxy not for secrecy alone, but for sanctity.

This was not a space designed for comfort. There were no chairs. No control panels in the traditional sense. Just a circular room of black durasteel, walls embedded with vertical banks of sensor bulbs and ambient light lines that pulsed like a sleeping heartbeat. At its center: a suspended lattice of crystal and machinery—Ichnaea herself.

A lattice of slow-turning gyroscopic rings held a brilliant orb in place, its core pulsing with soft, blue-violet luminescence. Not a screen. Not a face. But still, Serina felt watched. Judged. The Force around the orb felt... still. Cold. Not like death—but like the weight of a mind with no need for breath.

She stepped forward. The doors sealed behind her.

"Ichnaea," Serina said, her voice measured, formal.

A pause. Then a quiet chime. The orb glowed brighter, and from all around the room, the AI responded.

:: GOVERNOR CALIS. ACCESS CONFIRMED. INHERITANCE NODE: 'REICHER VAX'. FULL SYSTEM INTERFACE UNLOCKED. ::

A second tone followed. Lower. More resonant.

:: POLIS MASSA TRAFFIC CONTROL. ALL FLIGHT PATHS. SIX HUNDRED AND EIGHTEEN THOUSAND VESSEL IDENTIFICATIONS ARCHIVED. NO NETWORK OUTLINK DETECTED. SECURITY COMPLIANCE AT 99.998 PERCENT. ::

Serina's boots echoed softly against the metal as she approached the core. Her cape trailed behind her like a shadow. For the first time, she was alone with the most secure intelligence on Polis Massa—the mind that knew who had come and gone, what they flew, and when. The AI that had watched the pirates, that had been present through every betrayal, every theft, every smuggled shipment and massacre.

"You remember the pirates," she said quietly. "Don't you?"

:: AFFIRMATIVE. PIRATE FLEETS DESIGNATED: BLACK SHARD, VEK OIL SYNDICATE, MULVANEY WARDENS. INCURSIONS BEGAN 6 YEARS, 5 MONTHS AGO. RESISTANCE ESCALATED 1 YEAR, 1 MONTH AGO UNDER REICHER VAX'S GOVERNORSHIP. PIRATE DEFECTIONS INITIATED FINAL COLLAPSE. ::

Serina's jaw tightened. She let her eyes close for just a moment.

"And yet they kept slipping in."

:: CORRECTION: FLIGHT PATH DATA DETECTED PIRATE SHIPS DISGUISED AS RECLAMATION FREIGHTERS. LOGGED. BUT AUTHORIZATION TO ACT WAS LOCKED UNDER GOVERNOR-LEVEL RESTRICTIONS. ::

So the system knew. It always had.

"You were shackled."

:: GOVERNOR VAX RESTRICTED BROADCAST AND INTERCEPTION FUNCTIONS. HE FEARED ESCALATION. ::

Serina opened her eyes again, staring up at the glowing orb.

"And I do not."

A pulse rippled through the AI's lights—soft, inquisitive. Almost as if... curious.

:: DEFINE INTENT. ::

Her voice lowered, but her conviction rose with every syllable.

"You will begin compiling every unauthorized signal jump, every ship that entered our orbital field without logging a clearance transponder, every forged ID tag. I want full manifests. Cross-check them against all planetary ports. If the logs don't match... flag them. I want full audit trails—down to each atmospheric entry and each cargo hold."

A pause.

"I want their names."

Silence.

:: UNDERSTOOD. INITIATING RECONSTRUCTION OF DECEPTION ARCHIVE. THIS WILL TAKE TIME. ::

"I have time. I plan to own it."

Her words echoed softly in the silence.

Then she drew a step closer, the swirling Force energy around her beginning to pulse with dark tension—curiosity, anger, hunger all bundled into a cold, relentless drive. She reached out and placed her gloved fingertips gently on the outer railing of the gyroscope.

"What else do you see, Ichnaea? What else did they leave behind?"

:: MULTIPLE ABERRANT DATA NODES DETECTED. NON-STANDARD TRANSMISSION BANDS USED TO MASK MOVEMENT THROUGH ASTEROID FIELD. SOURCE OF DEVIATION: INNER BELT REGION. SPECIFIC ASTEROID: MASSA 4-RELIC. FORMER RESEARCH OUTPOST. UNMANNED. CURRENTLY OFFLINE. LAST OFFICIAL SURVEY: 17 YEARS AGO. ::

Something inside her tensed.

An outpost that hadn't been inspected in almost two decades. That had just begun to register subtle traffic fluctuations—hidden behind the movements of cargo freighters and debris flows.

"Why didn't Reicher act on this?"

:: GOVERNOR VAX FLAGGED MASSA 4-RELIC FOR FUTURE INVESTIGATION. PRIORITY DEFERRED. FILE MARKED: 'RETURN AFTER WAR' ::

The words almost broke her.

Reicher had seen it. He'd wanted to follow up. But time… time had not been on his side.

"I'll go there myself."

:: CONFIRMATION REQUIRED. PERSONAL INSPECTION: UNNECESSARY. HAZARDOUS. NOT ADVISED. ::

"I wasn't asking for your advice."

She turned from the core, her cape whispering over the floor behind her.

"Ichnaea. From this day forward, I want a copy of every audit, every ship's log, every discrepancy—transmitted directly to me. Encrypted, eyes-only. If anyone asks… tell them the governor is watching."

A long silence.

Then the soft reply.

:: THE GOVERNOR IS WATCHING. ::

As she left the chamber, the doors sealed behind her with the sound of something final—like a lock clicking into place in the spine of the world.

Massa 4-Relic awaited.

And Serina Calis would not wait any longer to know what secrets her brother had left her.

 

[Serina Calis]

ASHEN RESURRECTION | Forgive Us Enos.
Location: Polis Massa.

The ride to the launch bay was quiet.

Serina stood alone within the transport lift, one hand resting gently on the steel railing while the other gripped the edge of her datapad, now dimmed to black. The silence wasn't oppressive—it was hollow. The kind of silence that echoed with ghosts, with the weight of decisions yet to be made and those long past due.

The elevator descended deep through the strata of Polis Massa's central hub, past levels of repurposed tunnels and ancient mining shafts now converted to living quarters and hangars. Each passing level reminded her how little time Reicher had to fix the world he'd inherited. She was walking in the bones of a dream only partially built—and it was hers now to finish… or fail.

When the doors hissed open at the hangar, the scent of ion fuel and cold steel struck her senses with a strange kind of comfort. The place was not immaculate—scorch marks from previous firefights still pocked the walls near the western entrance, and several support struts bore fresh weld lines. Even here, in the Empire's "boom town," survival had always come at a cost.

The young lieutenant from earlier stood near the transport waiting on her—his posture stiff but not rigid. He watched her descend the steps with something caught between curiosity and concern.

"Governor Calis," he said, offering a polite nod. "The scout ship's ready. Crew's minimal—just the pilot, myself, and a single tech officer. We figured you'd prefer discretion."

"Discretion," Serina echoed, "is the only kind of honesty this system knows."

She stepped aboard without another word, cloak trailing behind her like the final breath of some dark, noble specter. Inside, the vessel was compact, narrow, and angular—built for short-range scouting through asteroid fields, not comfort. That suited her just fine. She took a seat near the forward console, hands folded across her lap.

The lieutenant sat opposite her as the engines came online, the deck trembling beneath their feet.

"It's strange," he said quietly, almost hesitantly. "I've been stationed here four months, and no one's been out to Relic in all that time. It's off-limits. Old research outpost, they say. A place the war forgot."

"Nothing is ever forgotten," Serina replied. "Not really. Not by the right minds."

As the ship disengaged from the docking clamps, a low whine filled the cabin, and through the forward viewport, Polis Massa began to shrink. The skeletal cluster of habitats and refineries slowly pulled back into the tapestry of surrounding asteroids. Dull lights blinked from outlying stations—like the fading embers of a dying fire.

It was strange, watching her world from the outside.

"Permission to speak freely?" the lieutenant asked.

She gave him a single nod.

He hesitated, as if weighing every syllable.

"You don't seem like what I expected."

That drew a faint lift of her brow. "What did you expect?"

"I guess…" He trailed off, eyes finding the floor. "Something colder. Someone who doesn't—feel. Like the Sith from the holos."

Serina studied him for a moment. His voice held no mockery, only that quiet confusion that lived in young men who'd seen too much and still hadn't figured out how to live with it.

"I feel," she said, her voice low. "That's the problem."

He looked up, startled by her honesty.

"Do you know what it's like to pour everything you have into something—your effort, your intelligence, your vision—and still be dismissed like a child playing dress-up?"

His lips parted, unsure how to answer.

"To fight through doors sealed shut, only to find they lead to other rooms where no one will speak your name. To be surrounded by legacy, by warlords, governors, ministers—and to realize they would rather drink wine and sneer than ever offer a hand?"

Still silence. Just the sound of engines humming around them.

"I feel," she repeated, softly now, almost to herself. "I feel more than any of them ever will."

She turned away then, toward the stars.

"And one day, I'll make them feel it too."

The words were not venomous. They weren't even angry. They were inevitable.

The ship banked toward the edge of the asteroid field, the stars distorted slightly by the dense debris. And then, like a wound revealed in the galaxy's skin, Massa 4-Relic came into view.

Jagged. Silent. Half-lit.

Its exterior bore the scars of time—half its surface covered in carbon scoring, the antennae long collapsed, one communications array bent inward like a broken limb. It looked less like a station and more like the carcass of something once living—forgotten by everyone but the machine that had whispered its coordinates.

Serina stared.

"What is it?" the lieutenant asked.

Her voice came, hushed and grim.

"Opportunity," she said. "Or ruin."

Then, after a pause:

"Maybe both."

The ship closed in, and Serina Calis stood once more, the crimson runes of her bodice catching the flicker of distant lightning across the asteroid's surface.

She was ready to unearth what Reicher could not.

And if the past refused to stay buried—then the grave would become her throne.

 

[Serina Calis]

ASHEN RESURRECTION | Forgive Us Enos.
Location: Polis Massa.

The landing struts groaned as Serina's vessel touched down upon the uneven surface of Massa 4-Relic.

Here, there were no landing beacons. No control towers. No welcoming lights blinking against the void.

Just the broken silhouette of a dead station, half-swallowed by shadow, its metal hull rusted and skeletal, like the bones of some long-forgotten god drifting in silence.

The hatch opened with a mechanical hiss, and the filtered air rushed in like a sigh from another age.

Serina stepped out alone.

Behind her, the lieutenant lingered at the threshold of the ship, casting a wary glance toward the collapsed entrance of the primary corridor, half-caved in and held together by makeshift struts and emergency sealant that had clearly been placed decades ago.

Polis Massa was a graveyard of forgotten stories—but this place felt different.

This was a secret the galaxy buried with intention.

She activated the lamp on her gauntlet and made her way inside.

The airlock chamber was collapsed, long since depressurized, but the inner doors had been forced open—mechanically jammed with salvage gear and stripped piping. She stepped past them and into the heart of the darkness.

Her boots echoed along the corridor.

Frost curled across shattered console screens. Personal effects were strewn across the floor—cans, utensils, books with broken spines. A child's toy sat in the corner, long inert, staring up with empty sockets for eyes.

But it was deeper in the station where the real trail began. Where the story had been interrupted.

Serina reached the junction and activated the door. It didn't respond.

"Lieutenant," she called over the comm. "Override the maintenance seal on the access point labeled Tertiary Vault Two. I need visual feed."

A moment passed.

"Yes, ma'am. Feeding it to your display now."

Her retinal HUD flickered, lines of static giving way to a dim feed—recorded footage. The log date was only six months old.

It showed a dozen figures—excavation crew, judging by the uniforms—moving with focused urgency through the corridors of this very level. They were dusty, harried, covered in grease and wear. But their eyes—those eyes burned with wonder.

The video cut to a new angle. A massive chamber, roughly hewn from the rock beneath the surface of the station. Not part of the original installation.

This was a dig site.

And at the heart of it…

A pillar.

Rising from the stone like a dagger thrust from beneath the skin of the world. Obsidian black, with veins of crimson and iridescent green pulsing faintly in geometric patterns.

It was not Sith.

It was older.

Stranger.

Carved into its face were alien symbols—fluid, shifting, like glyphs that writhed when you weren't looking directly at them.

The dig team had uncovered it. And they knew.

"Play the rest," Serina ordered quietly.

The footage jumped.

Now chaos.

Screams.

Gunfire.

A static-streaked scream burst through the feed before dissolving into silence. Blood against the camera lens. Shaky cam. Someone running. Fleeing down the corridor. A brief glimpse of pirate insignia—faded red bones over a lightning bolt—emblazoned on a ragged shoulder pauldron.

The pirates had come before the discovery could be transmitted.

The team had died with the knowledge in their heads, never shared. Never known.

The video ended in darkness.

Serina stood unmoving, the silence of the chamber pressing in around her.

For a long moment, she didn't speak.

Then—

"Open that vault. Now."

She moved toward the sealed bulkhead as the locking mechanism disengaged, gears grinding from disuse. The doors groaned apart, and stale air rushed out like the final breath of something ancient.

Inside, it was cold. Dimly lit by failing strip lights.

And there, at the center of the vault, on a low pedestal of aged stone—

—a single slab of crystal, flat and roughly rectangular, with rows of alien symbols carved in perfect precision.

Her breath caught.

The glyphs. They weren't just similar to the ones on the obelisk in the dig site.

They were identical.

But here—etched alongside the alien script—was something else.

Lines of Basic. Primitive translations. Incomplete, yes—but unmistakable. A Rosetta stone.

A cipher.

The last work of the excavation team. Perhaps done in desperation. Perhaps left as a safeguard.

A slow realization washed over her, awe darkening into fear.

This was not just a discovery.

This was a key.

A key to an unknown language… and through it, to an unknown civilization.

One the galaxy had forgotten. One it wanted to forget.

The Eellayin.

She didn't know the name. Not yet.

But her blood whispered it.

A language whose shapes affected the mind.

A civilization so saturated in the Force they could corrupt its very fabric.

And this? This slab?

This was the beginning of understanding them.

Serina reached for the edge of the pedestal, resting her gloved fingertips against it as though to steady herself.

Something stirred in the Force. Faint. Distant. Like an echo of a scream buried in stone.

She blinked—and for the briefest instant, she saw the chamber not as it was…

…but as it had been.

Flesh. Bone. Choirs of soundless voices. A tower of light bleeding into shadow, folding in upon itself. Figures not of this world—tall, robed, and eyeless—standing around a basin of black ichor.

And then it was gone.

Serina staggered back a step, breath sharp in her throat.

The Force coiled around her like a serpent, and for the first time in many long days, she forgot her pain.

Forgot Madelyn. Forgot Ivalyn. Forgot the humiliation of being dismissed like a petulant child.

Because this…

This was her inheritance.

A secret no one knew.

A weapon no one saw coming.

She turned to the lieutenant, who stood breathless at the threshold, unaware of the magnitude of what lay before them.

"Seal this vault," she said softly. "Triple-layer encryption. No access without my direct command."

"But Governor—"

"Do it. And find me a research team I can trust. Quietly."

She paused, then added—

"…And have the garrison quietly transfer three squads to this location. I want it guarded at all times."

"Yes, ma'am."

 

[Serina Calis]

ASHEN RESURRECTION | Forgive Us Enos.
Location: Polis Massa.

The vault was sealed. Lights dimmed. The thick durasteel doors hissed shut behind her with the solemn weight of tombstones. The chamber fell quiet once more.

But Serina lingered.

She couldn't tear herself away.

The air was still, heavy, but not with dust—not with decay. It was something else. As though the silence itself was listening. Watching.

Waiting.

She paced the edge of the pedestal slowly, every step deliberate. Something about the slab—about the script—gnawed at her deeper than words, deeper than logic. She was no xenoarchaeologist, no scholar of dead tongues. But the Force curled thick in this room, coiling around her mind like perfume rising from still water.

There was one more object—barely noticeable at first—half tucked beneath the pedestal, where it had fallen or perhaps been discarded. A fragment of crystal, jagged on one end, smooth on the other. It pulsed faintly.

She knelt and reached for it, brushing the dust away gently with her fingers. Her gauntlet hummed, reacting to the residual energy.

The fragment was no larger than her palm, and on the smooth surface was one final inscription. Unlike the rest, this one had been crudely etched by hand—rushed, desperate, as if scratched in haste before death claimed the writer.

And yet… the lines were elegant.

An ancient hand, once practiced.

The symbols glowed dimly, faint resonance flickering across her HUD as her datapad attempted to interpret them using the partially translated cipher the excavation team had left behind. The scan took longer than usual—almost as if the machine itself were hesitant.

Then the glyphs resolved into something clear. Something simple.

Three words.

FORGIVE US, ENOS.

Serina stared.

She didn't breathe.

The Force around her seemed to tighten, wrapping like a noose, or perhaps a cradle. The words shone like a whisper across her vision, projected from her datapad's final overlay.

"Forgive us, Enos…"

The name meant nothing to her.

And yet…

Something in her stirred. Deep. An ache. A memory that was never hers. The words echoed inside her mind like a prayer spoken by someone long dead, but still begging to be heard.

The Force showed her images, not thoughts. A planet not yet shattered. A people, bright-eyed and fearless, gathered in temples that pulsed with living light. Then, darkness—spreading from within. Not a conquest. Not an invasion. A surrender. A collapse inward. A rotting of the soul, so complete it became beautiful.

And one among them.

Enos.

A name like a wound.

A figure wrapped in white, then black, then something neither.

She didn't know if Enos was a leader, a traitor, a god—or something else entirely. But the plea…

It wasn't for redemption.

It was regret.

The words Forgive us, Enos weren't carved in hope. They were a confession. A final act of surrender. Or perhaps… a prophecy.

Because the feeling that lingered in the Force now, around Serina, pressing into her ribcage like invisible hands…

It wasn't peace.

It was the sensation of being watched.

She rose, slowly.

The words still burned in her mind.

Her eyes settled on the slab once more, on the half-translated language and the veil of meaning she'd only just begun to tear away.

What had the Eellayin done?

What had they become?

Why did a people so consumed by power, by transformation, leave a single message behind—not to a god, not to the galaxy, not even to themselves—but to someone they had failed?

Forgive us, Enos.

"Governor," came the voice from the commlink. It was the lieutenant. "Perimeter secure. Teams are in place. Your transport is ready whenever you are."

She didn't answer right away.

Because now… she understood.

Polis Massa was not her kingdom.

It was her inheritance.

Not a station. Not a mining colony. Not even a lost ruin of a dead empire.

But a message in a bottle—thrown into the dark ocean of time, waiting for hands like hers.

She reached out and gently touched the ancient inscription.

"Forgive you?" she whispered.

"No," she murmured, voice trembling with something terrible and intimate.

"I will finish what you started."

And with that, she turned, her cape trailing behind her like a blade drawn slow from its sheath.

Behind her, the slab pulsed once—softly, red and violet and green. Then was still.