Vestal didn’t carry Kade like luggage because she enjoyed it.

  She carried Kade like luggage because if she didn’t, he would wake up, see something broken, and climb it like a feral raccoon with a command license.

  The sedative had him out cold now—breathing steady, face slack in the rare peace of unconsciousness that wasn’t earned through exhaustion alone. Vestal lowered him onto his bed with the kind of practical gentleness she reserved for patients who were stubborn enough to injure themselves twice in one day.

  Kade’s prefab smelled faintly of oil, paper, and the ever-present damp of Horizon’s humidity. His things were neatly arranged in a way that suggested someone who couldn’t tolerate disorder but also didn’t trust anyone else to put anything where it belonged. The uniform jacket hung on a hook. His boots were lined up with a precision that was almost angry. A small stack of folders sat at the edge of his desk like a tiny fortress of bureaucracy.

  Vestal glanced over all of it, her eyes catching on the familiar shape of his sealed lacquered box in the corner—black, polished, so dark it seemed to swallow the prefab’s weak light.

  She didn’t go near it.

  She never did.

  She didn’t touch it.

  Not because she feared it.

  Because she respected him enough to treat his boundaries as real.

  Kade might be a menace.

  But he was her menace, and she’d learned where the line was.

  Vestal pulled the blanket up over him with one efficient motion, then turned to the one person she trusted to keep him from doing something stupid the moment he woke.

  “Tōkaidō,” Vestal said.

  Tōkaidō stiffened slightly, ears flicking under her hair.

  “Hai,” she replied softly.

  Vestal pointed to the chair by the bed.

  “Sit,” she instructed.

  Tōkaidō blinked.

  “…Here?”

  “Yes,” Vestal said.

  Tōkaidō’s cheeks warmed, immediately flustered by the idea of being in Kade’s room alone with him—even sedated. The fact that he was unconscious somehow made it worse, like her brain had nothing to focus on except the intimacy of proximity.

  Vestal saw the fluster and ignored it with professional cruelty.

  “If he wakes,” Vestal continued, “he stays in bed.”

  Tōkaidō swallowed.

  “Yes, Vestal-san.”

  “If he tries to stand—”

  “I stop him,” Tōkaidō said quickly, like she needed to prove competence before her embarrassment ate her alive.

  Vestal’s brow rose.

  “With what,” Vestal asked dryly, “your hopes?”

  Tōkaidō’s ears flattened.

  “…I can— I can call you,” she said.

  “Correct,” Vestal replied.

  Then she softened by a fraction.

  “And if he gets mean,” she added, “don’t take it personally. He gets… defensive when he’s cornered.”

  Tōkaidō glanced at Kade’s sleeping face, the rough lines smoothed by sedation.

  “…He bites,” she said, half question, half statement.

  Vestal looked at the chomp mark on her arm.

  “Yes,” she confirmed flatly. “He bites.”

  Tōkaidō’s mouth twitched faintly, the smallest hint of humor.

  “I will be… careful,” she promised.

  Vestal nodded once.

  “Good,” she said. “I’ll be back.”

  Tōkaidō hesitated.

  “Vestal-san?” she asked softly.

  Vestal paused at the door.

  “…Yes?”

  Tōkaidō’s voice dipped, Kyoto cadence smoothing the edges.

  “Are you… going to see Arizona?”

  Vestal’s expression tightened.

  “Yes,” she replied.

  Then, after a beat:

  “I heard something happened up north.”

  Tōkaidō nodded.

  Vestal didn’t ask how she knew. Horizon was a base built on rumors and shared pain. Information moved faster than forklifts.

  Vestal’s gaze sharpened, controlled.

  “Stay here,” she repeated. “Supervise him.”

  Tōkaidō nodded again, firm.

  “Yes.”

  Then Vestal left, boots thudding down prefab steps into the damp air.

  Arizona’s prefab was quieter than most.

  Not because it was special.

  Because Arizona made it quiet by existing in it.

  The door was closed.

  No chatter from inside.

  No music.

  No smell of cooking.

  Just stillness.

  Vestal knocked once.

  Soft.

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  Respectful.

  A pause.

  Then Arizona’s voice came through, low and tired.

  “Come in.”

  Vestal stepped inside.

  The room was dim, curtains half-drawn, light filtered into grey. A kettle sat on a small table. Books were stacked neatly. A blanket lay folded with care on the couch. Arizona’s wheelchair was near the center of the room, angled toward the window as if she’d been staring at the rain earlier and had simply… stopped.

  Arizona herself sat in the chair, posture straight but shoulders heavy. Her face looked calm in the way someone looked calm when they had learned how to hold grief without letting it leak.

  Vestal’s gaze took in the new scuff marks on Arizona’s rigging components leaning against the wall. The faint bruising at her collarbone. The signs of a hard voyage.

  Then Vestal’s eyes dropped.

  And stopped.

  On the table near Arizona’s hand, partly hidden beneath a folded cloth—like Arizona had tried to cover it and failed to convince herself it should be hidden from reality—was a pendant.

  Vestal’s breath caught.

  Not because pendants were rare.

  Because intact pendants that weren’t the owner’s…

  Those were rare enough to qualify as miracles.

  Arizona noticed Vestal’s freeze immediately.

  Her expression changed.

  Not outwardly dramatic.

  Just… the air around her tightened.

  Vestal didn’t move toward it at first.

  She looked at Arizona.

  “May I?” Vestal asked quietly.

  Arizona didn’t answer right away.

  Her fingers curled slightly around her wheelchair armrest.

  Then, in a voice that sounded like it came from somewhere deep and careful:

  “Yes.”

  Vestal approached the table like she was walking toward a sleeping animal.

  She picked up the pendant gently.

  The metal was cold.

  Heavier than it should have been for something so small.

  Vestal turned it over.

  Saw the number.

  77.

  Her pulse spiked.

  Vestal’s throat tightened.

  “Vermont,” she breathed.

  Arizona’s eyes lowered.

  She didn’t correct her.

  She didn’t deny it.

  She simply went quiet in a way that made it clear: This is real. Don’t touch it like it isn’t.

  Vestal held the pendant up slightly, angling it toward the light.

  It wasn’t cracked.

  Not in the catastrophic way.

  There were surface scratches, signs of time and movement, but the core resonance was still there. Vestal could feel it—faint but unmistakable—like a heartbeat in dormancy.

  Her mind went immediately clinical, because Vestal survived by turning miracles into plans.

  “This…” Vestal said carefully, “this can be stabilized.”

  Arizona’s eyes lifted sharply.

  Not hope.

  Not yet.

  Fear.

  Because if Vestal said it wrong, if she made it sound impossible, Arizona would have to swallow the pendant like another grave.

  Vestal corrected herself quickly.

  “It already is stabilized,” Vestal clarified. “Enough to have held.”

  Arizona exhaled slowly, trembling once.

  Vestal continued, voice calm, professional, but softened by something she didn’t bother hiding.

  “It can be brought back,” she said.

  Arizona’s lips parted slightly.

  Her voice came out small.

  “…She can?”

  Vestal nodded once.

  “Yes,” she said. “If the soul inside wants to return. That’s always the condition. But…”

  Vestal’s gaze shifted briefly toward Horizon’s ceiling, as if she could see through it to all the half-built projects and repaired berths.

  “But the base’s material reserves,” Vestal continued, “are limited.”

  Arizona’s face tightened.

  Vestal didn’t drag it out.

  She told the truth the way she always did.

  “If we bring Vermont back with what Horizon has right now,” Vestal said, “she won’t manifest at full Iowa mass. There isn’t enough refined steel, rigging lattice, reactor allocation, or pendant nourishment supply to rebuild an Iowa-class body.”

  Arizona stared.

  Her fingers tightened.

  “…Then what,” she asked quietly.

  Vestal turned the pendant over again, thinking out loud.

  “She could manifest smaller,” Vestal said. “Child-sized. A juvenile form. Something akin to an early-stage Kansen awakening.”

  Arizona went very still.

  Vestal watched her carefully, afraid she’d interpret it as insult.

  But Arizona’s expression didn’t show disgust.

  It showed… shock.

  Because the implication wasn’t “Vermont will be weak.”

  The implication was:

  Vermont would have something most KANSEN never had.

  Time.

  A beginning.

  A chance to grow instead of being thrown into war fully formed and immediately expected to die.

  Vestal, voice quiet now, said what she knew Arizona was beginning to realize.

  “If she returns in a juvenile state,” Vestal said, “she would… have a childhood.”

  Arizona’s eyes widened slightly.

  Vestal’s gaze softened.

  “That has almost never happened,” Vestal added quietly. “Not like that. It would mean Vermont would grow alongside her hull development.”

  Arizona swallowed.

  “…She’d need an Iowa,” Arizona whispered.

  Vestal nodded.

  “Yes,” she said. “Eventually. If you want her to mature into full shipform capability, she needs a properly built hull. That means not just raw materials, but dedicated construction time, skilled labor, and steady pendant feeding—before and during the build.”

  Arizona’s voice was barely audible.

  “…And if we don’t.”

  Vestal didn’t sugarcoat it.

  “If we don’t,” Vestal said, “then she remains smaller. Still alive. Still herself. But limited in mass and loadout.”

  Arizona stared at the pendant like it might vanish.

  Then, slowly, her expression shifted into something fierce and protective.

  “She will live,” Arizona said quietly.

  Vestal’s eyes flicked to her.

  Arizona’s voice firmed.

  “She will live,” she repeated.

  Not a request.

  A decision.

  Vestal felt her chest tighten.

  Because she understood exactly what Arizona meant.

  Not “she will live” as in “we’ll see.”

  “She will live” as in I will burn the world if I have to.

  Vestal nodded once.

  “Then we start preparations,” she said.

  Arizona’s gaze stayed on the pendant.

  Her voice cracked faintly.

  “…Thank you.”

  Vestal shook her head slightly, a rare gesture of softness.

  “Don’t thank me,” she said quietly. “Thank whoever dragged this out of the sea.”

  Arizona’s eyes flickered.

  A shadow crossed her expression.

  “…I don’t know who did,” she admitted.

  Vestal’s gaze sharpened.

  “And that,” Vestal said quietly, “is the part I don’t like.”

  Arizona’s hand drifted to her pocket unconsciously, as if checking the pendant’s presence even while Vestal held it.

  Arizona’s voice went softer.

  “I have a strange feeling,” she murmured, “like… someone I know was near me.”

  Vestal stilled.

  Arizona looked away.

  “…It’s probably exhaustion,” Arizona said quickly, like she didn’t want to entertain ghosts.

  Vestal didn’t argue.

  But she filed it away.

  Because Vestal didn’t believe in coincidences.

  Not in war.

  Not in miracle pendants.

  Vestal returned the pendant to Arizona carefully—like handing someone a newborn.

  Arizona took it with both hands.

  Held it close.

  Then tucked it away with deliberate care.

  Her shoulders relaxed by a fraction.

  Not healed.

  But… anchored.

  Vestal exhaled slowly.

  “I’ll coordinate with Wisconsin River,” Vestal said. “We’ll inventory what we have. We’ll figure out what we can allocate without compromising Fairplay’s Worcester completion.”

  Arizona nodded, eyes distant.

  Vestal paused at the door.

  Then, before leaving, she added quietly:

  “And Arizona?”

  Arizona looked up.

  Vestal’s voice softened.

  “You did not lose her,” Vestal said. “Not completely.”

  Arizona’s lips trembled.

  She didn’t answer with words.

  She simply nodded once, hard.

  Vestal left her to it.

  Back in Kade’s prefab, time moved differently.

  The room was dim, humid, quiet except for Kade’s steady breathing and the occasional creak of the prefab settling.

  Tōkaidō sat in the chair by his bed like she’d been ordered into position by fate itself.

  Her cheeks were still faintly warm from embarrassment, but she was holding steady—hands folded, posture polite, eyes flicking occasionally to Kade’s face to ensure he hadn’t woken.

  Kade didn’t wake.

  He slept like a man dragged under by chemical force and sheer stubborn exhaustion.

  The silence stretched.

  And in that silence, Tōkaidō’s eyes wandered.

  Not because she wanted to snoop.

  Because humans and shipgirls alike did that when left alone in someone else’s space—they looked for the shape of the person in the objects they kept.

  Her gaze moved over Kade’s desk, his papers, the aligned boots…

  Then stopped.

  On the black lacquered box.

  It sat where it always sat—corner of the prefab, tucked slightly out of direct traffic, as if positioned deliberately so that no one would “accidentally” brush against it.

  Its surface drank light.

  Even in the dim prefab, it looked darker than it should have, like lacquer polished with midnight. It wasn’t just black. It was a void shaped like a box.

  Tōkaidō’s ears flicked once.

  She stared at it for a long moment.

  There was no label.

  No serial.

  No Admiralty stamp.

  No inventory tag.

  Nothing that made it look “official.”

  Which meant it was personal.

  A family heirloom, perhaps.

  Something from before Kade became Commander Bher.

  Something he refused to explain.

  Tōkaidō’s gaze softened.

  She remembered how Kade always checked that corner of his room first when he entered, like confirming a heartbeat.

  She remembered how his voice turned sharp if anyone stepped too close.

  She remembered how even Vestal—who could bully battleships into taking vitamins—never touched it.

  Tōkaidō didn’t move.

  She didn’t reach.

  She didn’t even lean closer.

  Because she could tell, instinctively, that whatever was inside was not meant for anyone else’s hands.

  Not yet.

  Maybe not ever.

  Her fingers tightened slightly on her lap.

  She looked back at Kade’s sleeping face.

  Then back at the box.

  Then away again.

  Respect.

  Not fear.

  Just… respect.

  And somewhere in the quiet of that prefab, with Kade unconscious and a black box drinking the light, Tōkaidō felt a strange certainty settle into her chest:

  Kade carried things no one on Horizon understood.

  Not just trauma.

  Not just skill.

  But something old.

  Something sealed.

  Something he would only open if the world demanded a price too high for human hands alone.

  Tōkaidō kept her eyes on Kade after that.

  Because even if she didn’t touch the box…

  She suddenly understood why he kept it close.

  And why he kept everyone else away.