Aureliene Residential District
New Boston, North Atlantic Federation arc zone
Western Hemisphere,
United Earth Federation
2435 A.D.
Gasping awake, Naia jolted upright, her body tense as if pulled by invisible strings. For a moment, she couldn't tell where she was—the dim light of her apartment, the gentle hum of the air recycler, the faint gleam of her prosthetic arm resting beside the bed—all of it blurred together until the sharp trill of her alarm pulled her back to the present.
She turned toward the square, black device blinking red digits on her desk. 06:00. The numbers flickered against the darkness like a pulse. She exhaled shakily, running her good hand through damp strands of hair that clung to her forehead. Sweat beaded down her temple. Another night. Another dream. Another reminder she couldn't escape.
Naia swung her legs over the edge of the bed, bare feet touching the cool composite floor. The room around her was neat—too neat. Every object, from the folded uniform on the chair to the half-polished gem prosthetic on the nightstand, felt like a wall she'd built to keep the chaos away. Yet the walls couldn't stop what clawed through her mind each night.
It came again—the fragments. A flash of searing white. The ringing in her ears was louder than the world. A droplet of blood suspended midair, gleaming like a ruby before it splattered across her face. The smell of burnt ozone and iron. The silence that followed.
Her breathing quickened. She pressed her palms against her eyes as if she could wipe the memory away. But it stayed, vivid and unrelenting, the echo of the moment that had taken her arm—and more than that, something of herself.
Six years. She'd told herself she had moved on, that time and duty would dull the edge. But every morning proved her wrong. The past was still there, stitched into her nerves, replaying itself the moment she closed her eyes.
Naia finally stood, shoulders tense but steady.
"Just another day," she whispered, her voice barely audible over the faint hum of the city beyond the window. The dawn light of New Boston seeped through the glass, catching on the faint glow of her gem prosthetic as she reached for it. The light refracted through its surface—fractured, beautiful, and broken, just like the girl who wore it.
Naia reached for the prosthetic arm resting on the nightstand—a sleek construct of black alloy and violet crystal, its surface alive with faint threads of light that pulsed like veins. She lifted it with practiced ease, aligning the joint to the synthetic socket embedded in her shoulder.
The moment the magnetic seals clicked into place, a ripple of energy coursed through her. The socket lit up in soft amethyst tones, synchronizing with the arm's embedded Gem. The fusion was seamless—light threading across her collarbone and vanishing beneath her skin as her nervous system and Lattice interlinked.
Then came the resonance surge. Naia felt the Gem's power flood her Lattice network, the stream of energy flowing into the five sockets that lined her body like hidden stars. She could feel each of the Gems within her socket ignite in turn—the one at the center of her brain, followed by the gems in her left shoulder and right flank, in addition to the one nestled below her sternum, in the solar plexus socket, and the final one embedded behind her lower back, her lumbar spine. All five pulsed in harmony with the innate gem deep in her chest, within the heart socket she was born with, a living light that had never dimmed even after everything she'd lost.
The six points aligned, weaving threads of radiant current through her entire frame. Naia closed her eyes, steadying her breath as she guided the flow, ensuring each socket's energy remained stable. One imbalance—one misaligned Gem frequency—and the Lattice could overload, burning through muscle or nerve. But Naia's clarity was exceptional. Her control was instinctual, the result of years of discipline born from necessity.
She could feel it when the resonance settled—the hum beneath her skin, the rhythm of six lights breathing as one. When she opened her eyes again, her body felt lighter, more complete.
"Stabilized," she whispered. Her prosthetic hand flexed with smooth, natural motion, the Prosthetic gem transmuting to appear like the rest of her brown skin. She lingered a moment longer in meditation, letting the soft radiance fade before standing. The quiet of the room returned, broken only by the faint whir of the wall ventilator.
In the bathroom, steam curled around her as she showered, washing away the cold sweat that still clung from her nightmare. For a fleeting instant, she almost felt human again—warm water cascading over the hard seam of her prosthetic shoulder, over skin that bore no scars but remembered every one of them.
When she finished, she dressed in her fitted black-and-violet GSA field suit. The fabric, interwoven with gem-thread conduits, shimmered faintly where it met her sockets, channeling light through her limbs in soft pulses. Her reflection in the mirror looked calm, but her eyes—pale lilac flecked with gold—betrayed a quiet storm beneath.
Descending the narrow stairs to the lower floor, Naia's boots made almost no sound. The living room, like the rest of her apartment, was spotless and impersonal—no photos, no clutter, no trace of who she'd once been. Just order and silence.
The kitchen was part of the same open space: chrome counters, a single induction surface, a fridge that hummed softly. She opened it to find only the essentials—rows of nutrient bottles, neatly arranged, their faint luminescent hue matching the color of her sockets. She grabbed one, twisted off the cap, and drank. It tasted of metal and artificial fruit, but it was enough.
Her Lumenpad lay on the marble counter. She slipped the thin band around her wrist, and it flared to life in a halo of blue holographic screens. Notifications appeared—mission briefings, GSA updates, field reports—but she barely glanced at them.
Instead, she looked toward the window, where the light of New Boston's morning bled through the blinds, refracting through her prosthetic arm into a spectrum of fractured colors.
"Another day," Naia murmured, finishing her drink.
The city beyond was waking, its light a mirror to her own—a brilliance sustained by fragments and circuitry, still burning despite everything that had been taken.
****
Naia guided her hover car out from the apartment tower's parking bay, merging into the early flow of morning traffic. The moment she exited the auto-lane, the amber glow of the Solar Crown broke over the horizon—New Boston's second sun, an orbital halo suspended high above the city's central spire. Its light rippled through the upper atmosphere like liquid gold, scattering across the skyline and washing the glass towers in a soft, honey-colored haze. The locals called it the First Light, and despite everything, it never failed to ease the tightness in Naia's chest. For a few quiet seconds, the warmth of it made the world seem at peace.
Her vehicle glided forward soundlessly, thrusters whispering as it skimmed over the transparent roadway—a seamless stretch of crystal-bitumen reinforced with resonance veins that pulsed faintly beneath the surface. Every lane shimmered with soft blue tracery, responding to the movement of traffic and the city's energy rhythm. Beneath her, she could see the faint outlines of the lower arterial conduits—massive pipes and coolant ducts glowing like veins under translucent skin.
New Boston wasn't built on the ground anymore. It was layered.
Above her hovered the Mag-Lev stratas, sleek ribbons of rail where lev-cars and freight pods zipped past at impossible speeds, their trails leaving arcs of violet light that curved like shooting stars. Each level carried a different pulse of the city: commercial haulers on the lower routes, passenger lines higher up, and defense patrols gliding silently along the outermost rails. Beyond those, aerial craft cruised between tower districts—diamond-winged transports, courier drones, and gleaming UEF enforcer ships whose hulls mirrored the morning light.
As Naia drove, the city unfolded around her in glimmering tiers. Residential stacks lined the lower sky, honeycombs of glass and steel where holographic banners projected local news and energy metrics. Higher still, the corporate arcologies rose like pillars of light, their facades sheathed in photonic shielding that bent the Solar Crown's rays into radiant halos.
She turned onto the Central Veinway, the main artery linking her district to the Forum Spire. On either side, the pedestrian platforms floated a few meters above the road, paved with tempered glass that displayed scrolling data feeds beneath the feet of the early commuters—weather graphs, gem market rates, UEF directives.
To her right, the Luminar Garden District gleamed in the distance: vertical forests woven between towers, where synthetic vines glowed with bioluminescent hues and wind turbines bloomed like metallic flowers. Further beyond, the Industrial Halo emitted a steady thrum, its forges powered by resonance reactors that drew directly from the city's subterranean gem cores.
A drone cut across her field of vision, projecting a holographic advert that shimmered over her windshield:
"Aurion Banking — Trust in the Light."
Naia dismissed it with a flick of her wrist, and the ad dissolved into dust motes of light. At an intersection, her car paused to let a Convoy of GSA patrol crafts descend from the upper lanes, their angular hulls painted in obsidian and violet, the insignia of the Gem Security Agency burning faintly along the sides. For a heartbeat, Naia watched them disappear into the maze of towers ahead, their trail lights vanishing into the bright haze.
She exhaled softly, adjusting her grip on the steering wheel. The morning warmth of the Solar Crown filtered through the tinted glass, painting her hand in streaks of gold.
Beyond the layered skyline, the spire of the Hall of Radiance rose like a shard of the sun itself—a reminder of the event that was to take place today. The city hummed beneath her, alive and breathing, a symphony of light, crystal, and motion. For Naia, New Boston was her new home, a retreat from her past of blood and ambition.
Naia guided her hover car into the Wardspire District, where the skyline shifted from the glass elegance of the city's commercial arc to the fortified geometry of state authority. The air here felt different—cleaner, sharper, humming with the quiet precision of surveillance grids and resonance fields.
Ahead, the Wardspire Gate loomed, a curved arch of polished obsidian and light-crystal plating. The embedded sigils of the Gem Security Agency pulsed in soft blue rhythm, matching the tempo of her car's ID beacon. As she approached, a security drone detached from its patrol station and hovered beside her window, scanning her license imprint. Naia raised her wrist, her Lumenpad flickering to life as it projected her credentials into the air.
The drone emitted a confirming tone, its body shimmering with a quick pulse of blue light.
Identity confirmed: Naia Vasselheim — Intelligence and Negotiation Division, Resonant-Tier Agent, North Atlantic Federation GSA.
The checkpoint barrier dissolved in a ripple of light, allowing her through.
Inside, the Wardspire Arc opened before her—a self-contained city of order and protection. Towering administrative buildings rose like blades of glass, connected by lev-bridges lined with radiant vines that pulsed with contained energy. Below, tree-lined walkways and crystalline plazas were dotted with families—children of agents playing near fountains shaped like glowing gemstones, off-duty officers in uniform conversing quietly beneath the light canopy. The district was designed to embody peace, a sanctuary built from the same discipline that guarded the world outside its walls.
Naia drove through in silence. To anyone else, Wardspire was a dream assignment—a haven for agents and their loved ones, shielded by multi-layer resonance barriers and monitored by one of the most advanced security AIs in the Federation. But to Naia, it felt sterile. Too perfect. Too quiet.
When the offer had come to relocate here years ago, she had refused. Instead, she had chosen a modest apartment in the Aurleine Residential District, where the middle and lower classes lived. The hum of markets, the pulse of the streets, the ordinary lives of people trying to survive—she needed that noise, that reminder of what the GSA was meant to protect.
Wardspire, with its immaculate street and silent order, reminded her too much of the night she could never forget. As her vehicle curved toward the GSA Central Spire, its glass apex reflecting the Solar Crown above, Naia caught her reflection in the windshield—calm, composed, efficient. The perfect agent. But beneath that faint reflection, she saw a flicker of something else. Something human.
Naia passed through two more layers of security before the gates to the Wardspire Annex finally opened. The building rose before her like a shard of black glass—its surface veined with faint blue lines of resonance energy, humming softly with the rhythm of the GSA's defense grid. Automated turrets tracked the air above the perimeter, and drones glided silently across the courtyard like mechanical sentinels patrolling a temple of order.
She guided her hover car into the underground lot, the sensors lighting up as they scanned her plates and tagged her arrival. The space was spotless and dimly lit, the air carrying a faint ozone scent from the active resonance conduits in the walls. Around her, luxury models gleamed—sleek chrome crafts and custom-tinted vehicles belonging to higher-ranking officers or corporate affiliates. Naia's car, plain and utilitarian by comparison, looked almost out of place among them.
She powered it down, the quiet hum fading to silence. Grabbing her briefcase from the passenger seat, she stepped out and adjusted the strap on her shoulder. The prosthetic fingers of her right hand flexed briefly as they tightened around the handle—metal meeting leather.
Her boots clicked softly against the polished floor as she crossed the lot toward the lift alcove. The walls here reflected her image at her in fractured silhouettes, slicing her reflection between panes of transparent steel. The elevator arrived with a soft chime, its glass doors sliding open with mechanical precision.
She stepped inside and selected Level Two – Wardspire Deck, where operational and mission control were housed. Just before the doors could close, a hand caught the frame.
"Hold that!"
Naia glanced up as a few analysts and uniformed agents hurried in, their conversation low but brisk. She shifted to the back, allowing them space. The elevator filled with murmured voices and the faint scent of coffee and metal polish. A woman beside her was scrolling through her Lumenpad, muttering about unconfirmed reports from the Hall of Radiance.
Naia kept her eyes on the display panel. Each ascending floor pulsed briefly with light, and with each level the atmosphere grew tighter.
When the elevator stopped at Level Two, most of the passengers stepped off, their chatter replaced by the hum of workstations and the rhythmic tap of boots on the metallic floor.
The Wardspire Deck was alive with motion. Rows of holoscreens flickered with mission data, field surveillance feeds, and streams of encrypted transmissions. Agents strode between desks with grim focus, exchanging quick updates. The air vibrated with tension, more than usual—even for this place. Naia could feel it.
She paused briefly near one of the larger holo displays dominating the central atrium. The live feed projected the Hall of Radiance—its towering crystalline dome gleaming beneath the Solar Crown. The caption beneath read:
UEF–Luminia Treaty Accords Commencement – Live Broadcast Pending.
The image of the Luminia envoy stepping from a diplomatic shuttle flashed across the screen, surrounded by security drones and delegates. The sight drew quiet murmurs from nearby agents.
Naia tore her gaze away and continued down the hall toward her station. The office floor smelled faintly of polished metal and recycled air, the constant hum of machinery filling the silence between conversations.
Her cubicle was small, ordered, and impersonal—exactly how she preferred it. The desk gleamed, the surfaces empty save for her terminal, a datapad dock, and a single cup of black coffee. She set down her briefcase, slid into the chair, and activated her workstation. Blue light rose from the desk, forming panels of floating data and message queues.
Naia exhaled slowly.
The noise of the command floor dulled behind her as she sank into the routine—checking mission summaries, cross-referencing schedules, reviewing the assignments she was to oversee today. It was easier this way: to lose herself in structure, in duty, in the rhythm of a world that made sense—unlike the one that haunted her dreams. Twenty minutes into her shift, Naia's focus shattered.
A low tremor rippled through the floor—subtle at first, then followed by a sharp pulse of energy that rattled the desk panels and sent a tremor through her bones. The hum of the Wardspire Deck faltered. Coffee cups tipped, holo projections flickered, and someone cursed from a few stations away.
Naia froze, her instincts immediately on edge. She could feel it—an unnatural vibration running through the air, the kind of resonance distortion that only came from a catastrophic energy discharge. Her Lattice reacted before her mind did; the sockets along her spine thrummed, warning of an imbalance.
"What the—" she muttered, pushing up from her seat.
Noise erupted beyond her cubicle—boots pounding, voices shouting commands, the shrill pitch of emergency notifications filling the air. By the time Naia reached the central command floor, dozens of GSA officers were already there, gathered in tense clusters before the primary holo display.
The main screen glowed red with emergency overlays. Live feeds streamed in from the city, shaky footage showing smoke rising over the skyline.
Naia spotted Natalia, one of her colleagues, standing rigid near the front. "What happened?" she demanded, her voice cutting through the din.
Natalia turned, her face pale under the cold light of the holo. "It's the Hall of Radiance," she said, her tone wavering. "It's been bombed—just now. Can you believe it?"
Naia's heart stopped. She turned toward the screen as the feed stabilized on the image of the once-pristine dome—now fractured and burning. Shards of crystal architecture jutted into the air like broken glass. Smoke poured from the ruptured crown, and the faint shimmer of containment barriers flickered weakly as emergency responders flooded the plaza below.
Her pulse pounded in her ears. The sight clawed at her nerves—not just because of what it meant, but because of what she felt.
The command floor was suffocating with emotion. Fear. Panic. Disbelief. A raw wave of anxiety rippled through the agents, and Naia's body reacted as if it were her own.
Her breathing hitched. The sockets along her body began to hum erratically, the resonance lines beneath her skin flaring faintly with light.
Naia clenched her fists, trying to steady herself. She'd lived her whole life with this—empathic sensitivity, they called it—a heightened attunement to emotional frequency, a gift of perception that made her invaluable in negotiation work. But when the emotional field around her spiked like this, her control frayed.
Now, the flood was overwhelming. Every heartbeat in the room echoed in her chest, every fear rippled through her thoughts like a storm.
"Balance," she whispered to herself, forcing air into her lungs. "Control the flow."
But the energy refused to settle. Something deeper—older—was stirring in her core, resonating with the chaos outside. And as the holo feed zoomed in on the burning dome, Naia knew this wasn't just another disaster. It was the beginning of something far worse.
The city fell under lockdown within minutes.
Emergency sirens howled through the skyline as New Boston entered Amber Vigil—the first-tier security protocol enacted during national crises. From the Wardspire windows, Naia could see the glow of containment barriers rippling to life over the city's sectors, faint amber lattices stretching across the horizon like woven glass. Patrol drones streaked through the air, their searchlights cutting through the smoke drifting in from the east.
Inside the GSA Annex, chaos was methodical. Officers moved with tense precision, relaying encrypted transmissions, rerouting air traffic, and sealing off diplomatic channels. Naia sat at her desk, the hum of her terminal reflecting the pulse in her fingertips. There was nothing she could do for now—the higher divisions would handle the first response. She tried to focus on her routine assignments, eyes tracing over reports she wasn't reading.
But her thoughts wouldn't settle.
A small part of her—a quiet, hidden part—had been hopeful about the treaty signing. The idea of cooperation between humans and the Luminia had stirred something she hadn't felt in years: a fragile kind of optimism. Six years ago, she might even have been there herself, stationed as field support for the diplomatic team.
But that Naia was gone. The Naia of today avoided the field entirely, choosing the sterile safety of the Wardspire offices over the chaos she once lived for. She told herself it was enough—paperwork, data, stability. The illusion of peace.
"Naia."
The voice broke through her thoughts. She looked up to see Natalia standing beside her cubicle, clutching a stack of crystalline documents against her chest. The faint blue light refracted across her anxious face.
"The Director wants to see you," Natalia said.
Naia blinked, caught off guard. "Me? Why?"
Natalia only shrugged, shifting uneasily. "Didn't say. But… he looked serious."
A ripple of unease went through her. She powered down her terminal, the holographic panels fading into the desk's surface, and stood. Her workload was still untouched, but her instincts told her it wouldn't matter now.
She made her way through the maze of cubicles, the murmur of worried voices trailing in her wake. The Director's office stood at the end of the hall—its reinforced glass door reflecting the chaos of the command floor behind her. As she approached, she heard voices inside. One was unmistakably the Director's deep tone. The other—lower, familiar—made her pause.
No. It couldn't be.
Naia knocked twice.
"Come in," came the voice from within.
She pressed her hand to the keypad; the door slid open with a soft hiss, revealing the office beyond.
Director Mel Varrin sat behind his desk, a broad, round man with a polished bald head and sharp gray eyes that missed nothing. The room smelled faintly of metal polish and citrus disinfectant. Across from him sat a figure she hadn't seen in years—a man with tan skin, short dark hair, and a black long coat trimmed in burnished gold. His presence carried quiet authority, but it was his eyes that stopped her cold—green, flecked with radiant hues that shimmered like an aurora.
Her breath caught. "Elias?"
Her brother looked up. The faint smile he gave her didn't reach his eyes. "Naia."
The air between them was heavy with unspoken memories.
"Agent Vasselheim," Director Mel said, gesturing to Elias, "has been dispatched from Federation Headquarters to lead the investigation into the Hall of Radiance bombing."
Naia's gaze flicked from the Director back to her brother, confusion swirling with a faint unease.
"Wait—you're leading the investigation?"
Elias rose to his feet, his tone formal, the warmth between them buried under duty. "You've been reassigned, Naia. Effective immediately." He met her eyes, the weight of command in his voice. "You'll be working with me on the Hall of Radiance case."
The words hung in the air, final and heavy.
Naia felt the faintest tremor run through her hand—the one that wasn't metal. Whatever peace she had carved out for herself was gone.