Nostrils seal. The jaw clamps shut. Secondary oxygenation begins. Her skin grows stiff, her body hair lying flat and dense. Her heartrate plummets from the frantic drumbeat of survival, causing Ember to feel light-headed, blurring consciousness. She blinks through tears like diamonds and drifts helplessly in the current.

What else could she do? She doesn't have any propulsion, doesn't have a signal flare, is a rounding error in size. Around her is the detritus of her exit, the hole they tore in the ship's side, the powdered rubble and shattered signifiers of Beri mingling with slagged plates of external armor and drifting clouds of chemical afterburn. But they are not lying still; there is turbulence, disruption in the space between, ripples on the face of the sea. Too much noise to spot her, her alone, in all the grand wreck of battle.

She could survive for a long time, out here, but if she is not found, if Mosaic does not fish her out and scold her for getting herself frosted all over, then eventually she will drown; she will close her eyes and her powerful heart will simply stop beating. She will linger here forever. That is, unless [i]Polychromatikí[/i] pays attention to her and draws her along into a gravity well far off, barely alive, stranded on some farflung planet. (He is known to do this. Some lost souls even survive orbital reentry.)

Assuming that she is not fished out by Mosaic. Or by an ambitious Corvii looking to have leverage in their escape. Or [i]hunted.[/i] The void is beautiful, but it is not (despite the name) empty. There are monsters here, too. Great Void Leviathans, Eaters of Worlds, and things which ride the solar currents with great thin wings and gaping mouths.

Was that a flicker of movement? It flashes silver out of sight. She has no way to pivot, now that it (whatever it is) is in her blindspot. With the fingers of an old woman, Ember painfully curls her fingers around the hilt of her knife, ready to defend herself from something much, much worse than a crab.

[i]Poseidon, Horsefather, Master of Movement, Knower of the Unknown,[/i] she thinks to herself, as loudly as she can. [i]I am your creature, too. My scales shine, my colors warn, my movements are as fluid as the tidal rush. Be with me, here, now. Do not forget me.[/i]