Quixor’s gaze never wavered from her, the weight of her words settling in the space between them like the pulse of a war drum. He had always seen her—understood her—more than anyone else. The intensity of her gaze was something he could never quite decipher, even after all this time. She was more than just a strategist, a companion, a weapon. She was a force. And yet, there was a part of her that was elusive, held back, as though she feared that if she gave too much of herself away, everything she had fought for would collapse.

For a long moment, he didn’t answer. His fingers were still curled around the wine glass, but the fluid motion of his hand had slowed, as if the act of drinking no longer held the same purpose. His thoughts, usually sharp and efficient, were tangled in the quiet tension between them. He had spent years building an empire, expanding his influence, crushing opposition with ruthless precision. But now, the pieces that made up his world seemed to slip through his fingers like sand, leaving him uncertain, vulnerable.

Her words echoed in his mind. What happens when the war is won? It wasn’t a question he had allowed himself to consider before. Victory had always been the end goal, the final marker that would define his legacy. But now… now, the silence between them felt heavier than any battlefield ever could. It's one his advisors pestered him about. He knew his duty, yet he refused to act on it. Yet he wondered if the person sitting in front of him knew what he'd be asked to do. Whether she would be a worth companion at his side.

He leaned forward slightly, his eyes narrowing ever so slightly, watching the delicate curve of her lips, the faintest trace of a smile still lingering there. The realisation that she was letting him in—if only for this moment—sent a ripple of something unfamiliar through him. Not fear, not desire, but a kind of raw, unguarded need. A need for something more than what they had built together, more than the war and the strategy and the cold certainty of victory.

"I’m not sure I ever believed that the war would end," he said, his voice softer now, but no less intense. "There’s always something left to fight for, some new challenge, some new goal. It’s what keeps us moving forward. But what you’re saying…" He paused, as if searching for the right words. "What you’re saying is that maybe the fight was never just about what we’ve won. Maybe it was always about something we couldn’t see."

Rosaline remained still, her eyes not leaving his. The flicker of understanding between them was there, and in that moment, she seemed to exhale the breath she had been holding for so long.

"You’ve been so focused on what’s ahead," she said, her voice low but steady. "But you’ve never stopped to consider what happens when there’s nothing left to conquer." Her words were not accusatory, merely an observation of the truth he had never allowed himself to see. "What happens when all of this—the power, the control, the endless pursuit—becomes empty?"

His lips pressed together in a hard line. He had always known, on some level, that there would come a point where the battles would cease. The war would end, the victories would be claimed, and the world would settle into a new order. But he had never allowed himself to question what he would be after that, what role he would play in the new world he had built.

“I never thought I would need to think about it," he said, the words coming slower now, as though he were only just realizing their truth. "I thought the war would be the end of it all. That it would somehow make everything right."

Rosaline’s voice softened just a fraction, and for the first time in years, he saw the vulnerability beneath her calculated, unflappable exterior. She understood. She understood what it was like to give everything to a cause, to sacrifice every part of yourself for something that promised to bring meaning, only to find that when the dust settled, you were left with the hollow ache of wanting something else—something more.

And in that moment, he realised what it was.

"I’ve never had anything left when the war was over," Quixor confessed, his voice quieter now, almost self-deprecating. "Nothing but the next war. The next goal."

The tension in the room, the charged silence between them, spoke louder than words ever could. Rosaline had always known how to read him, how to see through the armor he had so carefully crafted. And now, as they sat across from one another, the game of power had shifted. There were no more strategies, no more calculated moves. Only two people, standing on the edge of something new—something raw, something human.

And for the first time in his life, Quixor wasn’t sure whether he was ready to win or lose.

Tristan’s hands shook ever so slightly as he reached for the monitor. Eon's sudden presence in amongst the crowd of monitors, the science officers, who were busy with their work. He’d been trying to mask it, trying to push down the unease at the sight of Eon as he approached, but it was becoming harder to ignore. Eon had noticed. Eon always noticed. There was something unnerving about the way the Valskarian’s perception stretched beyond the ordinary senses, as though the very atmosphere bent to accommodate his awareness.

Tristan couldn’t escape it. His pulse thudded in his ears, louder than the rhythmic beeps of the monitor, and his breath came faster. He hadn’t expected to feel this way—not with the data laid out in front of him, not when everything he had trained for pointed toward a straightforward solution. But there was something about the anomaly that didn’t sit right. It was too perfect, too chaotic at the same time, like an equation that both made sense and defied understanding.

The more he analysed it, the more the patterns seemed to shimmer just out of reach, as though something was manipulating the data to disguise its true nature. It was like staring at a puzzle whose pieces were there, but just beyond his grasp. The sensation made his skin crawl.

Eon’s looming presence only seemed to magnify the weight of the situation. His stillness was palpable, like the calm before a storm, but Tristan knew better than to mistake it for complacency. No, Eon was watching, waiting, dissecting every micro-expression, every flicker of doubt in his body. He’s already assessing me, Tristan thought, the frustration of that realisation gnawing at him. Eon always had that ability—to reduce him to nothing but the work, to erase his Aelvarian traits with cold, calculating precision.

His fingers hovered over the terminal. He had to present the data. He had to be clear, to be precise. But the weight of Eon’s gaze on him… it was suffocating. It made him feel small, unsteady. Vulnerable. It wasn’t just that Eon was more advanced, more intelligent—it was the quiet, inexorable pressure he exuded, as though the Valskarian's very existence was a constant reminder that there were things Tristan could never comprehend.

"Tristan," Eon’s voice broke through the storm of his thoughts, low and resonant. It was a sound that reverberated not just in his ears but in his chest, deep and unsettling. The simple way Eon spoke his name held the command of a thousand years of observation, a thousand lifetimes of knowing.

Eon didn’t wait for a response, didn’t give him the space to try and hide. "What is it that concerns you?"

The words were a soft command, but they hit Tristan with the force of a sledgehammer. There was no room for pretense in the way Eon phrased it. The question didn’t ask for an explanation—it demanded it. As though Eon already knew exactly what was wrong, and he expected Tristan to either step up or fail. His eyes—those ever-shifting, fractal patterns—locked onto Tristan with unnerving focus.

He couldn’t answer immediately. Every instinct screamed at him to not admit it, to cover up the gnawing sense of dread that had settled deep in his gut. But Eon was too perceptive, too tuned in to what Tristan was hiding. The longer the silence stretched between them, the more Tristan’s heart hammered in his chest, the more the sense of something off threatened to swallow him whole.

He wanted to say it was nothing—that he was overthinking, that he was fine. He’d trained for this. He could handle it.

But he couldn’t. Not now. Not with Eon staring at him like a predator who could smell his fear from miles away.

Instead, he exhaled slowly, the words slipping out almost against his will. "There’s something wrong with the energy readings just from the soil sample. Not just the magnitude or the output—it's like the fluctuations are… interfering with the fabric of space-time." His voice was lower than usual, a mix of hesitation and urgency creeping in. He could hear himself rambling, but he couldn’t stop. "They’re erratic, but not in any pattern I’ve seen before. Not like anything we’ve encountered in the simulations. It's like the anomaly's—"

Eon’s presence pressed closer still, like the very air around him was thickening, bending. His gaze did not waver, not even a flicker, as Tristan spoke.

And then, when Tristan finished speaking, Eon’s response was like a stone dropped into the abyss, deep and cold.

"Present your findings," Eon commanded again, but this time there was a sharper edge to his voice. The tone held no patience. No more evasion.

The room seemed to contract around Tristan, the walls closing in on him as he scrambled to open the right file. He could feel Eon’s eyes on him—always on him—and the sudden chill that swept through him only made his movements more frantic. The data displayed on the screen was real, yes, but the more he looked at it, the more his mind started to splinter. He could almost feel the strands of reality shifting in the raw energy readings. Something… unnatural was happening.

He couldn’t explain it. He couldn’t grasp it. The parameters they were working with were breaking down in ways he didn’t have words for, things that felt… alive. Active. As though the anomaly was aware of their presence.

"Tristan." Eon’s voice again, this time a low hum vibrating through the air, like a threat he couldn’t escape. "You are aware, I assume, that what you are describing borders on the impossible."

Tristan’s throat tightened at Eon’s words, the sheer weight of them making the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end. He felt his palms dampen, his pulse spike as his own worst fear began to manifest in the sterile air of the lab.

"I know," he rasped, barely hearing the words slip from his lips. "But that’s the problem. It’s not supposed to be possible."

For the first time, Eon’s fractal face shifted imperceptibly, the patterns twitching as though caught in an unexpected calculation. The faintest glimmer of concern, if such a thing could even be said to exist in Eon’s expressions, flashed across his features.

The data on the screen began to pulse with a new intensity, a soft, rhythmic glow that felt like the pulse of something ancient, primal.

Eon did not flinch. His eyes remained fixed on Tristan. "Then we must act swiftly. The consequences of such a breach may be… far worse than you understand."

The words hung in the air like a threat, but also an invitation—an invitation to face the unknown. To cross a line that, once crossed, could not be undone.

Tristan’s heart pounded in his chest. He wanted to refuse, to walk away, but something in Eon’s gaze—the urgency, the chilling calmness—kept him rooted to the spot.

With a sharp inhale, Tristan nodded. He wasn’t sure whether it was fear or something else that propelled him forward, but he knew one thing: this anomaly, whatever it was, would force both of them to face a truth neither of them were prepared for.

And whatever that truth was—it was coming for them now.

Quixor stood abruptly, the weight of Rosaline’s words still echoing in his mind. Like he'd stepped back into reality. He felt as though something had cracked inside him, a fracture in the fortress of his thoughts that he hadn’t been prepared for. It wasn’t her words, necessarily, that unsettled him. It was the question they posed—the one he’d never asked himself. What happens when the war is over? He wasn’t sure he had an answer, or that he even wanted one.

The dining room felt suddenly too close, too intimate. He could almost feel Rosaline’s eyes on his back as he moved toward the door, but he didn’t look back. He needed air. He needed distance. He needed to do something.

His mind raced as he walked through the halls of his estate, the familiar stone walls now feeling suffocating. The war, the strategy, the endless push for power—it had always been enough to keep his thoughts in motion, to keep him sharp and focused. But now, now it felt like he was standing on the edge of an abyss, unsure of what lay beyond.

Quixor left the building through a side entrance, stepping into the cool night air, the sounds of the city faint in the distance. His feet carried him without thinking, the heavy weight of his boots marking his steps on the cobblestone streets. He wasn’t sure where he was going, but it didn’t matter. The need to escape, to fill the silence inside him with something—anything—was stronger than any clear sense of direction.

His thoughts circled back to Rosaline’s question: What happens when there’s nothing left to conquer? The idea unsettled him. He had never been a man to stop, to sit idle and reflect. His entire existence had been built on the principle of perpetual motion. The next war. The next conquest. The next goal. But now? What if the end of the war didn’t lead to peace? What if it led to something darker?

He had spent years commanding armies, manipulating allegiances, shaping the fate of nations. He had known how to use people, how to control them, how to win. But he had never learned how to simply be. And now, for the first time, the possibility of that future—the one without a war to fight—loomed over him like a shadow.

The streets grew darker as he walked, and before he realized it, he found himself standing at the threshold of a place he’d visited many times, though never with this sense of desperation. The brothel.

It was a place he often turned to in moments of restlessness—its allure never about the women, but about the release it offered from his own mind. A momentary distraction from the constant swirl of his thoughts. The women here didn’t ask questions. They didn’t care about his ambitions or his legacy. They only cared about the now, the body, the pleasure. It was a relief of sorts, though it had never been enough to quiet the storm inside him. And tonight, he felt the storm roaring louder than ever.

He stepped inside, the familiar scent of incense and perfume greeting him. Soft laughter and music drifted from the back rooms, but it was quieter than usual—almost languid. As he made his way deeper into the establishment, one of the women, a tall redhead with eyes that had seen too many men like him, spotted him.

“You look like you’re in need of something,” she said, her voice low and knowing, though not unkind. She had always known how to read him—like everyone else here.

“I’m looking for something... different tonight,” Quixor replied, his voice rougher than he intended.

The woman didn’t press him, only gave him a thoughtful look before gesturing toward a quieter room in the back. She led him there, her heels clicking softly on the floor. Quixor sank into a chair, the weight of the room pressing down on him. He didn’t speak, just stared at the flickering candlelight. His mind was far away, in that place Rosaline had pointed out—a place where he was left with only himself.

The woman sat across from him, her gaze steady, waiting for him to speak. But Quixor had nothing to say. He wasn’t sure why he had come here—perhaps the act itself was an attempt to drown out the uncertainty that had begun to gnaw at him, or maybe he was hoping for a brief respite from the question that lingered in his mind: What happens when the war ends?

The silence stretched between them, thick and suffocating, until Quixor finally broke it.

“I’ve spent my entire life fighting. Planning. Conquering. But now… now I don’t know what comes next.” His voice was distant, as if the words weren’t even his own.

The woman didn’t respond immediately. She only nodded as if she had heard this before. Then, in a voice almost too soft to hear, she said, “Maybe you should stop fighting for a little while.”

The words settled into him, like a stone sinking into water. Stop fighting. For a moment, he considered it—considered the idea of stepping away from the endless battle that had defined him for so long. But the thought was terrifying. Without the fight, without the war, who was he? What remained?

He stood abruptly, his chair scraping against the floor. The woman didn’t move, didn’t press him further. She had given him what he needed—a moment to reflect, a fleeting chance to pause.

“I need to think,” he muttered, more to himself than to her.

He left the room without another word, walking back into the night, the weight of his thoughts more oppressive than ever. The streets seemed darker now, the shadows heavier. Quixor walked for what felt like hours, lost in a maze of his own mind, unsure of where to go or what to do. The only certainty left in his world was that the war would eventually end. And when it did, he would be left to confront the man he had never allowed himself to face—the man beneath the armor, beneath the empire.

And that man? He didn’t know if he could bear to meet him.