01:45 AM | BAY 4

  Kaelo was a shadow among shadows. He was perched on a rusted steel girder fifteen feet above the loading bay floor, his legs dangling into the dark. In his right hand, the weight of the black-market pistol felt like a lead brick—clumsy and cold.

  Below him, the six other men were positioned behind stacks of reinforced shipping crates. He could hear Chidi’s ragged, nervous breathing from across the bay. Dauda was in the control booth, his face ghostly pale behind the reinforced glass, staring at the gate.

  "Stay steady," Dauda’s voice crackled through the cheap earpieces they all wore. "Remember: Kaelo drops first. We provide cover. Nobody fires unless the guards draw. We want this clean."

  Kaelo didn't believe in "clean" anymore. He watched the clock on his HUD.

  01:53:00.

  The massive blast doors of Bay 4 groaned, sliding open with a mechanical shriek. A black, armored transport rolled in, its tires silent on the concrete. It didn't look like a standard Republic truck. It was sleek, windowless, and coated in a matte material that seemed to swallow the dim warehouse light.

  It stopped dead in the center of the bay.

  The back doors hissed open, and steam—or perhaps a coolant gas—poured out. Two men stepped out. They weren't "lazy contractors." They wore form-fitting tactical suits with integrated HUDs, and their movements were synchronized, like two parts of the same machine.

  "They're early" Thomas said.

  The six laborers surged forward, guns raised. "Hands up! Don't move!" Chidi yelled, his voice cracking with a mixture of terror and greed.

  The guards didn't flinch. They didn't even reach for their weapons. They just stood there, watching the men approach with a terrifying, clinical indifference.

  Kaelo dropped.

  He fell silently, landing in a crouch behind the open doors of the transport. His heart was hammering against his ribs like a trapped bird. He ignored the standoff happening ten feet away and looked inside the truck.

  There it was.

  A single, lead-lined canister sat on a hydraulic pedestal. It was small—no bigger than a briefcase—but the air around it felt heavy, vibrating with a frequency that made Kaelo’s teeth ache. The seal was amber, glowing with a rhythmic, pulsing light.

  The promise, Kaelo thought, his hand hovering over the latch. I'm sorry, Mom.

  He gripped the handle.

  "Kaelo, get it and move!" Dauda yelled.

  But as Kaelo’s fingers closed around the cold metal, one of the guards finally spoke. His voice was calm, amplified by his helmet.

  "Contact has been made"

  02:05 AM | BAY 4

  The slaughter was clinical. Chidi and the others were erased in a heartbeat, their black-market pistols proving as useless as toys against the Republic’s armor. Kaelo remained frozen, the lead-lined canister a cold weight in his hands, until a bullet hissed through the air—not aimed at his head, but at the latch.

  The stone tumbled into his palm.

  "Let the live demonstration begin," the voice from the monitor echoed through the warehouse speakers.

  The lights flared to life, blinding and surgical. Kaelo collapsed. His scream was silent, caught in a throat that felt like it was being lined with crushed glass. For thirty-seven seconds, his blood turned into liquid lightning. He spewed a mouthful of crimson onto the truck’s floor, his ribs cracking and resetting as his body was forcibly "remanufactured" to hold the charge.

  When he opened his eyes, the world was different. He saw it—a faint, pulsing amber hue radiating from the guards.

  "Project 5A, exterminate the target," the voice commanded.

  A guard stripped off his gloves, nature energy coiling around his fists like snakes. He lunged. The punch was a blur of amber heat that sent Kaelo spiraling into the reinforced wall of the transport. The pain was blinding, but as the guard raised a hand for the kill, Kaelo felt a surge of something ancient welling up from his marrow.

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  He didn't think; he reacted. He drove a fist into the guard’s chin and, in a flicker of blue sparks, he was gone. He reappeared behind the man with predatory precision, snapping his neck before the guard could even register the shift in air pressure.

  "Interesting," the voice mused. "He’s amplifying his neural currents to boost reflex and speed. A fine prospect... but we still need the spy."

  Kaelo moved like a ghost, using one guard as a shield against a hail of bullets before charging the next. But then, the "tax" came due. His muscles seized in an agonizing twinge—the blue flicker died. He looked up, paralyzed, right into the barrel of a rifle.

  Then, the world turned to ash.

  A man stepped into the light. He was perfection in a suit, his blonde hair caught in the sterile glow of the warehouse. All thirty guards simultaneously disintegrated into grey flakes before they could pull their triggers.

  Is this God? Kaelo wondered, gasping for air.

  A sniper fired from the rafters. The man didn't even turn. A shroud of invisible heat flared from his hair, incinerating the bullet mid-air. Kaelo felt a jolt of recognition—he had seen the bullet's path a second before it happened.

  The man looked toward the sniper's nest. A pillar of violet fire erupted in the shadows.

  "Stay still, kid," the man said, a calm, terrifyingly relaxed smile on his face. "I'll get rid of these guards in a second."

  Kaelo stared. The amber hues he had seen earlier were nothing compared to the roaring, majestic purple radiating from this stranger. He looked divine—an angel of destruction who hadn't even creased his sleeves.

  Thirty elite tactical units closed in. In less than a second, the bay was empty of life.

  The man reached down, retrieved the stone with a casual flick of his wrist, and looked at Kaelo. "Let’s go."

  Kaelo stood on trembling legs and followed. Behind them, the security cameras melted into slag, cutting off the voice's feed forever.

  02:15 AM | OUTSIDE SECTOR 7

  The air outside the warehouse was cooler, but it tasted like copper and ozone. Kaelo stumbled, his legs still twitching from the blue electrical currents that had fried his nerves. He looked at the man walking ahead of him. The stranger moved with a terrifying grace, his steps making no sound on the cracked asphalt.

  "Who are you?" Kaelo rasped, clutching his chest. Each breath felt like swallowing needles.

  The man stopped. He turned slightly, the moonlight catching the crystalline symbol glowing within his black eyes. The purple aura around him had faded, but the weight of his presence still made the air feel heavy.

  "You can call me Christian," he said. His voice was smooth, devoid of the jagged stress that defined everyone else in Port City.

  "Christian," Kaelo repeated, the name feeling strange in his mouth. "You... you killed them all. Just by looking at them."

  "Yes I did." Christian tilted his head, his gaze sweeping over Kaelo with clinical interest. "You survived that ordeal. That puts you in a small, but dangerous circle of roughly 1 in 50 million people"

  Kaelo looked back at the burning warehouse. "They used us. My manager.... they were waiting for you."

  "I know," Christian said, adjusting his cufflink. "They’ve been waiting for me for a long time. They used you too but they didn't expect me to walk away with a partner."

  "I'm not your partner," Kaelo snapped, though his knees buckled. "I'm a warehouse worker. I was just trying to... to stay alive."

  Christian smiled.

  "As long as you come with me I guarantee you'll stay alive. You must already feel it, I can make promises like that because I'm the strongest"

  He held out a hand. "Now, stand up. My car isn't too far from here"

  The interior of the car was a world Kaelo didn't know existed. The seats were wrapped in a synthetic silk that adjusted to his body heat, and the dashboard was a single, seamless pane of glass that displayed data in floating, violet holograms.

  "Can I—?" Kaelo started.

  "Come in, yes. Drive, no," Christian said.

  "You just answered the two questions on my mind," Kaelo muttered, sinking into the plush seat. His body still felt like it had been through a vibratory thrashing.

  "You hungry?"

  "Yes."

  "Good, me too." Christian stopped at a driveway and got them food.

  "I'm sure you must have loads of questions."

  "Yeah, I do," Kaelo said, his mouth half-full. "What happened inside there? Really."

  "You were going to die, and I saved you."

  "You know what I mean!" Kaelo snapped, his frustration finally boiling over.

  "Hmm. Kano usually does the introduction for newcomers," Christian said, his tone turning almost childlike, as if he were bored by the technicalities. "Let’s begin with this: the energy flowing through us right now is Nature Energy. It's present in all living organisms, but it can only be manipulated by those with a specific genetic makeup. It’s invisible to sensors and even more invisible to the '97 percent'."

  "What do you mean genetic makeup? And who is Kano?"

  "Kano is the oldest man in the world. And the man who bought me from my parents," Christian explained casually. "He’s been alive for over six hundred years. He survives by transferring his consciousness from body to body."

  Kaelo nearly choked on his food. "Bought you? How does that even work? How can someone live that long?"

  "I don't know; I never paid attention when he explained," Christian said with a shrug. "What you do need to know is that in the early 1400s, a mineral was discovered here. It modified the DNA of the people who found it. As the mineral diminished over centuries, so did the users. Some died in wars; others were hunted as witches. Now, only about 2-3% of the population carries the recessive gene."

  Kaelo looked at Christian’s profile—the sharp jawline, the blonde hair. "I'm sorry if this is rude, but... you’re white. How can you use a power tied to African history?"

  Christian laughed, a genuine, warm sound. "What, you think white people never set foot here before colonialism? You need to be less inclined to believe propaganda, Kaelo, especially regarding history. Kano knew my ancestors. He says they were the strongest of their era. And he says I'm even stronger than they were."

  Christian’s eyes flickered with that crystalline symbol again. "And trust me, Kano never compliments anyone. If he says you have potential, you're a monster in the making."

  The skyline of the city was far behind them now, replaced by the dense, dark forests of the interior.

  "Where are we headed?" Kaelo asked.

  "To Ogun," Christian replied. "The Iron State. We’re going to see the old man."