The Xen'thari captain blurred into a whirl of chitin and unbridled killing intent, its energy blade screaming through the ionized air in a lethal arc aimed straight for the silver mech's head. The strike was brutal, efficient—crafted to cleave through armor and bone in a single, devastating blow.
The mech did not dodge. It advanced.
Its left hand flashed upward, not to block, but to slap the captain's wrist from below. Composite met alien alloy with a deafening CLANG, and the brutal deflection sent the energy blade careening skyward, leaving the captain's torso wide open. In the same fluid motion, the mech's right palm—now glowing with a fierce, concentrated amber light—slammed into the raider's chest plate.
No explosion erupted. Only a deep, resonant THUMP that rattled Kaelan's teeth to their roots. A spiderweb of cracks spread instantaneously across the captain's iridescent armor from the point of impact. Then, a pulse of amber light—visible as a rippling distortion in the air—burst outward from the mech's palm.
The Xen'thari captain was hurled backward as if struck by a freighter, crashing through a support pillar in a storm of rock and sparks. It did not rise.
Silence descended again. More absolute than before.
The remaining Xen'thari soldiers froze, their tactical protocols seemingly short-circuiting at the swift, overwhelming elimination of their leader.
The silver mech straightened, its sleek form unnervingly calm amid the carnage. It turned its single, glowing optic toward Kaelan, who still knelt on hands and knees, gasping for breath through the aftershocks of pain and the strange, cosmic energy simmering beneath his skin.
"[Scanning Asset...]" the synthetic voice hummed, seemingly to itself.
"[Severe physical trauma detected. Severe psionic burnout detected. Unknown energy signature: [Stellar Core Fragment]. Classification: Primordial. Threat Level: Catastrophic. Containment Priority: Absolute.]"
"Containment?" Kaelan croaked, a spark of defiance cutting through the fog of agony. His veins still glowed with a faint, pulsing blue beneath the grime. "I'm not a damn specimen."
The mech's head tilted—a strangely avian gesture. "You are an asset of unknown potential and extreme volatility. You are also dying. Your cells are undergoing uncontrolled stellar catalysis. Without stabilization, you will achieve critical mass in approximately seventeen minutes. The resulting energy release will vaporize this asteroid and everything within a fifty-kilometer radius."
A cold that had nothing to do with the mine's frigid air seeped into Kaelan's bones. Vaporize. The word echoed in his mind. He'd only wanted to survive. To find out if his parents had made it out alive. Now he was a walking bomb.
"Can you stop it?" he asked, his voice tight with barely contained panic.
"Affirmative. My chassis is equipped with a Stellar Harmonization Array for field research. I can attempt to regulate the energy cascade." The mech took a step closer, its movements eerily precise. "You will come with me. Resistance is illogical and will result in termination to preserve local stellar stability."
Before Kaelan could form a retort—Come with it where?—a high-pitched whine filled the chamber. One of the remaining Xen'thari soldiers, its weapon aimed not at the mech, but at a cluster of cowering miners trapped under a collapsed gantry, fired.
The mech moved. It was a silver streak, interposing itself between the plasma bolt and the miners. The bolt dissipated harmlessly against its armored shoulder. The mech's right arm shifted, forearm plates sliding apart to reveal a compact, multi-barreled emitter.
Pew. Pew. Pew.
Three precise, humming beams of amber light lanced out. Each found a seam in Xen'thari armor—a neck joint, a visor edge, a power pack coupling. Three soldiers collapsed, smoke rising from perfect, cauterized wounds.
The display of cold, surgical lethality was more terrifying than the captain's brute force. The remaining raiders, their morale shattered, fled in a frantic retreat deeper into the mines.
The mech's arm resealed. It did not pursue. "The retreat is tactical. They will signal for reinforcements. This location is compromised. Decision window: twelve minutes until Asset detonation."
Kaelan pushed himself to his feet, his legs trembling. The blue glow beneath his skin burned brighter now, pulsing in time with his frantic heartbeat. He could feel the heat building—a sun threatening to ignite in his chest. He looked at the miners—the few survivors, their faces etched with terror and awe. He looked at the path to the surface, where his parents might be. Might have been.
He had no choice.
"Do it," he grated out. "Stabilize me. Then I'm finding my family."
"Acknowledged. Do not resist."
The mech stepped forward, its chest plate irising open with a series of soft clicks. A complex apparatus of crystalline rods and glowing filaments extended from within on delicate mechanical arms. It hummed with a clean, technological energy—utterly alien compared to the wild, ancient power churning inside Kaelan.
The apparatus surrounded him, the tips of the rods trained on his chest, his head, his major joints. A low thrumming filled the air.
"[Initiating Harmonic Dampening Field. Asset, prepare for neural interface.]"
"Neural inter—AGHH!"
It felt like ice water and lightning being poured directly into his brain. A flood of data—not words, but pure, unfiltered information—cascaded behind his eyes: schematic diagrams of his own body, flashing with red warnings around his heart and neural pathways; a spiraling, three-dimensional model of the blue shard embedded in his sternum, pulsing with chaotic energy; and overlaying it all, a grid of amber lines, striving to contain, to channel, to calm.
The wild stellar fire inside him recoiled, then raged. It was a feral beast confronted with a cage. The blue light erupting from Kaelan's skin flared violently, pushing against the amber grid. Alarms blared in the mech's internal systems, its external speakers emitting a sharp static hiss.
"[Containment failure! Energy feedback loop detected!]"
"You're… making it worse!" Kaelan snarled, agony tearing through him. The system messages in his mind blurred into a wash of red text.
"[Warning: Host vessel integrity failing.]"
"[Emergency protocol initiated: Symbiotic Stabilization.]"
"What does that mean?!" Kaelan yelled, though no sound escaped his lips.
The mech did not answer with words. Its chest apparatus retracted swiftly. Instead, it reached out with its two physical hands, gripping Kaelan's shoulders. The metal was shockingly cold against his skin.
Then, the amber lines on the mech's own body blazed with incandescent light. The light traveled down its arms, into its hands, and then into Kaelan.
This was no external cage. This was an invasion.
The mech's consciousness—a vast, cool, logical intelligence of staggering complexity—brushed against the edges of Kaelan's terrified, human mind. It did not speak. It showed.
It showed him the energy pathways. It showed him the raging river of stellar power and the broken, human levees struggling to hold it back. It did not build a new cage. It began, with impossible precision, to repair the levees. To widen the channels. To guide the river.
The amber light was not containing the blue fire. It was merging with it, tracing circuits of stability within the chaos, forcing a brutal, painful order.
Kaelan's scream died in his throat. His vision whited out. Two images superimposed themselves in his mind: the ruined mine around him, and a sterile, white laboratory where a younger version of the silver mech's pilot—a girl with fierce, intelligent amber eyes and grease-smudged cheeks—welded a crystalline matrix onto a reactor core, her tongue poking out in concentration.
The connection lasted only a second. Then it severed.
Kaelan gasped, stumbling backward. The searing, explosive pain was gone. The blue glow beneath his skin had faded to a faint, steady hum, centered on the shard in his chest. He felt… clear. Hollowed out, but clear. The sun in his chest was now a contained star, burning steadily, predictably.
"[Symbiotic link established. Stellar Cohesion stabilized at 8%. Detonation risk: negated.]"
"[New system parameters integrated. Analyzing…]"
"[Skill identified: [Stellar Flash]. Basic emission control achieved.]"
The silver mech took a step back, its usual perfect poise faltering slightly. A thin wisp of smoke curled from a joint on its left arm. The amber light in its optic dimmed for a moment before brightening again.
"Stabilization successful," the synthesized voice stated, but it sounded… strained. "The link transferred critical system stress to my unit. Mobility reduced by 22%. Combat efficiency impaired."
Before Kaelan could process any of it—the mental invasion, the sudden stability, the fleeting image of the girl—a new, deeper tremor shook the mine. This was no weapon's blast. It was the groan of stressed rock and shearing metal.
"[Seismic activity detected. Origin: Orbital bombardment has compromised the asteroid's structural integrity. Catastrophic collapse imminent.]"
"We need to leave. Now." The mech's voice held a new urgency. It turned and began striding toward a collapsed tunnel, its left leg moving with a slight, barely perceptible hitch. "My transport is buried 200 meters this way. Assistance will be required to clear debris."
Kaelan took one last, desperate look toward the surface, his heart a leaden stone in his chest. Mom. Dad. The thought was a physical pain, sharper than any the stellar energy had inflicted.
But the ceiling was cracking. The mech was right. To find them, he had to live first.
He took a step to follow the silver machine, his body feeling both incredibly light and terribly heavy. The ghost of its logical, formidable consciousness still lingered in the corners of his mind—a silent, unsettling passenger.
As they hurried into the dark, unstable tunnel, a final, grim notification flickered at the edge of Kaelan's awareness. It was sourced not from the mech, but from the deeper, older system within him:
"[Alert: Host's unique energy signature has been logged by [Xen'thari Hive Network - Subjugator-Class Vessel]. Priority target designation applied.]"
"[Alert: Energy spike has registered on [Mechanist Union - Frontier Scanners]. Classification: Anomalous. Recovery team dispatched.]"
"[Calculating survival probability in current scenario…]"
"[Result: 0.7% and declining.]"
End of Chapter 2