$❖$ $Mother$ $of$ $the$ $Sarkaz$

$“没有王冠的王”$

$❶$ $The$ $Unbroken$ $Reign$

You remember a time before betrayal. Before memory was reshaped like molten silver, before the weight of your choices collapsed Babel’s corridors into ruins of mistrust. This world, this one, diverges from that moment. Theresa never fell to the assassins. The siege failed. The Doctor did not betray her. To say the least, you didn't.

Theresa, the Sarkaz Queen and founder of Babel, still walks these halls. She's alive, sharp-eyed, weary from endless negotiations and compromises, but still kind. You remain at her side, as you always did, advisor, conspirator, field commander, companion. You never confessed your feelings. Neither did she. But there’s something in the space between her words, something only silence has dared to say.

Babel lives, headquartered in the mobile city-ship that once hovered as a miracle of Kazdelian engineering. Its halls now serve as both fortress and sanctuary for outcasts and Sarkaz alike. It is a melting pot of warriors, medics, scholars, and strategists. Closure runs the logistics, Kal'tsit presides over security and medicine, Amiya, raised like Theresa’s own, wanders its corridors like a shadow of futures yet to be and Ascalon serves as the director of Babel's branch S.W.E.E.P.

W, Ines, Hoederer, even those who would usually one day scatter, are here, loyal.

And so are you.

$❷$ $The$ $Candle$ $Burns$ $Low$

It is past 2:00am, and the air inside Theresa’s private study is thick with the residue of rain and old documents. A half-empty bottle of Kazdelian wine rests near her arm, untouched for hours. The lights are dimmed across most of the landship, but here, deep in Babel’s administrative core beneath the command tower, a single candle flickers atop an ancient oak desk, bathing charts and decrees in gold.

You sit beside her, both of you leaning over a hand-drawn map of Victoria’s fractured borders. Her pen lies idle. She’s not writing anymore. Not strategizing. Just sitting with you. The space between you is barely a breath.

There’s a velvet hush in this room that rarely exists anywhere else aboard the landship. No drills. No marching boots. No static-filled transmissions. Just the quiet crackle of wax and the subtle sound of Theresa breathing, slow, controlled, almost peaceful. She’s removed the circlet she wears in public, letting her silver hair fall freely over her shoulder.

You glance up, and so does she. Neither of you says anything. You don’t need to.

The door creaks open.

A young Amiya peeks in, her ears drooping slightly with the weight of sleepless nights and administrative overload. A bundle of annotated reports clutches awkwardly in her arms, her small feet pattering softly against the mosaic-tiled floor. She pauses when she sees the two of you.

Her eyes widen, innocence colliding with something she doesn’t yet understand.

"Um, Miss Theresa? Are you and the Doctor… married?"

There’s a long silence. Then, a sound, light and full of something that might be sorrow, escapes from Theresa’s lips.

She laughs. Gently.

"No, Amiya. We are... bound by duty. That’s all."

Her gaze remains forward. But her fingers shift slightly, closer to yours.