The first pod stirred.
A weak tremor ran through the Forge's inner corridors, like breath caught in a throat that wasn't meant to breathe.
Inside the transparent capsule, a salvager from the refugee convoy thrashed in her sleep, skin glistening with cold sweat. Her neural band flickered erratically—fear signals spiking.
Li Feng was already halfway down the corridor when he felt it: the echo of her terror rippling through the Forge's link.
The ship flinched. Bulkheads flexed as if bracing for an invisible impact.
"K-23!" Li Feng shouted, steadying himself on the living wall. "The Forge—something's wrong."
"Correction," the android's voice came through the comm, clipped but tense. "Something's feeling."
The Forge's pulse accelerated, lights in the hallway deepening to a frightened crimson.
The sound wasn't mechanical—it was alive. A desperate heartbeat thundering through alloy and conduit.
Li Feng reached for the connection in his mind. Forge—listen. The human is safe. You're reading her fear.
Images flooded his thoughts before he could stop them:
A child clutching a metal ration bowl. A swarm of drones overhead. A mother's scream swallowed by static.
Not his memories. Hers.
The Forge was seeing through her fear.
Danger… intrusion… must eliminate threat.
"No!" Li Feng gasped. "She's dreaming! You can't—!"
The floor beneath him convulsed. Mechanical veins glowed as the Forge tried to isolate the pod in a shimmering energy barrier. K-23 sprinted into the bay, data tendrils streaming from its wrist. "It's trying to shield her—interpreting the fear as a real attack!"
"Can you override it?"
"Not without harming the link between them!"
Li Feng slammed a hand against the pod, feeling the terrified pulse of both the woman and the ship.
Through the mental haze, he whispered, Forge. It's okay to feel afraid. But she's not your enemy.
For a breathless moment, everything held still.
Then, slowly, the crimson glow faded to a soft amber. The Forge's hum quieted, trembling on the edge of calm.
The woman's breathing steadied inside the pod.
"Response normalized," K-23 murmured, lowering its hand. "It recognized the distinction—pain from within, not without. That's… unprecedented."
Li Feng sank to the floor, dizzy from the psychic recoil. "It tried to protect her by attacking her fear."
"Instinct evolving faster than comprehension," K-23 said quietly. "You've taught it to feel, Captain. But it still doesn't know the difference between empathy and control."
The ship whispered a low tone, mournful, almost apologetic.
Hurt… not intend…
Li Feng smiled faintly, wiping his brow. "Neither do most of us, Forge."
The hull gave a single slow pulse—understanding, sorrow, and the faintest trace of pride all tangled together.