The station — a sprawling orbital platform whose full name, according to the signage arching above the docking concourse, was Threshold Anchorage, though everyone he overheard simply called it the Anchorage — swallowed him whole within the first ten minutes.
Nothing about it resembled Veyrhold’s careful, resource-starved order, nor Cael Athis’s merchant Tradefalls with their temporary pavilions and rationed generosity. This was permanent. Built to last.
Corridors wide enough for a dozen people to walk abreast, lined with storefronts selling everything from ship components to exotic foodstuffs to services Rohan couldn’t begin to identify from their signage alone, all of it lit by a soft, even glow that came from no single visible source.
People moved through it with the particular unhurried confidence of those who had never once had to worry about ash squalls or glassmaws or whether the next Tradefall might bring their community’s ruin. Some wore augmentation markers openly, subtle glowing lines along their skin that Rohan suspected denoted rank or achievement in whatever local system governed this part of the universe. Others carried themselves with the crisp efficiency of career spacers, moving between docking gates and cargo lifts without ever once glancing up from handheld data slates.
Rohan felt, for the first time in longer than he could remember, genuinely and completely invisible.
’Nobody here knows who I am. Nobody here cares. That should feel like freedom.’
It mostly felt like standing at the edge of a very tall cliff. Still, it was far better than anything he’d have to experience back in the Origin Realm. Back there, he and Elane were gradually starting to become known in their small area of influence.
He found a public information terminal near the concourse’s central hub — a broad, glowing pillar surrounded by a low crowd of people querying it about docking schedules, market rates, and directions — and approached it with the same cautious deliberation he’d once used to approach an unfamiliar patch of the Ashen Marches.
[Great System Note: Local infrastructure detected. Public terminals may be queried for general information without registration.]
Well, that’s convenient. Let’s start small.
He touched the terminal’s surface, half-expecting rejection, and found instead a simple interface unfolding before him — currency exchange rates, transit schedules between the Span’s four worlds and two stations, general notices about docking fees and customs requirements.
The currency section told him almost everything he needed to know about his immediate situation. Universal credit, the interface explained in patient, simplified text clearly meant for newcomers, could be earned through registered labour, converted from goods of demonstrable value, or transferred from an existing account — none of which Rohan currently possessed in any usable form.
He thought of the sealed packet against his ribs. Bryan’s reserve record. It might be worth something here, if I can find someone who actually knows how to read it and cares enough to honour it.
It was, he reflected grimly, exactly the kind of problem four months on Cael Athis had trained him to solve through patience, observation, and a willingness to take risks that would have terrified the boy who’d stood dazed and disappointed at his third Awakening ceremony seven months ago.
One problem at a time. Shelter first. Then income. Then everything else.
He turned from the terminal and began to walk, letting the crowd’s flow carry him deeper into the Anchorage, watching, listening, learning the shape of a world he intended to survive in for exactly as long as it took to find what he’d actually come here for.
The labour boards, when he finally located them tucked into a side concourse two levels below the main hub, taught him more about the Halcyon Span’s actual character than anything else he’d encountered so far.
Dozens of listings scrolled across a wide public display, refreshed every few minutes by some automated process Rohan didn’t understand and didn’t need to — cargo handlers wanted for a three-day loading contract, a hydroponics technician needed on Calder’s Rest, security escorts requested for a merchant convoy departing in six hours, general labour available for anyone willing to work the Anchorage’s lower maintenance decks on short notice.
Every single listing, without exception, required registration credentials Rohan did not possess.
He tried anyway, because trying had never once been the part he struggled with. A gruff, heavyset man overseeing a cargo-loading contract near the freight docks looked him over with the particular assessing squint of someone who’d hired plenty of desperate newcomers before, took one look at Rohan’s spear and travel-worn ash-cloth, and asked, not unkindly, whether he had a registered worker identification chip.
"No," Rohan admitted.
"Then I can’t take you on official manifest, and if I can’t take you on manifest, station insurance won’t cover you if a crate drops on your head, and if station insurance won’t cover you, I’m not putting you anywhere near my cargo." The man scratched at his beard, considering. "You look strong enough. Desperate enough too, which usually means reliable, in my experience. But rules are rules on a station this size. Too many eyes watching for exactly the kind of shortcut you’re asking me to take."
"Is there anywhere that doesn’t ask for a worker chip?"
The man’s expression shifted into something more careful. "There’s always somewhere that doesn’t ask, kid. The kind of somewhere that also doesn’t ask a lot of other questions you’d probably rather they asked. I’d think hard before you go looking for that particular kind of work, if I were you. People who hire off the books tend to have reasons for staying off the books, and those reasons aren’t usually good ones."
Rohan thanked him and moved on, filing the warning away alongside everything else Odris had told him about watching who seemed too eager to help a man with no traceable past.
He tried three more listings before the afternoon ended, each conversation following roughly the same shape — genuine interest in his evident capability, immediate withdrawal the moment the question of registration came up, a vague, uncomfortable sympathy that did nothing to fill his stomach or secure him a bed for the night.