The hours dragged on and the negotiations drifted into less formal waters, as they so often did aboard the Starfire Ascendant. What began in Violet’s private suite—an expensively furnished chamber reserved for high-ranking guests—soon gave way to leisure. 

The room itself was as much a stage as a sanctuary with a wide observation window framing the starfield beyond the ship. It was from here that the small gathering spilled outward, gravity pulling them inevitably toward the entertainment decks (despite anyone's effort for the contrary). Deals were rarely struck in ink alone, and conversations stretched more freely when drink and distraction were at hand.

The destination became one of the ship’s upper-class bars: The Celestial Parlor. Its walls were an ever-shifting panorama of nebulae and starlines, a programmed illusion that gave the impression of drinking in open space. A chandelier of floating light-orbs cast a soft aurora over lacquered tables. Music drifted from a synth-string quartet in the corner, soft enough not to drown conversation, but insistent enough to remind everyone they were in a place of refinement.

It was here that Violet’s attention found Elkon Mishima. Unlike so many executives who veiled themselves behind bodyguards, false names, and discretion, Mishima thrived on visibility. His arrival was theatrical—coat of woven nano-silk flashing with shifting patterns, a drink in one hand and a cigar-like stim in the other. His laughter carried across the room, deliberate, his voice a performance meant to claim territory. The projection band on his wrist spelled his family crest in burning kanji, bright enough to reflect in the polished glass of the bar. People noticed him because he demanded to be noticed.

Elsewhere, the press of the crowd revealed something more unsettling. Between reflections in the mirrored columns and the play of holographic light, Darya caught sight of them: the smooth, featureless face of a rabbit mask. Not once, but twice. Identical to the one worn by the enigmatic woman from earlier in the evening. Each glimpse was fleeting—a shape lingering at the edge of the crowd, gone the moment the eye focused. The figures never stood long enough to be studied. No voice, no stance, no height that matched the woman before. Just the repeating image of the mask, as if the ship itself were reflecting her presence back at them in fragments.

When the evening finally wound down, the return to their quarters was a quieter affair. The Starfire Ascendant’s guest corridors were far from the bright lights of its social decks. Carpeting muffled each footstep. The walls hummed faintly with the pulse of the ship’s reactors. Every so often, the ceiling lights dimmed to simulate a shipboard “night cycle,” leaving the passages tinted in pale indigo.

It was only when they reached Violet’s suite again that something seemed… wrong. The door was not sealed. Instead, it hung just slightly ajar. Not wide—no more than the width of a finger—but enough that a thin seam of shadow leaked through the gap onto the corridor’s carpet.

No sound came from within. No movement. Just the faint, expectant silence of a space that should have been secure.