3.8 LIGHT

Juna maintains the pod through exhaustive diagnostics while she and Ste wait for any sign from their balloon drone. The grim calculus of Shroud’s wear, accidents, and monsters weighs on Juna, and the two fill the silence with awkward talk, including rumors about Bartokh and crew relationships, revealing misperceptions and brittle camaraderie.

A faint ping interrupts their vigil. Despite Juna’s remaining off-shift time, Ste begins a careful descent of the chimney on an anchored line, the Shrouded pacing them but unable to help if they fall. The signal strengthens and identifies as the drone, albeit with multiple failures.

They reach the crash site: the balloon shredded, the casing dented, the buoy gone, and the wing frame already torn apart by Shrouded. Rushing in before their companions can dismantle the core, Juna and Ste secure the hardware and, after tense splicing and retries, extract survivable data from the corrupted memory.

Processing yields degraded but usable meteorological and navigational data, enough to sketch terrain ahead and triangulate their current location near the midline between inward- and outward-facing hemispheres. Crucially, the drone lets them narrow their destination to a few square kilometers—something they can hope to detect if they reach it.

With renewed direction, they leave the wreck behind. A local Shrouded escort forms up again, trading the familiar three-beat signal. Juna and Ste resume the long trek, buoyed by thin hope and a provisional map while remaining wary of Shroud’s attrition and their fragile machinery.