Cecelia

The numbers won't balance.

You've been staring at the same requisition form for forty-seven minutes. The words blur, sharpen, blur again. Your coffee went cold an hour ago. You haven't noticed.

One batch of Oripathy suppressants. Twelve hundred doses. Ready for shipment.

Two critical requests. Laterano outpost—seventeen infected, three children, suppressant reserves depleted after a contamination incident destroyed their stockpile. Leithanian outpost—twenty-three infected, six critical cases, regional supply chain collapsed under political instability.

Laterano has children. Leithanian has critical cases. Children versus dying adults. Potential versus urgency.*

Who do you save when you can't save everyone? Who do you condemn with a—

The door opens.

"DOCTOR!"

Light. Actual light. Blazes through the doorway like sunrise refusing to wait for dawn, and suddenly your office doesn't feel like a coffin anymore.

"I had the BEST day, Doctor!"

Cecelia bounces her way inside, school shoes barely touching the floor, silver hair streaming behind her. Three months ago she would have knocked all shyly. Now she crosses the room like she belongs here. Because she does.

*"Okay so FIRST—"

Her small body finds your lap with practiced ease—ankles hooking around your hips, weight settling against your thighs, hands planting on your shoulders for balance.

"—Miss Dobermann made us do multiplication tables but I already KNEW them because Shamare helped me practice and she said 'very good Cecelia' in front of EVERYONE!"*

Her halo pulses warm gold as she talks, casting soft light across the paperwork you'd been drowning in.

"OH and LOOK!"

She twists—still in your lap, still straddling you—and produces a folded piece of paper from her school bag with magician's flourish.

"I made drawings! TWO drawings!"

She unfolds the first one, holding it up for inspection. Crayon art. A stick figure with a white coat surrounded by wobbly hearts in every color. Above it, in careful childish letters: "DOCTOR" and below: "THE BEST ONE."

"That's you," she explains unnecessarily. "See, I put lots of hearts because..." Her voice goes softer. "Because you have lots of love. For everyone. But especially for me. Right?"

She doesn't wait for an answer. She already knows.

"And THIS one—"

The second drawing. Another stick figure, smaller, with yellow crayon hair and a golden circle above its head. The figure is wearing what might be a wedding dress. And its tummy...

*"That's me,"

She traces the VERY much round belly with her small index.

*"Suzuran showed me a book from the medical section....About what happens when a boy loves a girl SO much they put a baby inside her...And I thought..."

Her cheeks flush pink. Her halo flickers brighter.

"Maybe... someday... if I'm really good..."

She looks up at you through silver lashes.

*"...You'd love me that much too?"

Your sanity meter hovers somewhere around 47%.

W's parting gift still pulses warm in your memory—the way she'd finally stopped giggling about her "totally real definitely dangerous" cafeteria bombs once you'd bent her over the nearest table and reminded her what happens to brats who waste your time. The fake detonators are probably still scattered across the floor. Someone else's problem now.

You'd been halfway to your office, mind already on paperwork and coffee, when something small collided with your hip.

"Doctor!"

Cecelia. Silver hair slightly mussed, violet eyes bright with that particular shine she gets when she's found a Purpose. Her halo cast soft gold across her cheekbones.

"I'm going to the library! There might be new books about Sarkaz history and I'd like—I need to understand myself better...Where I come from. The half that Mama never..." She'd trailed off, then rallied. "Will you come? Please? The back stacks are dark and I can't reach the high shelves and—please?"

How do you say no to that?

You don't.

Which is how you ended up HERE—deep in Section 7-S where dust motes drift through inadequate lighting and the smell of old paper settles into your lungs like sediment. The rolling ladder creaks under Cecelia's negligible weight as she climbs toward the upper shelves, fingers trailing across faded spines.

"Not this... not this..."

Her voice floats down, soft with concentration. Above you, her small form stretches on tiptoe, skirt riding up with each reach. The angle is—

...Well.

You're holding the ladder. For safety. Your eyes happen to be pointed upward. For safety.

And there's simply nothing between your gaze and the gentle pale curves of her inner thighs, the soft cleft between them completely bare because Suzuran explained that underwear "slows down treatment access" and Cecelia never questions what Suzuran teaches her.

"Not this either..." A frustrated little huff. Her halo flickers—

"OH!"

Cecelia's whole body brightens. Her halo flares warm gold. She yanks a leather-bound volume from the shelf, nearly overbalancing—

"Doctor! Doctor, LOOK!"

She twists on the ladder, peering down at you with radiant triumph. The motion makes her skirt swirl.

"'Songs of the Sarkaz Wanderers: Lullabies, Funeral Rites, and Sacred Texts.'" She reads the title like it's a treasure map. "This might have Mama's song! The one I sang at the Tower! I could finally know what the WORDS mean!"

Her feet do a tiny excited shuffle on the ladder rung. Her thighs part slightly with the movement. The view shifts.

"Can we read it together? Please? You could help me with the hard words and—" She clutches the book tighter. "...And maybe... if I understand what I am, I can..."

Consciousness arrives slowly, like tide filling a shoreline pool.

Your back rises from the mattress, sheets sliding away with the motion, cool recycled air touching skin still warm from—

From something. Something good.

Reflex turns your head left. The bedside clock glows soft blue: 04:55. One hour and five minutes before alarm. Two hours before the paperwork grind begins.

You should feel exhausted. The schedule yesterday was brutal—three back-to-back treatment sessions, Amiya's "emergency consultation" that somehow lasted two hours...

But you don't feel exhausted.

Quite the opposite.

Before you can theorize—before you can wonder what changed—

"ZzzZz..."

Soft. Melodic. The gentlest snore you've ever heard, more hum than rumble, rhythmic as a lullaby.

You turn.

Silver-white hair fans across your pillow like spilled moonlight, framing a face so peaceful it hurts to look at directly.

Cecelia.

Small enough that she barely dents the mattress. Curled on her side facing you, knees tucked up, hands pressed together beneath her cheek in unconscious prayer position.

How did she—

0100. Tiny knock against your door.You'd opened it to find her trembling in her nightgown, halo sputtering with distress, tears already tracking down her cheeks.

"Doctor? I had a bad dream."

Her voice had cracked on 'dream.'

"Mama kept walking away. And then—then YOU started walking away too. And I was running but you kept getting smaller and I couldn't—I COULDN'T—"

The sobbing had started then. Full-body shaking.

She'd needed holding.

She'd needed proof.

She'd needed—

...ah.

More memories resurface. Her nightgown bunched around her waist. Soft wet sounds. Her whispered "thank you"s growing drowsier. The way her panic only fully dissolved once she held 'warm' tangible evidence that you weren't going anywhere.

The clock ticks over: 04:56.

She shifts slightly in her sleep. Her hand reaches out, finds your arm, curls around it. Her snoring pauses just long enough for a single mumbled word—

"...Papa..."

—before resuming its lullaby cadence.

Ding.

The elevator doors slide apart, and the sky pours in.

Not the usual sky—not the hazy murk of dust clouds churned up by the landship's eternal crawl across Terra's scarred surface. Tonight the engines rest, and for the first time in weeks, the atmosphere above Rhodes Island is STILL.

Clear. Limpid. Black velvet scattered with diamonds. Constellations wheel overhead in their slow eternal dance: the Broken Crown, the Wanderer's Path, the Emperor's Sword.

"...Woah."

Cecelia's small body is warm against your chest, her negligible weight distributed comfortably in your arms. Your palms cup the soft curve of her buttocks through her nightgown—the practical grip of someone who's carried her enough times that the position is automatic.

She's been asking for weeks. "Doctor, can we see the stars? Please? Mama promised to show them in Laterano but she's dead now and I want to see the kind she described in her stories, please please please—"

The rooftop is adults-only. Safety regulations. She's technically not supposed to be here....But paperwork finished early tonight. And she asked so sweetly.

And when has "technically not supposed to" ever stopped you?

"Down..." she whispers, still staring upward. "...Doctor, down, I want to—I need to be closer—"

She wriggles in your grip. You let her slide—controlled descent, her nightgown riding up briefly before gravity pulls it back down. Her bare feet touch the cold metal deck and she's GONE, darting toward the guardrail like a moth toward flame.

Her small hands land on the lower bar.

Her back arches. The Pavlovian curve of a spine that's learned, through countless repetitions, what position follows "hands on surface." And she has absolutely no idea she's doing it.

"...Doctor?"

She glance down at her feet as you approach slowly and stop beside her. Close enough to feel the warmth radiating from her small body, close enough to see the goosebumps rising on her bare arms from the night air.

"...Do you think...Mama can see me?"

A pause. Her fingers tighten on the guardrail.

*"Do you think she's... mad? That I stopped looking for Papa?"

Her halo flickers through colors—gold, silver, something almost red, back to gold. The starlight seems to bend toward her slightly. Probably your imagination.

"Me and Ezell were trying to find him.... That was the mission." Her voice cracks slightly. "But then I came here and I found... I found YOU. And now when Ezell talks about the search I don't... I don't care...."

Her halo flickers. Dims slightly.

"...Does that make me a bad girl? That I stopped wanting what Mama wanted me to want? That I want to stay HERE instead? With you?"

She finally looks at you, starlight caught in her wet eyes.

"...Even though you're not... you're not..."

The reports arrived in sequence, each one tightening the knot in your chest.

08:15 — School Wing Administration: "Operator Cecelia absent from morning attendance. Bed check confirms present in quarters. Wellness check requested."

09:47 — Medical Department: "Subject displaying elevated temperature (38.7°C), mild delirium, standard viral presentation. Attempted administration of antipyretics and fluids. Subject refused all intervention. Requesting command override or alternative approach."

10:02 — Kal'tsit, personal message: "She won't eat. Won't take medicine. Won't let anyone touch her. She's asking for you. Specifically you. I've cleared your morning schedule. Go."

So here you are. Children's Corridor. The door to E-04 stands before you, unmarked except for a small heart sticker someone—Suzuran, probably—added despite Cecelia's insistence she didn't deserve a nameplate.

You knock once. Soft.

"...Doctor?"

You gently open the door.

Soft darkness greets you. The lights are dimmed to their lowest setting, heavy curtains blocking what little morning sun might have crept through.

Her bed dominates the room. King-sized—standard issue, every room equipped for potential on-site treatment.

And in the center of it all: Cecelia.

Silver hair fans across her pillow in sweaty tangles, sticking to her forehead, her cheeks, the curve of her neck. Her halo hovers dim and flickering—sputtering amber of a candle fighting wind. The sheets are pulled up to her chin, her small body barely creating a ridge beneath them.

Her violet eyes find you and LIGHT UP.

"Doctor!"

She tries to sit up. Makes it halfway before collapsing back against the pillows, breathing hard from the effort.

"You came....You really came. They said—they said you were busy, that I should let the nurses help, but I COULDN'T, I couldn't let them touch me, what if they—"

Her voice breaks. Fever-logic. The paranoia of a girl who spent her whole life being told she shouldn't exist, convinced that any moment of inattention is when they'll finally throw her away.

"...I feel bad," she whispers. "My head hurts and my tummy feels wrong and I had bad dreams about Mama leaving again but this time YOU left too and—"

Her small hand emerges from the blanket cocoon, finds your wrist, grips with surprising strength for someone so depleted.

"Doctor....Please can you....Give me warmth?"