VoidHive Codex — Arc 4, Chapter 32: The Silence After

[JOINT COMMAND — ADMIRAL COSS — PERSONAL CORRESPONDENCE — DAY 24]

Sera,

I read your report at 0200. I made coffee. I read it again.

Harrow is going to say you've been compromised. He's going to say you went in there to answer a question and came back having decided the question was wrong, and that this is exactly what a compromised officer does — reframes the mission until the mission is whatever they want it to be.

He's not entirely wrong. I want you to know I know that.

But here's the thing about Harrow. He's a general. He thinks in terms of positions — you hold them or you cede them. He looked at the Architects' question and he saw a trap, and he wasn't wrong about that either. Yes or no, we lose something either way. He saw that clearly.

What he didn't see — what I'm not sure I saw until your second report — is that the trap was never meant to be a trap. They built it as a door and they've forgotten how doors work. Eleven thousand years is a long time to stand in a doorway.

Stay.

Figure out the better question.

And Sera — for what it's worth, from someone who has been making civilisation-level decisions based on a sample size of one for thirty years:

I think you're right.

— Coss