Vestal didn’t go to dinner.

  Not because she didn’t want to.

  Not because she didn’t need to eat.

  Because on Horizon, the people who held everyone else together rarely got to sit down long enough to pretend they were part of the room.

  She moved through the prefab corridor with a medical kit slung at her side, boots quiet on damp flooring. The mess hall’s warmth and noise existed somewhere behind her—distant voices, clatter, the faint scent of food in the humid air—but Vestal followed a different set of signals.

  The kind that didn’t come from generators or construction.

  The kind that came from a body failing.

  Amagi’s space was kept as calm as Horizon could manage.

  Not a true infirmary—those were too crowded and too exposed to the base’s constant movement—but a quiet prefab room set aside for a ship that had been brought here half-deconstructed and still somehow remained dignified.

  The light inside was soft and low. The air smelled of tea, paper, and that faint metallic tang that clung to KANSEN when their systems were under strain.

  Vestal knocked once.

  No answer.

  She didn’t wait.

  When Vestal opened the door, she knew immediately something was wrong.

  Amagi was sitting up in bed, but the posture was brittle—too careful, like sitting upright cost her something. Her hair was tucked back loosely, but a few strands clung damply to her face. Her skin looked pale in a way that wasn’t just “sickly shipgirl aesthetic.”

  It was the pale of systems drawing down.

  Her eyes lifted toward Vestal, and the softness in them was still there—grace even in suffering—but the focus was… off.

  Like Amagi was looking through fog.

  “Vestal,” Amagi murmured.

  Her voice was quieter than usual.

  Vestal’s chest tightened.

  She stepped closer, gaze already scanning.

  Breathing rate elevated.

  Skin temperature slightly cool.

  Microtremor in fingers.

  That faint sheen at the edges of her eyes that wasn’t tears—stress moisture, like the body was burning through reserves and couldn’t regulate properly.

  “How long,” Vestal asked, voice controlled, “have you been feeling worse?”

  Amagi’s lips curved faintly.

  It looked like an apology.

  “Long enough,” she said softly.

  Vestal didn’t like that answer.

  Vestal rarely liked Amagi’s answers, because Amagi had a habit of enduring until endurance became damage.

  Vestal set her kit down with a firm motion.

  “Any pain?”

  Amagi hesitated.

  Then, honestly:

  “Not sharp,” she said. “More… like pressure. Like my chest is full of water that isn’t there.”

  Vestal’s jaw tightened.

  That could mean any number of things in KANSEN physiology, and most of them were bad.

  Amagi’s condition had always been complicated: critical damage legacy, unknown sickness resonance, incomplete carrier restoration, the kind of systemic fragility that didn’t show up cleanly in standard charts. A ship-soul could be rebuilt from steel, but the pendant resonance—the person—didn’t always recover at the same speed.

  Vestal’s eyes moved to the corner where Amagi’s repair status logs were stacked.

  Too many red notes.

  Too many “pending.”

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  Too many “awaiting material allocation.”

  The base had improved.

  Horizon was building.

  But the math was still brutal: you couldn’t patch everything at once, and the war didn’t pause so you could catch up.

  Vestal reached out and took Amagi’s wrist gently.

  Pulse irregular.

  Not human irregular—KANSEN irregular, the kind that meant the internal “hum” of systems wasn’t syncing correctly.

  Amagi watched Vestal with calm acceptance.

  She didn’t look afraid.

  Which somehow made Vestal more afraid for her.

  “Amagi,” Vestal said quietly, “you should have called me.”

  Amagi’s gaze lowered.

  “I didn’t want to be—”

  “A burden,” Vestal finished, voice sharper than she intended.

  Amagi didn’t flinch.

  She simply nodded once, small.

  Vestal exhaled slowly, forcing her tone back into controlled steadiness.

  “You are not a burden,” Vestal said, each word deliberate. “You are a patient. And you are important.”

  Amagi’s eyes softened faintly.

  “You are kind,” she whispered.

  Vestal didn’t indulge the compliment.

  She opened her kit instead, because kindness didn’t stabilize failing systems—medicine did.

  From the kit, Vestal withdrew a sealed injector and a small ampoule marked with a symbol that only certain repair ships used. Not a human stimulant. Not an analgesic. Something made for ship-souls: concentrated stabilization compound designed to reinforce pendant resonance and ease systemic cascade when a KANSEN was drifting toward critical.

  It wasn’t something Vestal liked using casually.

  It bought time.

  It didn’t fix the underlying problem.

  And time was only useful if you did something with it.

  Amagi watched the injector with calm curiosity.

  “That’s… for us,” she murmured.

  Vestal nodded.

  “It’s for you,” she corrected, then added firmly, “and it’s not optional.”

  Amagi’s lips twitched faintly.

  “Of course,” she said softly, almost amused.

  Vestal moved with practiced precision—wiping the injection site, steadying Amagi’s arm, checking her expression.

  “Tell me if it burns,” Vestal said.

  Amagi’s gaze stayed on Vestal’s face.

  “It will,” she replied quietly. “But I will endure.”

  Vestal didn’t like that either.

  But she didn’t argue.

  She administered the injection.

  The compound went in slow, deliberate.

  Amagi’s fingers clenched briefly.

  A small breath escaped her, thin.

  It did burn.

  Vestal could see it in the way Amagi’s shoulders tightened, the way her eyes fluttered closed for a second.

  But Amagi didn’t complain.

  She just endured like she always did.

  Vestal held her steady until the injector clicked empty.

  Then she withdrew it and pressed a small patch over the site.

  For a moment, nothing happened.

  Then Amagi’s breathing shifted.

  Not dramatically.

  Just… eased.

  The pressure in her chest seemed to lessen by degrees. Her shoulders lowered slightly. The microtremor in her fingers calmed.

  Color returned to her skin in a faint wash—not healthy, not “fine,” but less dangerous.

  Amagi opened her eyes again.

  Her focus was clearer now.

  “Ah,” she murmured softly. “That is… better.”

  Vestal’s jaw unclenched by a fraction.

  “Stabilized,” Vestal said quietly. “For the moment.”

  Amagi’s gaze lowered.

  “For the moment,” she repeated.

  Vestal sat on the edge of the chair beside the bed, posture rigid because if she allowed herself to relax, she might start thinking too loudly.

  She didn’t want to show fear.

  Not to Amagi.

  Amagi was already living with enough fear disguised as grace.

  Vestal adjusted the blanket around her.

  Checked her temperature again.

  Listened to the hum of Amagi’s internal rhythm like a mechanic listening to an engine that was trying to die politely.

  Then Vestal said the truth.

  “Your restoration timeline is not matching your resonance recovery,” she said quietly. “Your ship can be rebuilt. But your body—you—need more support than Horizon can provide with what we have right now.”

  Amagi’s eyes softened.

  “I know,” she whispered.

  Vestal’s voice tightened.

  “If this continues,” Vestal said, “you could crash.”

  Amagi didn’t flinch.

  She just looked tired.

  “…Die,” she said softly, finishing the thought without drama.

  Vestal swallowed.

  “Yes,” she admitted.

  The silence that followed wasn’t awkward.

  It was heavy.

  Rain tapped against the prefab roof like a soft metronome.

  Somewhere far off, the mess hall laughed faintly—someone forcing humor into the air because that’s what people did when they refused to break.

  Vestal stared down at her hands for a moment.

  Then looked back up at Amagi with that stern, caring expression that made everyone on Horizon behave whether they wanted to or not.

  “I’m going to keep you from reaching that point,” Vestal said firmly.

  Amagi’s lips curved faintly.

  “I believe you,” she murmured.

  Vestal didn’t let the warmth of that sink too deep.

  Instead she asked, practical:

  “Have you eaten?”

  Amagi hesitated.

  “A little,” she admitted.

  Vestal’s eyes narrowed.

  “A little is not enough,” she said, then softened slightly. “I’ll have Tōkaidō bring you something later. Something you can tolerate.”

  Amagi’s eyes flickered with gratitude at the mention of Tōkaidō.

  Then she asked, voice quiet:

  “Will Kade… be angry?”

  Vestal’s brow rose.

  “Why would he be angry?”

  Amagi’s gaze drifted to the window.

  “Because he cannot fix this with a wrench,” she said softly.

  Vestal’s mouth twitched faintly—almost a smile, almost frustration.

  “He will be angry,” Vestal admitted. “But not at you.”

  Amagi nodded slowly.

  Vestal rose, gathering her kit.

  At the door, she paused and looked back.

  “Try to rest,” Vestal instructed.

  Amagi’s voice was soft.

  “I will try,” she promised.

  Vestal lingered another moment, then spoke the part she’d been holding back.

  “Tomorrow,” Vestal said quietly, “I’m putting in a request to Kade.”

  Amagi blinked.

  “For what?”

  Vestal’s expression hardened into purpose.

  “For a mission,” she said. “Or salvage. Or anything that gets us the material we need. We can’t keep buying you time with injections. We need structural solution.”

  Amagi’s eyes softened.

  “You will ask him to risk others,” she murmured.

  Vestal’s jaw tightened.

  “I will ask him to risk planned,” she corrected, voice firm. “Not waste. Not neglect. Not cruelty. Planned risk with a purpose. That’s the only kind of risk Horizon can afford.”

  Amagi watched her for a long moment.

  Then nodded once, slow and solemn.

  “Then,” Amagi said softly, “I hope the sea is generous.”

  Vestal’s expression didn’t soften.

  “The sea is never generous,” she said quietly. “We take what we need.”

  She left Amagi’s room with that sentence sitting heavy in the air.

  Outside, Horizon’s rain-wet corridors smelled like damp steel and work.

  And somewhere across the base, in the mess hall, Kade was being forced to drink water instead of coffee—alive, stubborn, and still not aware that tomorrow Vestal would walk into his office and ask him to do what he hated most:

  Send people out again.

  Not because it was glorious.

  Because someone was running out of time.