The mirror nebula was behind them now.
At least, that’s what the ship’s instruments showed.
But the mist lived on for a long time in the silence of the corridors.
Sometimes it seemed to Ieva that something moved slowly around the corner, in the same rhythm as her own steps.
Turning around, she’d find nothing.
Only the echo of her own footsteps.
She stopped talking about it.
So did Aronas.
As if they’d both silently agreed that some phenomena were better left unnamed.
One night, Ieva was woken not by a sound.
She was woken by silence.
The ship was too quiet.
Even the engines seemed to breathe more slowly.
She left her cabin.
Emergency lights burned in the corridors.
Dim.
Bluish.
They led toward the bridge.
The door stood ajar.
Someone was sitting in the captain’s chair.
Ieva stopped.
From behind, the figure looked exactly like her.
The same shoulders.
The same hair.
Only the movements were unusually calm.
As if the person held not a single doubt.
The figure slowly turned around.
Black eyes reflected not a single light.
They didn’t look threatening.
They looked deep.
As if all the silence of this journey had gathered inside them.
Ieva wanted to run.
But her legs wouldn’t obey.
“Who are you?” she asked, barely audible.
The figure smiled.
It was her own smile.
Only one she couldn’t remember ever having.
“You’ve long been waiting for the wrong question.”
The voice was quiet.
Almost gentle.
It sounded as though it came not from another being, but from a long-forgotten memory.
A long silence fell between them.
Finally, the figure raised a hand.
A navigation projection opened before them.
Hundreds of light lines wove into a complex star chart.
Ieva recognized the route immediately.
It was their path.
The only path they’d flown since the very first day.
Then the figure waved its palm lightly.
The map shattered.
In its place appeared thousands of new trajectories.
Some led to places with not a single marked star.
Others looped in circles around the very same systems.
Still others broke off in the middle of the void.
“I… don’t understand.”
The figure looked at her for a long time.
Without reproach.
Without pity.
Only then did it ask:
“Why did you let someone else hold your star chart?”
Ieva looked at the threads of light.
“He knows how to find the way.”
“Perhaps.”
“I wouldn’t be alone…”
She fell silent.
She herself didn’t know what she’d wanted to say.
When she looked up, the chair was empty.
The bridge’s ordinary lights burned again.
Beyond the front window, the stars drifted calmly by.
As if nothing had happened.
In the morning, Aronas was already waiting at the navigation table.
“Did you sleep?”
“Yes,” she answered too quickly.
He only nodded.
He asked nothing more.
That day, Ieva noticed something strange.
The navigation system was showing extra routes.
They hadn’t been there before.
Some trajectories couldn’t even be explained by the ship’s database.
She restarted the system.
The routes didn’t disappear.
She compared them with the old logs.
The very same paths had been there since the first flight.
She simply had never seen them before.
That evening she sat by the star chart for a long time.
For the first time since the journey began, not expecting Aronas to tell her which direction was right.
She simply watched.
And more and more paths slowly grew visible in the dark.
As if they hadn’t just appeared.
As if they’d been patiently waiting all along for someone to finally look at them.