Page 106 of Stars in Umbra
19
A Revenant Phantom
RINA
The flyer cut a sleek arc across the cloud line, its silhouette dark against the early morning haze over New Rambasa.
The Thabot Barracks came into view below.
The vast complex of reinforced dura-steel, perimeter towers, and subterranean bunkers sprawled like a bastion sentinel at the city’s edge.
It was one of the Dunian military’s most active bases, where drills mimicking galactic warfare unfolded daily, and readiness was not a goal but an unrelenting requirement.
Rina eased the controls, guiding the craft onto the southern rooftop pad, designated for high-clearance entries.
Her wrists were free now, after Mo removed the cuffs from her hands before the flight without ceremony.
He was now reticent, having not spoken more than a few words since.
She’d tried, twice, to probe him during the flight.
Both times, she received little more than a grunt or the burning flick of gray-gold eyes.
She gave him the space, also so she could try to get her head around what had just happened, her mind churning.
As the flyer descended, the militarized automated defense systems retracted after receiving her high-level clearance codes.
The full-spectrum green light included an emergency override encryption, the kind reserved for top brass or wartime exceptions.
She didn’t use these codes without reverence, and a shiver went through her, for now she was liable to answer to her seniors if shit went sideways.
They touched down in silence.
No ground crew was in sight, nor were any officers or cameras.
It was as requested.
Minutes earlier, when they lifted off from the hospital, she issued a private, urgent directive, classified under Active Threat Containment Protocols.
It was a warning that her arrival on base would involve a live asset of unverified classification and potential meta-state instability.
Her message, phrased with enough delicate care not to ignite panic, was still adequate to clear every corridor in her path.
They disembarked into charged silence.
Rina cast the man beside her a glance.
He prowled alongside her, barefoot still, his hospital bottoms incongruous against the garrison’s clean lines and militarized interior.
Yet he moved with lethal grace, shoulders tight, that crackling energy still alive beneath his skin. His gaze remained forward, stormy and unreadable.
Whatever war was happening inside him, it had no room for words.
They passed checkpoint after checkpoint, her biometric ID clearing each one.
The barracks’ executive tier was ghostly quiet, its usual hustle reduced to echoes by the weight of her silent order.
Light pooled in strips across the polished floor as they went past strategic command offices and long glass windows overlooking training ranges.
