The survey vessel *Vanguard* hung in the void between stars, its hybrid bloom-shadow drive humming at low power. The test jump had lasted three weeks already, longer than planned. Sabrina stood in the engineering bay, wiping sweat from her brow.
The Mirror Collective engineer, a wiry man named Kael, monitored the console across from her. Their pairing had been deliberate—his expertise in shadow systems complemented her bloom integration training. But the hybrid drive was not behaving.
Dissonance drift hit without warning. One moment Sabrina was calibrating power relays. The next, she felt Kael's earlier fatigue as if it were her own—aches in shoulders that weren't hers, a faint echo of his pulse. Hours delayed. She gripped the rail and breathed through it.
"Another crossover," she reported over comms.
Aiden's voice came back from the flagship, steady. "Log it. Elara's reviewing the patterns now."
