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1. An Invasion of Sacred Space, or: A Late-Night Coordinator
Soft artificial light filtered into the Silver Anchor's bedroom.
Ledea Mace woke slowly, and the first thing she registered was a texture against her skin that was not right.
"...What is this..."
She sat up. She looked at herself. She went still.
Before sleeping, she had been wearing — without question — her usual pajamas. One hundred percent cotton. Chosen entirely for comfort. What she was wearing now was something else entirely: a nightgown of layered silk and frills, the kind of garment that belonged in a fairy tale. A large ribbon at the chest. Delicate lace at the cuffs. Every small movement produced a soft, refined rustle.
Ledea did not require even one second to identify the responsible party.
The space beside her, occupied until last night, was empty. She exhaled — a long, thorough exhale — changed back into her normal clothes, and walked to the living area.
Shutia was already there, making coffee.
"Morning, sis. ...Wait — *what*?! Sis, why did you change?!"
The mug nearly left her hand.
"Good morning, Shutia. I'd actually like you to explain why I woke up wearing what I was wearing. In your own words."
"Heavy-handed is such an uncharitable way to put it! That was a premium sleep-enhancement gown, the product of cutting-edge sleep science combined with my personal aesthetic vision. Sis's sleeping face was so transcendent that I just—"
"I don't know where to begin."
Ledea sat down on the sofa.
"Listen to me, Shutia. My body is not your dressing doll. ...That said. The fabric, I will admit, was not unpleasant."
"*Really*?! Then tonight, the lavender version—"
"I will not be wearing it. ...Now. Breakfast, and then we leave. We have something to look forward to today."
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2. A Golden Dream, or: A Light That Fits Her Age
Today's destination had nothing to do with the guild.
Ledea had overheard something at a station bar several days ago — a rumor about an undiscovered gold deposit deep inside a debris field — and had decided to investigate on her own initiative.
"Sis, I think you might be setting your expectations a little high."
Shutia offered this from the co-pilot seat as the Silver Anchor approached the rust-red rock field.
"Remember what happened last time? No treasure. Just Katrine showing up in her gold-painted ship. This is almost certainly another dead end."
"No, Shutia. This time it's different. I can feel it."
Ledea's eyes held something Shutia didn't see often — something unguarded and bright, the kind of excitement that belonged to someone her actual age. The composed, perpetually-adult fifteen-year-old, looking like she was narrating her own adventure story.
"If we find the deposit, we can stock up on spare parts for the Anchor. And that premium lubricant you like. As much as we want."
The miniature fist she made as she said it finished the job entirely.
*(...Oh no. She's adorable. What was that little gesture. I need to press my face into her hair immediately.)*
Shutia fought down the expression threatening to form and executed a complete reversal. "You're right, sis! If sis says it's there, it's there!"
Though somewhere in the back of her mind, a different thought surfaced briefly — Katrine's face, the moment after the rescue. Red to the ears. None of her usual retaliatory commentary. Just retreat.
*(...Not worth thinking about. That woman's internal logic is harder to decipher than any spatial anomaly.)*
She refocused and brought the radar sensitivity up.
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3. A Labyrinth of Rock, or: An Accidental Rainbow
The sector in question was a dense maze of interlocking drifting stone — the kind of space where a single miscalculation would bring hull against rock.
"Carefully. Shutia, track the obstacles ahead."
"Copy. Large cluster, ten o'clock starboard. Port side clear."
They moved through the dark gaps in careful coordination. An hour passed. Then two. The scanners returned iron and nickel, iron and nickel — ordinary readings, nothing more. The gold deposit did not appear.
"...It isn't here. A bar rumor after all."
Ledea's shoulders dropped. She released the controls and exhaled quietly.
"I'm sorry, Shutia. I dragged you out here for nothing."
"Don't be. Just getting to take a drive with sis makes it worth—"
Shutia stopped mid-sentence.
Her eyes — with the particular acuity that made her what she was — had caught something: a faint light leaking from a crack in a large boulder, at the very edge of the screen.
"...Sis. Wait. Something just caught the light."
"What?"
"Take the controls. Get us closer."
They approached slowly. Shutia pushed the external camera to maximum magnification.
What was there was not gold.
Wedged into a complex gap between boulders, generated in the dark without anyone to witness it, was a *Stellite* — a formation that looked transparent at first glance, but when the ship's light hit it at the right angle, fractured into a deep, shifting rainbow: pure blue bleeding into burning red, color moving through it like something alive.
"...Beautiful. It isn't what we came for, but — I've never seen a mineral like this. Not once."
"Bringing it in. Anchor out."
Shutia ran the harpoon with a delicacy that matched the moment — working around the stone without marking it, carefully separating the crystal's base from the surrounding rock. It settled into the recovery pod. And then it was aboard, sitting quietly in the Silver Anchor's interior, holding its light.
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4. A Treasure for Two, or: The Best Kind of Day Off
"...Extraordinary. Every jeweler on the station — nothing they carry looks like this."
Ledea had her face close to the *Stellite* where it sat on the table, completely absorbed.
"We're not selling this. This is ours — yours and mine. Let's put it in the main lounge. Proof that we were here today, together."
"Wait — you don't want to sell it? We came for money."
"Money matters. But this memory matters more." She looked up at Shutia with a smile that was complete and uncomplicated. "We found it together."
That smile.
Shutia reached out and ran her hand gently through Ledea's hair.
"...You're right. A treasure for just the two of us. Worth more than anything we could have sold."
No gold like Katrine's. No warmth like the Pom's. Something else — a light that existed in the dark, found by no one else, belonging only to them.
"Days like this aren't bad either," Ledea said.
She placed her hand over Shutia's.
Her eyes closed, slightly, with something that looked like contentment.
Shutia held the small warmth in her palm and made a quiet promise to herself: that this rainbow light would never fade. That this smile would never be taken.
"...Yeah. Best day, sis."
The Silver Anchor turned back toward Subaru Station, carrying its rainbow afterglow.
In the lounge ahead of them, the debate about where exactly to display the *Stellite* was already forming — a peaceful argument, and a welcome one, with no dress-up proposals in sight.