Chapter 22: Aftermath & Adjustment

The quiet after revelation never arrived all at once. It came in layers—systems stabilizing, people catching their breath, decisions forming faster than emotions could follow them.

The Praesidium held position in high lunar orbit when the first rendezvous signal resolved from the dark.

Two ships emerged from shroud with deliberate patience, sliding into formation as if they had always belonged there. Their profiles matched the Praesidium in philosophy if not scale—elegant, restrained, unmistakably Semaian.

Darius watched them approach, arms folded, posture still.

“They brought more than hulls,” he said.

Amina inclined her head. “They were never meant to come alone.”

Cargo manifests unfolded across the tactical display:

• Construction latus arrays
• Power spine cores
• Atmospheric control seeds
• Medical fabrication nodes
• Twenty-five shuttle craft, configurable for civilian, medical, or logistics use
Not a fleet.
A beginning.

Amina studied the data in silence longer than necessary.

“My people do not return to the galaxy without somewhere to stand,” she said finally. “Any royal re-emergence requires a place beside a world—not on it.”

Darius exhaled slowly. “A buffer.”

“Yes,” she replied. “A promise we can keep.”

The call from Earth arrived shortly after.

It was not dramatic. It never was.

A children’s hospital in eastern Ukraine. Drone strike. Power failure. Pediatric trauma exceeding capacity in minutes.

Renee was already standing by the time the report finished populating.