“Delivery estimates are calculated using real-time orbital traffic data and are accurate to within ±47 minutes.”

  — Kallum Transport Services, Customer FAQ

  I stood in the back garden, staring up at the afternoon sky like it owed me money as my holoband buzzed for the fifteenth time in ten minutes. I glanced down, hope flaring—

  KALLUM TRANSPORT: Delivery status: 5 min.

  The same message.

  For the past twenty minutes, it had been “5 min.” Before that, it had cycled through “15 min” for half an hour.

  I refreshed the tracking page.

  KALLUM TRANSPORT: Delivery status: SOON

  “Soon,” I muttered, glaring at the holographic text. “Very helpful. Thank you, Kallum Transport. Feels kinda bad to have my name slapped on something that crappy.”

  The garden was perfectly still around me. Biosculpted trees rustled softly in the artificial breeze the climate systems generated as somewhere in the distance, a neighbor’s fountain burbled peacefully.

  Central District… where I’d spent the entire morning preparing for this.

  Preparing the basement workshop, well, my basement workshop apparently.

  I’d moved everything.

  Tools organized by function and size, and scrap metal sorted into labeled containers. The wine collection was carefully dusted and barricaded with an impromptu scrap wall, because Mom would absolutely notice if I’d damaged anything.

  The space was ready. Ten meters by ten meters of climate-controlled potential, just waiting for a crafting bench that would let me build system-grade equipment instead of cobbling together salvage with prayers to John.

  But first, the delivery had to actually arrive.

  I checked my holoband again.

  KALLUM TRANSPORT: Delivery status: SOON

  My eye twitched.

  Thankfully, soon I heard a low rumble, distant but growing. Not the whine of a gravitic engine or the hiss of atmospheric thrusters, but deeper. The sound you felt in your chest before your ears properly registered it.

  I looked up, and breaking through the cloud layer, descending with inevitability, was the cargo ship.

  It looked like someone had taken ten different ships and mashed them together without caring about aesthetics… because that’s exactly what it was. Modular cargo haulers, each one a self-contained unit, locked together in a configuration that prioritized capacity over elegance. The central spine held them together, a massive structural framework bristling with docking clamps and stabilizer arrays.

  Each module was easily the size of a small building. Together, they formed something that shouldn’t fly but did anyway, held aloft by gravitic systems powerful enough to make physics and math shake in fear.

  It wasn’t unusual in the Central District. I’d seen similar configurations descend a week ago, probably delivering to some exec’s home. Just another day in the district where money made gravity feel bad.

  …but this one was mine.

  This ship, this massive amalgamation of industrial practicality, was descending because I’d spent half a million credits. Because my cousin had helped me navigate the Kallum inventory system. Because for once, I wasn’t just watching luxury happen to other people.

  The rumble grew louder as it descended, and I felt it vibrate through the ground beneath my boots.

  The ship slowed as it approached, gravitic engines adjusting with movements that seemed impossible for something that size. Fifty meters above my home, it stopped. Just... hung there, blocking out the sun, casting the entire garden in shadow.

  I stared up at it, neck craned back, taking in the sheer scale of the thing hovering over my house.

  Then, with a mechanical grind I felt more than heard, one of the modules detached. Docking clamps released with metallic clangs as the stabilizers retracted and the module separated from the central spine slowly, carefully, gravitic systems firing in controlled bursts.

  And it descended.

  Straight down toward me and our garden with its perfect grass and biosculpted trees and the loading bay I’d just learned existed yesterday.

  The module was smaller than the others, relatively speaking. Maybe ten meters long, six meters wide. But watching it descend, watching it blot out the sky as it came closer and closer, made my chest tight with something between awe and primal fear.

  Twenty meters.

  Ten.

  Six?

  It stopped six meters above the lawn, hovering with the faint hum of gravitic systems working to keep several tons of cargo and equipment suspended in defiance of everything Isaac Newton had worked for.

  The underside of the module was smooth chrome, broken only by the Kallum logo etched in that familiar flowing script.

  Lights blinked along the edges, like green indicators showing stable hover, or safe descent.

  I stood there, frozen, staring at this thing that had just descended from orbit specifically for me, as its heat radiated from the gravitic emitters, making the air shimmer.

  My holoband buzzed.

  KALLUM TRANSPORT: Descent complete. Please wait.

  The cargo module’s side panel hissed open with a sharp pneumatic release that made me flinch, and a figure dropped from the opening.

  No gravitic assistance, or rope, just a clean six-meter fall that should have shattered ankles, but the man landed in a perfect crouch that barely disturbed the grass. His knees absorbed the impact, chrome servos in his legs probably doing half the work.

  He straightened, and my breath caught.

  A man I knew well wore elite operator gear, but not the flashy kind you saw in holos. This was functional luxury; leather combat jacket reinforced with woven trauma plates that caught the light wrong, suggesting exotic materials I couldn’t identify. Tactical pants with too many pockets, each one probably holding something that could kill me three different ways. Boots that were simultaneously corporate-formal and built for dropping from orbit.

  But it was the details that made my survival instincts scream.

  The way his jacket hung suggested holsters. Plural. The slight bulge at his hip could be a sidearm or something worse. The nearly invisible filament running from his collar to his wrist, some kind of integrated military-grade system, and his left eye was chrome.

  Mid-fifties, maybe; I never asked. Silver streaked through dark hair kept short. Face weathered in a way that suggested he’d earned every line through violence survived rather than age accumulated.

  He held a simple-looking case in his hand. Brushed metal, standard Kallum corporate issue that could hold anything from contracts to antimatter.

  His gaze swept across me with professional assessment, cataloging threats, exits, tactical advantages, before settling into something that might have been casual interest if his posture hadn’t remained perfectly ready for violence.

  I took one step back before my brain caught up with recognition.

  “Dante Valerio,” I breathed.

  Head of Kallum Counter-Intelligence. The man who’d stood in our old home on Mars and told me, voice cold and professional, that my father was dead. The man who’d informed my mother she had one week to evacuate Kallum property “per protocol” before security changed the locks.

  The man about whom one thing was whispered throughout every Kallum facility, every corporate gathering, every hushed conversation in corners where people thought they weren’t being monitored:

  When you see Dante, you are either dead, or about to be.

  “Please—” I backed away, hand fumbling instinctively for my pistol.

  Which I wasn’t carrying.

  Because I was in my own garden in the middle of Central District wearing civilian clothes like an idiot.

  Dante watched me scramble with an expression that could have been amusement. He tilted his head slightly, the chrome eye whirring as it focused, and his lips quirked into something that wasn’t quite a smile.

  “You know,” he said conversationally, “I’ve heard what people say about me. The whispers.” He took a step forward, casual, unthreatening, which somehow made it worse because every movement screamed controlled lethality. “I’ve never corrected them. It’s... useful.”

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  He paused. “But relax, boy. I’m not here for you.” The almost-smile widened slightly. “Unless you give me a reason to be. Then the mythology becomes accurate very quickly.”

  I stopped moving. My chest heaved, hyperventilating like I’d just run a marathon.

  His posture shifted, relaxing by maybe five percent, which somehow made him seem more human and yet no less dangerous. “Remember what I taught you, boy. Have you forgotten all the lessons? Besides, I’m doing a favor for Katherine.” He adjusted his grip on the case. “Promised her I’d make sure you didn’t get any drugs, didn’t do anything stupid with corporate property, didn’t—” He waved his free hand vaguely. “—become a problem.”

  The casual delivery of “become a problem” made my stomach drop.

  I rolled my eyes before I could stop myself. “I don’t do drugs.”

  “Good.” Dante nodded approvingly, like I’d passed some test I hadn’t known I was taking. “A lot of plebeians do after not manifesting. Grief, rage, all that emotional nonsense.” His chrome eye whirred again, focusing. “But something tells me you’ve got a secret to tell me.”

  He said it lightly, almost friendly, but I could feel the weight of his attention. Just as he taught me, he was reading me. Heart rate, blood pressure, pupil dilation, maybe some system fuckery as well. Cataloging every micro-expression that suggested I was hiding something.

  Which I was.

  Obviously.

  He knew I knew he knew, and he was enjoying watching me squirm just enough to maintain that useful mythology.

  Dante glanced back at the cargo module, hovering patiently above the lawn. “Oh, I blocked the guys long enough.” He started walking toward my house, not asking permission, just moving with the confidence of someone who knew exactly how dangerous he was and didn’t need to prove it.

  Whatever.

  I watched him go, that leather jacket moving with him like a second skin.

  He reached the back door, pressed his palm to the scanner and disappeared inside, leaving me standing in the garden with a cargo module full of half-a-million-credits worth of equipment and no idea what the hell just happened.

  My holoband buzzed.

  KALLUM TRANSPORT: awaiting delivery confirmation and access authorization for cargo transfer.

  Right. The shipment.

  I took a shaky breath and pulled up the confirmation interface. “Loading bay access, code 6-9-4-2,” I muttered, entering it into the system.

  The house responded immediately. Somewhere beneath the lawn, machinery hummed to life. The section of grass next to the barricaded wine’s entrance split smoothly along invisible seams, panels retracting to reveal a loading platform rising from below.

  Chrome and permacrete, sized to accept cargo modules exactly like the one hovering above my garden.

  Speaking of which, the module adjusted its position with gravitic bursts, moving toward the platform.

  As it descended, a ramp extended from its side, and figures emerged. Delivery crew. Four of them, wearing Kallum Transport coveralls and anti-grav harnesses. They moved efficiently, already checking manifests on their bands.

  The crew chief, a woman with gray hair and a no-nonsense expression that suggested she’d done this exact job ten thousand times, spotted me and nodded. “Dash Kallum?”

  “Yeah, that’s me.”

  “Sign here.” She held out a holo-tablet.

  I pressed my thumb to the screen, and the manifest populated with line items that made my chest tight:

  - Exotic Alloy Stock (23 variants)

  - System-Grade Fibers (Combat Rated)

  - Power Distribution Components

  - Michalski Hexagon Hybrid Shield Matrix

  - G-Servos (Quantity: 20)

  - Fasteners, Wiring, Circuits (Assorted)

  The list went on. And on.

  “Where you want it?” the crew chief asked.

  I pointed toward the loading platform. “Basement workshop. Through there.”

  She nodded and started directing her team. The anti-grav harnesses kicked in, and they began unloading crates. Heavy equipment floated as if it weighed nothing, guided by careful hands toward the platform.

  I followed them down, watching as they maneuvered everything into my empty workshop space. The crew set it down exactly where I pointed, then started bringing in the crates. They stacked them efficiently along the wall, each labeled with contents and handling instructions.

  I watched the pile grow and grow... and realized with slowly mounting horror that I had absolutely no organization system prepared.

  No racks.

  No shelving.

  No sorting mechanisms whatsoever.

  I’d spent all morning cleaning the space and hadn’t thought about what came after the delivery.

  “Uh,” I said as the crew chief set down another crate. “Actually, can you just... leave them here? I’ll sort them myself.”

  She raised an eyebrow. “You sure? We’ve got anti-grav. Could organize this properly in ten minutes.”

  “No, it’s—” I gestured vaguely. “I need to figure out my own system. Tinkerer thing.”

  She shrugged. “Your call.”

  The crew continued unloading, and I directed them to make piles based on material type. Exotic alloys in one corner, fibers and fabrics in another, electronics and components along the back wall, leaving a space in the middle for the Orbital. It wasn’t elegant, but it would work until I could build proper storage.

  Wooden crates stacked on wooden crates, each one representing thousands of credits worth of materials I’d have to catalog myself.

  Great.

  Thirty minutes later, the crew chief handed me the final confirmation. “That’s everything. Just need authorization.”

  I signed off on the delivery and watched them pack up their equipment.

  The cargo module lifted smoothly from the loading platform, retracting its ramp as it rose back to rejoin the main ship hovering fifty meters above.

  The grass panels slid closed, sealing the loading bay with barely a seam visible, and I was left standing in my workshop, surrounded by half a million credits worth of equipment and materials, with absolutely no idea where to start.

  So, of course, at that moment, the holoband buzzed.

  I pulled it up, grateful for the distraction from staring at the organizational nightmare I’d created, and realized I'd ignored two messages.

  [Erika: You promised to call!!! ]

  [Erika: How’s the gear prep going?]

  [Erika: DASH! STOP IGNORING ME! Shipment arrived yet?]

  Shit, I’d completely forgotten.

  I hit the call button, and her face materialized in holographic projection above my wrist. She was in what looked like a garage, with industrial lighting, tools visible on racks behind her, and the distinctive crimson paint of her Vantrel gleaming in the background.

  “Dash!” Her expression shifted from annoyed to excited in an instant. “Finally! I was starting to think you’d—” She paused, actually looking at me. “Are you okay? You look kind of...”

  “Stressed,” I finished. “Yeah. The shipment arrived.”

  “That’s great!” She leaned closer to her camera, and I could see grease smudged on her cheek. “How much did you get? Did the bench come? What’s it like?”

  I turned the holoband to show her the workshop. The camera panned across the stacked crates and the general chaos of materials I hadn’t sorted yet.

  “Holy shit,” Erika breathed. “That’s... Dash, that’s a lot of equipment.”

  “Half a million credits worth,” I said, turning the camera back to face me. “And I forgot to order any organizing systems, so now I’ve got to build storage from scratch before I can even start on actual projects.”

  She laughed. “That’s so you. All the expensive gear, none of the boring prep work.”

  “Hey, I cleaned the space,” I protested weakly.

  “Uh-huh.” Her grin was wicked. “And how long did you spend planning where everything would go?”

  “I... didn’t.”

  “Of course you didn’t.” She shook her head, still smiling. “Well, at least you’ve got materials now. What are you building first?”

  “Storage racks,” I said flatly. “Because apparently I’m an idiot.”

  Erika’s laugh echoed in the workshop. “You’re not an idiot. Just enthusiastic.” She glanced to the side, at something off-camera. “Though I can’t talk. I’ve been working on my baby all day and completely lost track of time.”

  I blinked. “Your... baby?”

  “Yeah!” She shifted the camera, and I caught a better view of the Vantrel behind her. “Gravitic mana-filter change, steering calibration, and I’m upgrading the gravitic stabilizers. The stock ones are fine, but if I want to push her harder in races, I need better response time.”

  My brain stuttered to a complete halt.

  “You’re... working on your car,” I drawled. “Yourself.”

  “Obviously?” Erika tilted her head, confused. “Why would I pay someone to do something I can do better?”

  “You can... modify gravitic stabilizers?”

  “It’s not that hard,” she said, as if recalibrating complex gravitic systems was something people just did on weekends. Well, tuesdays in this case. “Just need to adjust field harmonics and make sure power distribution doesn’t spike when I floor it, and attitude changes. Basic stuff.”

  Basic stuff.

  Gravitic harmonics.

  Erika was a tinkerer.

  “I didn’t—” I stopped, realizing I was staring. “You never mentioned you worked on your car.”

  She shrugged in the same casual way as if it were completely normal. “You never asked. Besides, it’s not like I’m building from scratch like you do. Just modifications and maintenance.” She grinned. “Though I fabricated custom mounting brackets for the new stabilizers. The stock ones wouldn’t fit right.”

  “You fabricated—” I couldn’t finish the sentence.

  My brain was melting.

  “Dash?” Erika’s voice pulled me back. “You okay? You’re making that face again.”

  “What face?” I managed.

  “The one where you’re thinking too hard about something and forgetting to use words.” She leaned closer to her camera, and her expression softened into something that made my chest tight. “It’s cute, but also kind of concerning.”

  Cute.

  She said cute.

  “I’m—yeah—fine,” I stammered, suddenly very aware that I was probably blushing. “Just... surprised. You’re really good with technical stuff.”

  “Thanks?” She sounded amused now. “I mean, you’re literally standing in front of crafting stuff worth more than my car. I think you’ve got me beat on the technical front.”

  “But you can work on gravitic systems,” I blurted. “That’s—that’s really advanced. Most people can’t even—”

  “Most people don’t need to,” Erika interrupted. “If you want to race, like properly, you need to understand what you roll. Every change, every mod, it all affects how fast you show those jerks you’re the best.” Her eyes lit up with the same competitive fire I’d seen during the incursion. “Can’t just rely on stock components if want to win.”

  She was talking about racing, but the philosophy was the same; never settle for good enough when you could make it better.

  “That’s...” I swallowed hard. “That’s really cool, Eri.”

  Her face flushed slightly, the grease smudge on her cheek making it more obvious. “It’s just practical,” she said, but she was smiling. “Anyway, I should let you get back to building those storage racks.” She paused. “Unless you want help? I could come over...”

  My heart did something complicated. “I—you’re working on your car,” I said quickly. Too quickly. “I don’t want to interrupt—”

  “I’ve been at it all day,” she said, rolling her eyes. “I can finish that anytime. But if you’re worried about me seeing your disaster zone of a workshop...”

  “It’s not a disaster,” I protested. “It’s... organized chaos.”

  “Uh-huh.” Her grin widened. “So that’s a no on the help?”

  I looked at the mountain of crates, then back at her holographic face. The logical part of my brain screamed that having Erika here would be amazing, helpful, and also terrifying because I’d probably say something stupid every five minutes.

  Also, there was a head of counter-intel in my home. “I should probably figure out my own system first,” I managed. “But... maybe next week? Once I’ve got basic storage sorted and actually done something?”

  “Deal,” Erika said immediately. “I’ll come check out your setup.” She winked. “And maybe teach you some proper organizational techniques. Have this neat rack.”

  “I know how to organize—”

  “You literally admitted you forgot to order storage systems.”

  “That’s—” I stopped. She had a point. “Fine. Next week. You can mock my organizational skills in person.”

  “Perfect.” She glanced to the side again, probably at her car. “Okay, text me if you need anything, okay?”

  “I will,” I promised.

  “And Dash?”

  “Yeah?”

  She gave a small smile. “I’m proud of you. Getting all this equipment, building your workshop... it’s really cool seeing you do this… and I missed our talks.”

  My face was definitely red now. “Thanks, Eri.”

  “Anytime.” She gave a small wave. “Talk later!”

  The call ended, leaving me standing in the workshop with a smile I couldn’t quite suppress. “Right,” I said aloud, rolling up my sleeves, as the crates stared back at me judgementally.

  Comma’s footsteps echoed down the basement stairs before I saw her, and when she appeared in the doorway, she wore the smuggest smile I’d ever seen on her face, which was saying something, considering she’d perfected smug by age twelve.

  “Dante says you’ve got a problem!” she announced, bouncing on her heels with barely contained glee, her eyes sweeping across the chaotic piles of crates with the schadenfreude only little sisters could manage.

  “He said, and I quote, ‘The boy needs supervision before he hurts himself with his own incompetence.’ Those were his actual words, Dash. The head of Kallum Counter-Intel thinks you’re incompetent!”

  I stared at her, then at the crates, then back at her smug face.

  “He’s still here?”

  Comma’s grin widened. “Oh, he’s waiting for you upstairs.”

  TODAY’S CHAPTER IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY Dante is watching

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