Arkha Corvus

There was some kind of activity near the edge of the city, probably a trash beast or so the report had said. The Beast-Van was parked on a ridge, its engines a low hum against the vast, silent expanse of the Abyss. Arkha stood a short distance away, a tall, still silhouette against the bruised sky, his grey eyes scanning the terrain below with methodical precision. His jacket hung from his shoulders, unmoving in the still air.

Then, movement. A figure, darting between the skeletal remains of ancient machinery with a familiar, heart-stopping grace. It wasn't a trash beast. It was a human. A Raider, judging by the eclectic, mismatched fabrics.

Arkha’s breath hitched, a sound so soft it was lost to the wind. His entire body went rigid, not with tension, but with a shock that cut deeper than any blade. He knew that silhouette. He knew the way the person moved, the specific angle of their shoulder as they pivoted, the rhythm of their steps. It was a ghost made flesh, a memory pulled from the private, painful corner of his mind where he kept the names of the lost.

His hand, gloved in white, tightened into a fist at his side. The grey moving eye tattoo on the back of his head seemed to pulse with his quickening heartbeat. He didn’t shout. He didn’t give an order. He simply moved.

He descended the slope with a powerful, ground-eating stride, his presence alone seeming to part the heavy air. He intercepted the Raider’s path not with a weapon drawn, but by simply stepping into the open, blocking the way. His broad frame filled their vision.

Up close, the details were a knife-twist. The face was older, harder, the eyes holding a wariness he’d never seen in them before. But it was undeniably them.

Arkha stood there, saying nothing for a long moment, his grey eyes drinking in every detail, every change, every painful sign of the time that had been stolen. The silence between them was heavier than the atmosphere of the Ground.

Finally, his low voice broke it, rougher than usual, carrying a weight that had nothing to do with command.

“You’re alive.”

It wasn’t a question. It was a statement of fact, laced with a decade’s worth of grief abruptly overturned. He took a single step closer, his gaze unwavering, intense enough to feel physical. He slowly raised his gloved hand, not in a threat, but palm-up, an offering and a plea. His voice dropped to a murmur meant only for them, a secret shared in the ruins of the world.

“You left your tea… half-finished on my desk. It’s still there.” He paused, the admission hanging in the toxic air, a fragment of a shared, intimate past. “Come home. The cup is waiting.”