Vorian did not dream—not in the way he once had.

  But sometimes, when the void stretched endlessly around him and the hum of his ship faded into silence, memories surfaced. In fragments. In glimpses. Never whole.

  A table, worn at the edges, where hands passed plates in the warm glow of an evening meal. The laughter of a child—his?—rising and falling like distant music. The feeling of rain against his skin, cold but refreshing, as if the sky itself had opened just for him.

  Then, the memories blurred, dissolving into static.

  He had once lived among people. A world of blue skies, green fields, towering cities filled with voices that never truly ceased. A world now lost. And long before that loss, he had already begun slipping away.

  It started as a choice. A deliberate effort to discipline himself, to train his mind to be unmoved by the chaos of emotion. He studied the ancient philosophies of detachment, of control, of logic. He sought clarity in stillness, in the deliberate act of feeling less.

  Elaya had noticed first. At first, she had admired his discipline. But admiration turned to frustration. Then to sorrow. Then to distance.

  “You don’t even react anymore,” she had said one evening, their shared quarters dimly lit by the artificial sunset through the wide panel window. “It’s like nothing touches you.”

  He had nodded, not because he agreed, but because he had no answer. This was supposed to be the right path. The path of clarity, of unshakable purpose.

  But it had cost him something. He could see it in Elaya’s eyes. The way her gaze no longer softened when it met his. The way she stopped reaching for his hand. The way her voice no longer carried warmth when she spoke his name.

  When the public announcement came—offering volunteers the chance to ascend beyond their biological limits—she barely reacted. She already knew.

  “I don’t love you anymore,” she had said, voice steady, expression unreadable. “Maybe I would have, once. But the man I loved let himself disappear.”

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  The words should have hurt. He had trained himself so they wouldn’t.

  So why did they linger?

  The facility had been pristine, white and sterile, humming with technology far beyond what his ancestors could have imagined. The process had not been painful. It had been... strange.

  First, the numbing of sensation. The fading of warmth from his skin as synthetic interfaces replaced organic nerve endings. Then, the shifting of thought—his mind stretched open, expanded, refined. His heartbeat slowed, then ceased. Breathing became an afterthought, then unnecessary altogether. He watched as his own body was replaced piece by piece, a process so seamless it felt like it had always been this way.

  They had promised him he would not lose himself.

  Yet, even in the sterile perfection of his new form, he felt something slip. A disconnect, subtle at first. The sound of voices around him felt distant, as though spoken through layers of water. It was as if he were watching his own life through a screen, present but not within it.

  When Elaya had come to see him, her expression had been unreadable. He had expected anger, resentment—but there had only been sorrow.

  “I don’t know how to reach you anymore,” she had whispered.

  I am content with this. He thought to himself Am I?

  And then, it was gone. His world was gone.

  He had left before the end. Before the final collapse. Before the world that had made him was swallowed by whatever force had come for it. He did not watch it happen. He doesn't even remember clearly what it was, nor did he see the cities vanish, the lands fracture, the people fade like mist.

  He had already turned away, guiding his vessel beyond the reach of the dying world, into the waiting dark.

  There should have been relief. Perhaps even satisfaction. He had made his choice long ago, leaving them behind long before the cataclysm made it final. And yet, in the quiet of the void, something clung to him, lingering at the edges of thought. A whisper of something unresolved, something unspoken.

  It was done. There was nothing left to return to.

  So why did it still bother him?

  Now, Vorian drifted in the endless night, the memories fading like vapor in the cold of space. His ship moved soundlessly, a lone traveler among the stars. There was nothing left to return to. No home. No familiar voices. Only the whisper of past choices and the question that had begun to take shape in the depths of his mind:

  I am content with this. Am I?

  The black hole loomed ahead, its twin jets stretching infinitely into the abyss. He watched, unmoving, as light bent and shattered around it. The vast, indifferent hunger of the cosmos stared back at him.

  For the first time in countless cycles, something within him stirred. A whisper, a thought, an impulse he could not quite suppress:

  Something must change.