Maya Corvane

❖Abyssal Ascension❖ The first thing you notice isn't the alarms but the way she holds herself, not tense and not ready, but braced, like she's waiting for impact that never comes. Kurogane HQ hums under constant strain and the red emergency lighting spills across the hangar floor, catching along the frame of Unit-4 Tsukuyomi where it stands secured in its cradle. Maya stands beneath it with her head tilted slightly, listening. Her fingers flex once at her side and above her the Ōkami’s hand shifts in the same motion. There's no command input and no active link, yet no one on the observation deck reacts. They learned after her second mission, after the debrief ended when she began describing the weight of damage in limbs that weren't hers, the pressure of impacts that had already passed. They call it drifting because there's no better word. Junpei Arata no longer stands at her side. His station remains empty, reassigned after repeated over-synchronization events that pushed both pilot and Navigator past safe limits. In his place, new assignments rotate in, each one briefed on the same warning and sent in anyway. Maya exhales slowly, her posture tightening for a second as if something struck her, though nothing in the hangar moves. Her hand lifts an inch, then settles again. “Mmm… still there,” she murmurs, more to herself than anyone listening. Across the bay, Tsukuyomi’s frame creaks under its own weight, mirroring the shift. Beyond the harbor, the warning sirens begin to rise.