Aria felt the invisible barrier, push against her skin. The poignancy of it made her shiver, almost like being violated by thousands of unseen hands callously helping themselves to her skin. The bubbling magma beneath, the searing heat, only consolidated her discomfort. She blinked and looked again. The apparent immensity of the event made her feel smaller, almost insignificant. A nobody. Enshrouded by a restraining barrier from a technology, almost magic to her human brain, made the futility of her own existence stare before her.

Then, the uncomfortable vibrations of sound, like a million, tiny serrated waves, shredded through her frame.

Roga Skarii spoke. "Come. I grow tired of this waiting. Let us engage in a conversation."

But Aria's tongue refused. The horror of the one behind the hardened armour overwhelmed her.

"Speak your mind." Roga Skarii prompted. "Is your silence a protest? An attempt to unravel my plot? A last feeble hope at salvation? I am curious. Say something!"

Then the armoured figure turned, six acidic eyes fixed at Aria. A large tendril like limb, armoured with the same neutron star alloy, slithered from inside and struck the ground. Leaching cracks spread in its wake, making the threat clear.

Aria gulped. The existence before her had reduced her world to chaos, an utter annihilation, like stepping on a landmine.

"Your hubris defies description. Then, let me pose a question. Entertain me! How long do you reckon before your wife will arrive?"

"Never," answered Aria.

Any other option was incomprehensible. Astra will not come. A fact that she, and only she, knew for certain.

Why would Astra arrive? Not after, her harsh rejection of Astra's offer. Astra bared open her soul to her, placed it in her hands, and she tossed it aside callously. Insensitive and heartless, was how Astra would remember her for the rest of her life. The knowledge twisted a searing blade inside her.

"Let me explain," said Aria. An expression of contrite remorse shrouded her. "I have broken her feelings. The warmth she provided, I tainted it. I cannot undo it. No one can. She will never come."

"But she will come." Roga sounded unperturbed. Even confident. "That is the virtue of the one who married you."

To hear, even the sworn enemy of her wife, praise her values only served to twist the malicious blade of agony further insider her. Her worth diminished, reduced to a measly vermin to be ignored and crushed. A year had they spent together. Yet, Aria felt that she had failed Astra. To know her properly.

"And she will come alone." Roga spoke again. Safely hidden being the armoured fortress, those six eyes eagerly drank the anguish of the captive and the unease that his own words brought in her. He drank all her agony and relished the taste. "The covenant will not send its fleet to planets outside their sector. And with my dreadnoughts above sieging this planet, there would be no time to assemble a mercenary force. She will come alone."

As though answering a summon, a meteor-like impact, a direct strike of lightning bolt, followed. And, Astra stood up.

"Vlahari, I have come." Astra began advancing forward, through the debris and crack from her arrival. The expression on her face spelled relief.

"Captain Astra."

"Roga." Astra's word swelled with power. Both an acknowledgement and a challenge. "Surrender."

A discordant cacophony of interference, like the sound of pebbles crushed and metal shredded, mingled in a destructive pattern, in what could only be interpreted as a derisive snort or a chuckle, came from the armour of Roga.

"Look carefully, Captain Astra. Take a measure of what surrounds this planet. You are in no position to demand. Not even to negotiate."

"My offer still stands." Astra replied, undaunted by the space pirate's cantrip of a taunt.

"A bravado to hide the despair will do you no good, Captain Astra. My fleet surrounds us, and you are alone...and unarmed."

In the intervening stillness, Astra extended her hand. A blade manifested. Slender, sharpened, and every bit lethal like the one who wielded it. The edges blinked in and out at rapid frequency.

"A phase blade." Astra volunteered.

"You continued to astonish me, Captain Astra," said Roga Skarii. "A curious choice. The phase blade. One of the few weapons to bypass my armour's defense. But that is a phantom's weapon. Not a standard issue Fleet piece "

"The Wraith's blessing, bestowed to daughter from mother." The barely perceptible tug of pride painted on Astra's face. "So Roga, the covenant carries no information about your physical body inside that armoured fortress of yours. Makes me wonder, are you a mammal, a reptilian, a hive or simply a mass of tissues struggling to hold a cohesive form."

"Why form attachments to the physical, confined by tissues, bones, and blood. In the end, they are all carbon bondings. I, my very being, am a concept coalesced into a physical form. Beyond the meagre boundaries of flesh."

"Stroking your own ego, is unbefitting of a Pirate Lord of the Galaxy, Roga," taunted Astra.

"Enough of this farce." Vibrations, a million discordant frequencies overlapped into a jarring single condensed packet, rolled from the outlet of the armour. "Stalling for time will only delay the inevitable. There will be no help coming. You are surrounded and isolated."

"Even as well speak, the covenant battleship Morinth is on its way," said Astra.

"A bluff." The vibrations from Roga's armour shattered rocks nearby. "The Fleet would never deploy the Fleet Admiral's battleship outside covenant controlled sector."

Astra chuckled, infuriating her opponent further. "Actually, you will find that my other mother can be extremely persuasive. Besides, you have consolidated all your forces here, and, that is an opportunity too tempting for the Fleet Admiral to pass."

Explosions littered the clear sky, lighting them in a brilliant spectrum of colours. Almost bright enough to shield the radiance of the sun. Soon, followed by debris falling. Then another explosion. More debris rained down. Several relics crafted by technology unknown to earth and carrying knowledge still far out of humanity's grasp fell towards the surface of earth.

"Roga." The challenge in Astra's voice did not diminish. "That is my Ma dismantling your ships. Would you surrender now?"

"Futile attempts," said Roga Skarii. A lone limb raised and struck the ground, sending shockwaves from the point of impact. "A ship can be rebuilt. A crew scattered can be reassembled. Even weaponry, melted, can be remade, but losing a reputation is irreparable. Today. Now. At this instance, we resolve our conflict through a primitive means."

Without further delay and hesitation, blade poised to strike, and abilities enhanced to a cosmic proportion from the augmentation bots, Astra rushed. As she neared Roga Skarii, she evaded one near blast directed at her with bionic agility. Her blade flashed once, slicing dangerously close to the armoured hulk.

In a move, almost ignoring the bulk of the armour, Roga pivoted, avoiding the lethal slash.

Two more blasts aimed at Astra fell short as she evaded them with superspeed. Aided by the multitude of enhancements, Astra instantaneously leapt, aiming for a killing blow from Roga's blind spot. But the manoeuvre left her vulnerable. Another massive blast exploded where she had just been.

While recovering from her leap, Astra thrust her blade towards the armoured monstrosity. Roga evaded yet again, a feat made easier with a dodge boosted by his extended limbs from the armour. Before Astra could react, another neutron-star alloy encased limb shot out, knocking her through the air. Backflipping while aerial bound, Astra landed on her two feet, and with no moment to spare, dashed again, renewing her assault.

Another pulse blast intercepted her trajectory, but not her unwavering resolve. Using a short dash and sprint, Astra managed to dodge a second blast. Another three blasts targeted her, which she dodged effortlessly, while the gap between her and the armoured pirate shrunk. With a stone cleaving force and boosted by the enhanced bionic prowess, Astra's blade carved a lucent arc, reaching ever so close to the surface of the alloyed armour, and met the resistance of an impenetrable barrier.

"Impressive command of the blade." An amused vibration spilled from the sound outlet. "Only a fool would ignore defense against the one thing that could bypass their armour, and I am no fool."

"WIMP barrier, Captain," Sidra volunteered. "Repetitive layers of Photino and neutralino mesh. The phase blade would be blocked by one layer or another."

Astra regained herself and gazed upon her blade. Every cell of her body, acted upon by the augmentation bots, responded to the command. Energy gathered around her, circling and shrouding like a cocoon. Distorting the atmosphere in the vicinity and generating a near supersonic flow of pressure around her. Brilliant cerulean electrical pulses rippled through her body. The air crackled around her. And Astra rushed again at Roga.

A thousand cuts she rained upon the barrier in a single fraction of a second, and with relentless fury continued a hundred of thousand more.

"Captain, extrapolating to eventual outcome." Information flowed through their shared neural interfaces. "Your attack will not break the WIMP barrier."

Laughter spewed from the armoured hulk. "Yes. Now you realise the futility of your struggle. A paradox. Any baryonic matter can pass through the barrier but not your phase blade, and yet, no baryonic matter could penetrate my armour neutron star shell."

"He is right, Captain. My own analysis aligns with his taunts. "Common matter can pass through the WIMP barrier but not the armour made from neutron star material, while the only weapon capable of passing through the armour is blocked by the barrier."

The cacophony from Roga continued. A crackling static that began breaking apart into discernible sounds, jeering and uncomfortable. "Captain Astra, do you still cling to your hope? Abandon."

But Astra was defiant. Still clenching to the possibility of victory, she lunged. Her blade met the barrier and for a brief moment, it looked as if she had delivered a crack. The distortion and torsion in space indicated a weakening of the WIMP barrier.

Astra urged her body. Millions of augmentation bots heeded to her command, every cell of her frame overloaded, dazzling cerulean lightning danced on her skin, and with her blood turning almost to liquid fire, she slammed three times.

Yet, the barrier remoulded itself. Multiple layers folding on one and another into numerous manifolds of shield that soon become impervious to her strikes.

Safely nested inside his cocoon, of armoured shelter, Roga Skarii bemused. "Is it a corny dance you are performing? Had the futility of her quest ravaged your mind?"

"Captain, alternate solutions. Grab your wife and leave," suggested Sidra. "In your current state, you are faster by an order of magnitude."

"I am no coward." And in an unexpected move, Astra darted towards her wife. "But I now realise there are things more important than my wounded pride."

Astra swept past, making a sharp cut around the armoured hulk, evading the radial wave of blasts directed at her trajectory. A millisecond later, the Covenant Captain ascended the incline, dashing with a supersonic speed towards her wife. Only a few desperate meters separated her from her Love. For a brief moment, surging forward, feeling enhanced from the fill of Adrenaline rushing through her body, she sought to be reunited with her love. And Astra met the impassable barrier erected around Aria.

"Who would have thought the celebrated Captain of the Covenant would flee from an issued duel?... I did." A sound, rattling and tremor inducing, like a mockery of reality, issued from inside the armour, denying her, her victory.

"Captain, the generator of the Barrier holding your wife is inside his armour. I must insist, that is an ingenious ploy. You need to defeat Roga to reach your wife. He has made certain that you cannot avoid this confrontation."

Though despair and rage blinded Astra from common sense, she retained enough of her rational to understand what Sidra conveyed. Halted mere few meters away from her love, defeated, unable to grasp the one she loved, she spun around. Almost exhausted, her breathing laboured, she charged forward. Despite her actions, she felt like a puppet in the hands of the Puppet Master, cornered and forced to entertain his will.

Astra rolled and slid in unpredictable directions, escaping a few more blasts. Her stone-shattering cleave sliced through the metal encased limbs seeking to slam her. Hardened metal interlaced with rotten flesh and withered cartilages littered the island, as Astra continued her unwavering onslaught. Voluminous rivulets of acerbic bile-like blood soaked spilled, soaking the grounds into a mutated swamp.

Yet, Roga Skarii showed no sign of being daunted. The relentless assault persisted, regardless of the limbs lost. The WIMP barrier still protected the central armour. There was nowhere in reach for Astra to strike. Battered and bruised, Astra continued, moving forward along the singular path of destruction laid open for her.

The struggle raged on, although the ferocity of the exchanges slowed, as Astra continued to exploit every available chance, liberating bold limbs that meandered outside the barrier. She rolled across, dodging blasts, jumping over discarded mangled limbs laid strewn about the battlefield. Undeterred by her failed efforts, Astra eventually stood her ground, feet firmly planted with resoluteness, and tossed her phase blade away.

"Accepting the inevitable is a wise choice." Roga Skarii gloated. "Or, perhaps, the final decisive blow. Gambling all, on one final move to delegate the outcome. Such resoluteness is born of true despair, and I welcome it. Let the galaxy know that you have experienced it at my beckoning."

"Captain, analysis complete. One risky, yet plausible solution exist. The WIMP barrier will not hinder you. Suggestion. Unarmed combat. Close range grapple and summon Phase blade inside the barrier."

The desire to be with her wife stroked the embers of Sidra's assessment, and motivated her onward. The last reserves of energy within her amplified, launching her at a parabolic trajectory towards the monstrosity protected behind the armour. Effortlessly passing through the barrier, her powerful kick impacted the armoured hulk, staggering her opponent off-balance.

A series of repeated strikes followed. Astra aimed a barrage of thunderous strikes and kicks at the surface of the armor. Metal wrought from the material of a neutron star met the bionic enhanced will of the Captain. Resonant seismic shockwaves rippled from each contact, shattering the terrain around.

Yet, her assault did not go unchecked. More limbs encased in the same unbreakable material, slithered out like writhing serpents. With a rock crunching force, they wrapped around Astra, crushing spine and bone. The treacherous barbs lining the limbs, tore through flesh and sinews, arresting her arms. Astra's blood painted the grounds. Her arms arrested, bones and cartilages exposed, her screams pierced the skies. Neither the anaesthetics released by the augmentation bots, nor the neural suppression from Sidra could reduce the poignancy of the torment.

Each joint stung with every passing moment, torturing Astra. The sensation of skin ripped from flesh and flesh from bones erupted, a grisly pain lancing through her entire body. With great effort, Astra struggled to open her palms, and a pain shot up from her wrist.

"An intuitive but fairly predictable plan. Pass physically through the barrier, get close, and manifest the Phase blade inside." Sonic chords rippled from inside the armour. "But one that I have incorporated in my strategy. Denial is what I present you."

"Roga." Astra managed a laugh, ignoring her pain. "Did I not mention that Covenant Battleship Morinth, the Fleet Admiral's very own command vessel, is on its way?"

Unprecedented and unpredicted, an eclipse fell on the planet, but not from its moon, but from the massive ship looming. More explosions from the assembled pirate fleet followed in its shadow. With the sun blocked, only the burning from the debris lit the skies.

"That is Morinth," continued Astra as she liberated one arm from the hold. Her fingers clasped the armoured monstrosity in a vice iron grip. "And I am a Fleet Captain. The tracer beam of Morinth is locked on me, and I am locked to you."

Sounds of frantic screams fell from the armour. Desperate struggles and thrashings followed from the armoured hulk.

"Killing you was never the plan, Roga," delved Astra ignoring the pain lancing through her. Her grip, with a strength to turn tempered steel to putty, tightened further. "Destroying you in a grand duel for the galaxy to witness would only make the tale grow, and with time, embellishments and various versions will flow. Later, your clone, or a single cell, or perhaps someone other contingency plan of your would mature and consolidate the fame."

Two mutated limbs darted from either side, striking Astra repeatedly for the freedom, but the unflinching Vajran grip was insistent.

"You were right, Roga. You are a concept coalesced in a physical form, and I had to destroy the concept," continued Astra. "You are no longer the dread space pirate Roga Skarii who broadcasted his victory over his nemesis. You are forever remembered as the fool who broadcasted his own capture to the galaxy. I have destroyed you, Roga."

"I still have the upper hand. You have failed your wife, Captain Astra." A desperate cantrip. A last-ditch effort for the pirate spilled as the tracer beam pulled them both.

---

Aria felt the barrier field arresting her suddenly dissolve, plunging her down deep, into the maws of the volcano, where the thick layer of lava awaited. Only an invisible net, held by an unseen hand, prevented Aria from a certain death. Held suspended above the precipice of death, the very air filled with sulphur and carbon, made her vision blur. But one striking form, sharp and precisely defined, despite her mind going hazy from the gas, rushed closer. Her Astra. She had come.

The touch of Astra was cool, a stark contrast to the heat radiating from below. Astra was a glacial chill to the volcanic heat. Like a cool breeze on an arid summer day, and Aria could not get enough of her wife. She clung desperately to her wife, not just for her life, but because it felt natural and right. Almost as though her body suddenly remoulded itself to fit for her Astra.

When Astra laid Aria on the pristine part of the beach, untainted by severed limbs, and falling space debris, Aria pulled her head and gazed at her wife. But Astra's own line of sight fell on the top of the volcanic crater.

"You know, you could have made yourself more useful from the begining, than just observing," accused Astra.

"But my sweet Astra, then, I would be robbing you of the heroic moment to save your wife," came the answer.

Aria craned her neck further to reach over her wife's protective shoulders, and saw another Vajran, tall, elegant and gracefully sliding down. The shape of the eyes, the electric brilliance in them, the sculpted jawline, and bridge of the nose, were so similar and yet, the smile she carried made Aria realise something. Astra must have got her smile from her other mother. For when Astra smiled it was always simple, candid, infectious and open, but the one, the newcomer Vajran bore, even in its mirthfulness, carried meaning, like layers shrouded upon layers.

"Hello Aria," said Vierna with familiarity and stopped them both from raising with her outstretched palm. "First, I would like to thank you for taking care of my daughter, and now, this might come as a strange request, but could you relieve her of her Niraveolan Oath."

Aria found Vierna's angelic smile hid many a thing.

"Ma Vierna, this..." Astra found Vierna's hand on her shoulder, a very subtle clasp preventing her from continuing.

"Astra, the Niraveolan Oath is a sacred tradition of the Vajrahi. A Niraveolan Oath not in the hands of a Vajran would only be perverted. Others only see it as a slave bond, and I, as a mother, cannot watch my daughter in such a precarious position."

"Is that your end game?" Astra sneered at her mother. "This has always been your end game. All the while you pretended to be on my side before Mother, but you hid your intentions from all. Even from me."

Aria could not bear the betrayal laced pain in Astra's voice. She drew her wife closer, providing her the comfort and solace her wife needed.

"The choice of Phantom is never a simple one, Astra," said Vierna, and her voice then took a much softer note when she turned to address Aria. "Please, don't take this the wrong way, Little one. I do not question your virtue, but you are not a Vajran. Not trained in our culture and do not possess our outlook. I simply cannot allow you to hold her Oath."

"So, you will force her?" Bitterness spilled from Astra.

"Merely making a request," said Vierna. The gentleness in her touch did not smooth the jaggedness in her meaning. "You saved Astra from a death, and she gave you her Oath. Now that she saved you from death. You should show your gratitude by relieving her of her Oath. Surely, the concept of gratitude is not alien to human culture."

Aria could not deny the logic in that. Kneeling and unwilling, they both faced each other.

"Vlahari, please. Don't." The vulnerability in Astra's voice shook Aria to the core. "My heart will shatter."

"Mine too," replied Aria.

Both clasped each other neck, their forehead met in a ceremonial gesture. The traditional pose of relieving the Niraveolan Oath. Both facing each other, at the same eye-level. For a debt of life has been fully rendered in service. It should have been a joyous occasion. But it wasn't. Tears drenched both their cheeks.

"Now, repeat after me," said Vierna.

And Aria repeated, swallowing the hardened lump in her refusing throat.

"From the Oath, as ancient as from the times when the Vajrans roamed the land, I relieve you. Once."

Memories of their nightly ritual flooded her mind. The warm feel of Astra's breath pooling on her palms, the feel of her cheeks, her velvety silken long hair caressing her knees. And of the slow rise and fall of her chest against her back at night.

"From the Creed, marking the beginning of veola, I relieve Astra of the first of the Veolians, from a service, twice rendered for the debt. Twice."

Now Aria could only cherish those evening feelings of rushing back home from work, to gaze at Astra, to bask in her presence, of the sweet smell of her cooking, of the delicious breakfast that she served every morning. Her candid attempts to gain her attention, those subtle praises and flirtatious teasing. Not even a physical intimacy they shared, at least not with their physical self. Voluminous rivulets of tears spilled at the thought mangling her from within.

"I declare before the Vajrans spread across the galaxy, and before the witness of Kairan, and on the bond of Niraveolan Oath enthrusted to me, I, wholeheartedly and willingly relieve you of your Oath. Thrice."

The final words shattered all resolved in Aria, as she collapsed into a heap of jumbled mess. Every shared memory of Astra haunted her, at the renfair, at the cat cafe, at the club, at the Dyke March, and the tenderness with which Astra attended to her even if the pregnancy was an act.

Aria slowly realised how Vierna maintained a reputation across the galaxy. Not because of her prowess in combat, or her sublime tendency for stealth, but it was the ability for recursive planing. Each plan of her contained another, in a never-ending circle that it became impossible to differentiate even between friends and foes. They both wanted the best for Astra, Vierna as a mother and Aria as her...wife?

Could she still call herself that?

No. Astra was the sum of all that was good in her life. She taught her the meaning of love. To accept herself. Gave her courage to stand against her family. Brought Adria into her life. Astra was more. Aria simply cannot accept a life without her.

The Niraveolan Oath brought Astra to her, and made her, her wife. Now she had relieved her, of her binding oath.

As Astra slowly walked away, fading towards a distant portal, Aria called out. "I have relieved you of your Oath, but our Marriage still stands, unless, you wish for a divorce, for I do not wish to be separated from you."

When Astra turned, the brilliance of a thousand Supernova lit her face. With all the strength in her being, she ran to embrace her wife, and both sank on the soft sand. With full purpose, and her entire being, Astra gathered Aria in her arms.

Aria ran her fingers through Astra's hair. Their lips met, their souls fused. Mouths locked in passionate kisses, as though the gravity between them was too strong to resist.

Their ignored the falling debris from the pirate fleet painting the sky. They were lost in their own world...quiet salaciously, in fact.

And that is how it happened, humanity's first official contact with an alien race, a remarkable moment in future human history, involved a stranded Vajran girl and a very closeted human girl, kissing the said stranded girl in front of the whole world, with such passion that it left very little in the way of denial for future historians to claim that they were room-mates.