"Your father designed this ship's archive systems," the robot continued, as if speaking might soften the weight in the air. "Your mother ensured its protection. Both of them were—" it hesitated, static warping its voice—"unusually devoted to each other."
Jinyue's gaze flicked toward it. "Unusually?"
"Yes," the robot said. "For a sub-female and a female to remain monogamous was considered… inefficient. Socially frowned upon."
Jinyue frowned. "Why?"
The robot's head tilted slightly. "Reproductive biology. Within the Dominion, sub-females constitute the majority of the population. They are capable of both carrying and—on rare occasions—fertilising eggs. However, their fertility is lower than that of males, and thus most are encouraged to bond with multiple partners to ensure reproduction efficiency."
Jinyue blinked slowly, trying to untangle that. "Wait. You're saying sub-females can get pregnant and impregnate others?"
"Correct," the robot said simply. "It depends on biological calibration and hormonal balance. In pairings between sub-females and females, natural conception occurs rarely, hence the use of assisted incubation. Fertilised eggs are artificially implanted into specialised nutrient pods, where they incubate until hatching."
"Hatching," Jinyue repeated, faintly shocked.
So Zergs laid eggs. Of course they did.
He felt disgusted, in disbelief, a distant sense of betrayal by the universe's design itself.
The statement was horrifying and suddenly as happy as can be that he lacked his original body; he couldn't even begin to imagine the whole egg-laying process.
Was this what evolution had chosen to keep? What a grotesque joke.
Why did I even wake up in such a scary place!
The robot nodded. "Zerg offspring develop externally. Once the egg reaches maturity, the hatchling emerges and is cared for communally. It is efficient, though nutrient-intensive. Male Zergs provide the genetic diversity and physical dominance required for higher-tier offspring, while sub-females maintain population stability."
Jinyue felt his brain lag a few steps behind the conversation.
Male Zergs. Three genders. Of course.
He stared blankly at the floor, struggling to visualise any of what he'd just heard. He filed the questions away and circled back to the original concern, "So my… parents. They were… an exclusive pair?"
"Yes," the robot said. "General Keira Valen and Sub-female Arin Valen were recorded as one of the few monogamous unions in the Dominion. It was considered unconventional, but tolerated due to their rank."
He laughed softly, too sharp to be humour, too quiet to be madness. "Unconventional," he murmured. "Of course."
The irony burned.
He'd been killed for something genuine, apparently.
After all, he refused to share his wife because he wanted one partner, one life together; he was inherently selfish and jealous. He had never claimed to be an angel or even perfect.
Now, in this place, fidelity…no, the correct phrasing seemed to be monogamy was the abnormality. The rare choice. The world had twisted itself into something that mocked everything he'd stood for.
His chest felt tight as it ached in familiar heartbreak.
He turned away from the photo, dragging a hand through his hair. "So, I died for monogamy," he whispered under his breath, "and woke up in a species that thinks it's defective."
The robot didn't respond. It simply waited beside him, patient and steady.
After a long silence, Jinyue asked, "How do they… see each other? These… castes?"
The robot's eye dimmed thoughtfully. "Social structure is determined by reproductive hierarchy. Males, being the rarest, are at the top and can choose to work the less intensively work or just stay at home while their spouses provide for them. Sub-females are the functional base of society—the caretakers, scholars, scientists, and labourers. Females occupy positions of strategic command, military and genetic prestige. The equilibrium ensures stability."
Jinyue pressed his lips together, the words tasting bitter. "Equilibrium," he echoed.
They moved on.
The robot led him through the Command Deck, where shattered consoles flickered faintly with dying light. "Your mother fought here," it said. "When the ship fell, she sealed the main corridor to prevent boarding. Her last act was protecting this vessel."
The seats were empty, the floor scorched. Jinyue could almost hear the chaos that must have filled the space once—screams, alarms, the metallic ring of impact. He looked down, seeing faint streaks of blood still crusted between floor panels.
He imagined her there: a towering figure, eyes alight with battle-fury, standing alone against a storm of enemies to protect her son. He felt something twist deep in his gut—pity, admiration, guilt. None of them fit right.
When they finally reached the ship's reactor chamber, the faint blue pulse of its core reflected in Jinyue's tired eyes. The low hum filled the silence like a heartbeat.
"I have maintained this vessel to the best of my ability," the robot said. "Awaiting directives from the Valen heir."
Jinyue leaned against the railing, exhaling slowly. The faint vibration of the reactor buzzed under his palms. "Directives," he murmured. "I don't even know how to exist here, let alone lead anything. I lost my memories some time ago after this weird sickness"
The robot tilted its head. "You are the heir. That is enough."
Jinyue looked up at it, eyes shadowed. "You really think that?"
"I was built to," it said simply.
He huffed a quiet breath that might have been a laugh. "Then I guess that makes one of us."
*****
He was led to his apparent room when the original owner was a child to rest.
It wasn't what he expected. The space was small, oddly clean despite the age of the ship. The walls were a soft white-gray, illuminated by faint strips of light that pulsed like a heartbeat. Everything felt too sterile, too organised—like one of those ultra-modern showrooms on Earth that no one actually lived in.
He trailed his fingers across the smooth desk surface, the dust faint but real beneath his touch. His hand trembled slightly. The air smelled faintly metallic, dry, with a hint of ozone. Even the quiet weighted it, an engineered kind of silence that seemed to hum against the back of his skull.
His reflection ghosted faintly across the glass panel of the desk, pale, alien, exhausted. It startled him. For a minute, he'd forgotten that he was in a different body.
He simply looked at that unfamiliar face, and the full strangeness of his situation finally sank its teeth in.
Every place seemed to be soundproof, considering the robot had earlier mentioned the trash was still falling… unbelievable.
The robot had left him there, claiming it needed to check on the healing pod, which he had been locked in.
Supposed to heal me fully, it had said. If it wasn't damaged.
Jinyue had scoffed at that. If the pod was working at full capacity, then what the hell was the fever? What was the weakness, the trembling, the way his body still felt like it was held together by frayed wires? But then again, what did he know about this body? About this biology? Nothing. He was operating on instinct, on memory, on the ghost of a life that wasn't his anymore.
And now, for the first time since he'd woken up in this godforsaken place, he was alone…and tentatively safe. At least he could now think somewhat.
When the door sealed shut behind him, the sound of it closing made him flinch. For a few moments, he just stood there, staring blankly at the curved wall until his knees gave out and he sank onto the edge of the bed.
And that was when it hit him.
The silence. The stillness. The truth that there was no one else.
The adrenaline had finally bled out of him. The fight, the defiance, the desperate need to survive, all of it had drained away, leaving him hollow.
His breath shuddered.
The tension drained from his shoulders, leaving a hollow ache behind. The tears came before he even realised he was crying. They rolled hot and uninvited down his face, dripping from his chin onto his shaking hands. He tried to swallow them back, pressing the heel of his palm against his eyes, but his chest heaved instead, raw and uneven.
He hated that his eyes burned, that his breath hitched, that his hands trembled. He had never cried. Not when he was abandoned as a child under a bridge as if he were a troll. Not when he built his empire from nothing. Not even when his wife had smiled at him over that poisoned cup. He had been too angry for tears then. Too betrayed. Too stupid.
But now?
Now, the grief hit him like a wave.
He sank onto the floor, his back against the cold wall, and let his head fall into his hands. The loss was a physical thing, a weight pressing down on his ribs until he could barely breathe.
He had spent his whole life alone, building, fighting, proving himself to a world that never really cared. And the one time he had let someone in—the one time he had trusted, had loved, had believed—she had destroyed him.
He had loved her.
God, he still loved her, who was he fooling?
His chest hurt; an almost physical ache, like something was being pulled out from between his ribs. His vision blurred again as tears pooled and spilled down his face. He tried wiping them with his tattered, dirty clothing, but only made it worse.
Deep down, he had even hoped that the divorce papers would make her regret her actions. That she would finally fall back into his arms, that she would love him just as fiercely as he had loved her.
She hadn't.
She had killed him instead.
He pressed his forehead against his knees, his whole body trembling. His breath came in shallow bursts.
The only person he'd trusted and let into his heart, his whole life, had taken it and broken it into pieces. She had most likely even taken everything that he'd built. Even if it had been for her, it still stung. That someone else would benefit from the product of his hard work and love. That the man would not even love her and was only there for his money.
His hands clenched into fists.
"She killed me," he muttered hoarsely, his voice cracking. It was unfamiliar; it only made him feel worse.
Now he was stuck in a foreign, unfamiliar body that wasn't him, sick as a dog and weaker than he had ever been.
The words felt foreign on his tongue. He said them again, just to hear them out loud. "She killed me."
The sound broke halfway through. His shoulders shook with a strangled noise that wasn't quite a sob, wasn't quite laughter, perhaps it was both.
Now he was stuck on an unfamiliar planet, millions of years into the future. Stuck with no other chance of finding love. Stuck with no other chance of trusting anybody else.
He was stuck in a wasteland planet with no other inhabitants other than himself and that creepy and strangely human robot that could overpower him and this weak body in seconds.
He dragged in a shaky breath, his throat raw, and pressed a hand to his chest. He could feel the shallow rise and fall, too fast, too fragile.
He had no one. No way back. No one to even remember him.
And the only thing that stood between him and madness was that robot; the one with a human voice, patient eye, and enough power to crush him like glass if it wanted to.
He laughed once, quietly. It came out broken.
His hands dropped to his sides, limp. His shoulders sagged as though gravity had tripled.
Once again, Lan Jinyue understood what it meant to be completely, devastatingly alone.
He had forgotten how much it hurt.