The Orbit We Choose

They built a station together. Saving it means facing everything they left unfinished.

Four years ago, Rhexai-Nine-Rings and Caleb Soren built Cynosure, a space station designed to shelter radically different species. They planned a home of their own, too—until a promise lost in translation left each convinced the other had rejected their future.

Now the station is coming apart, and its original architect is being blamed.

Rhexai is a five-meter-long, segmented alien woman who lives in vacuum. Caleb is a fifty-three-year-old human salvage engineer with prosthetic fingers, an intimate knowledge of her work, and a construction secret he should have confessed years ago.

To find the source of the damage, they must retrace the routes they once built together. Behind altered plans and sealed passages lie questions neither can afford to avoid. So do unfinished spaces that make it painfully easy to remember why they fell in love.

Their professional chemistry is undiminished. Their trust is not.

As the danger spreads, desire draws them closer—but every touch requires care, and no beautiful design can substitute for an honest promise. Saving the home they built for everyone else may be their last chance to discover whether they can still choose a future together.