I stood in front of Owen's grave, the soft earth still fresh. Kneeling, I adjusted a crooked stone at the base, brushing away bits of dirt and debris. We'd spent the morning giving him a proper farewell—what little that meant out here. But even as I tried to focus on the details, a knot of guilt twisted in my chest.
He didn't deserve to die like that.
If I had listened to that voice sooner… maybe we would've reached the rift in time. Maybe he'd still be here.
I shook the thought off before it could burrow deeper. We couldn't afford that kind of thinking. Not now. Not with what we needed to accomplish. I stood, brushing the dirt from my palms, and shifted my focus inward, pulling up the screen to examine the lightning control.
"So," Henry said, cutting through the silence, "How many powers did you get?"
I dismissed the screen and looked over at him. He looked… older. Not physically, but in the way he held himself. Like the last day had carved something out of him. Still, I recognized what he was doing. Trying to keep the rest of us from getting swallowed by the grief.
I nodded. "A couple," I said quietly, wiping my hands against my pants before listing off what the core had granted me. Talking about it felt easier than thinking about the empty space beside us, where Owen should've been standing.
As I spoke, Henry's eyes widened in realization that each core wasn't exactly the same when it came to power.
Ella, maybe trying to cut the tension, piped up, "Well, hey… I guess it's not about how many powers you get, right? It's about how dramatically you die using them."
The words hung there.
Too soon, Ella… too soon.
Her smile faltered even before she finished.
"Yeah," Henry said, forcing a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes. "Real comforting."
Ella winced and looked away, muttering, "Sorry."
Trying to help with the situation, Benjamin stepped in. "What do you say, Atlas? Care to show us what those powers can do?"
The shift in energy was subtle, but real. I felt the pressure in my chest ease just a bit as their eyes turned toward me. Benjamin always had a knack for reading the room.
I nodded, forcing a breath. No more stalling.
I wasn't sure how I'd managed to put it off all night. Maybe part of me had been scared to try. But now that I was standing here, something had changed. A hum stirred in my blood, buzzing like electricity just under the skin.
"Alright," I said, stepping forward, trying to sound more sure than I felt. "Let's see what I can do."
I glanced toward Henry. "How do you usually activate your powers?"
He gave me a half-smile and rubbed the back of his neck. "I don't know, man. I just… feel it. Like it's always there, just waiting."
I squinted at him. "Great. Super helpful."
The others chuckled softly, breaking the tension. I exhaled, closing my eyes for a moment, tuning out the world. I reached inward, trying to find that spark Henry had described. At first, there was only silence as a part of me began to wonder if it had all been a fluke.
But then, like catching your breath after nearly drowning, I felt it.
A pulse.
It was like static under my skin, building fast, like storm clouds gathering in my chest. I reached for it, not with my mind, but with instinct. The second I did, the dam broke.
A jolt tore through me, bright and alive. My heart raced as power surged through my limbs, setting my nerves alight. The air around me snapped and sizzled.
Lightning Enhancement had activated.
A crackling aura enveloped me, dancing across my arms and shoulders like threads of living electricity. I could feel the hum in my bones, the weightlessness in my step, the rush of energy like I could run straight through a mountain.
The others instinctively stepped back.
"Whoa…" Henry breathed, eyes wide.
"Okay, that's new," Ella said, already pulling a notebook from her bag.
I bounced on the balls of my feet, testing the sensation. My body felt like it was moving ahead of my thoughts. Testing, I threw a few punches into the air, and with each strike came a crack, like distant thunder snapping against the morning sky.
"This feels... weird," I muttered. "But kind of amazing."
My movements were almost too fast. I felt like I was a second behind my own reflexes, like I had to catch up to myself.
"Whoa, slow down, Atlas!" Emily called, backing up with her hands raised. Her voice held that blend of awe and alarm.
Amelia crossed her arms, watching me carefully. "Impressive," she said. "But let's not accidentally knock someone out, alright?"
I grinned, the rush of it all making my chest feel light for the first time in days. But as I tried to dial it back, I realized the electricity didn't want to let go. The energy clung to me, stubborn and wild, crackling along my fingers and humming beneath my skin like it had claimed part of me.
I took a breath, deeper this time.
In… out.
Slowly, the buzz faded. The lightning dimmed. The static dissolved into a tingling echo.
And then it was gone.
Not bad for a first try.
"Okay," I said, already feeling the itch to push further. "Let's try the next one."
This time, I reached for Lightning Control, curious to see what came with the name. I closed my eyes, focusing inward, searching for that same electric pulse I'd touched before. But it wasn't the same. The hum was there, but more elusive now, like a current running just out of reach.
The energy danced at the edge of my senses, slippery and wild.
Then a crack split the air.
A bolt of lightning screamed past my head, close enough that the heat kissed my cheek and the hairs on my neck stood on end.
"Oh crap!" I shouted, ducking reflexively as the bolt arced high into the sky, vanishing with a sizzling trail of white-blue static.
Everything went still.
For a second, no one said a word. The air was thick with ozone and disbelief as they all looked on with varying levels of alarm. "Let's not blow our heads off, shall we?" Benjamin finally said.
"Yeah… that didn't go as planned," I muttered, shaking out my hands, trying to settle the adrenaline now burning in my veins. I exhaled, drawing from what I'd seen Amelia do. The way the stones slowly circled her, as if guided by some unseen hands.
The hum returned, stronger now. I reached for it again, more slowly, and this time it responded. The lightning moved, not with violence, but with rhythm. Sparks drifted from my fingertips and curled into the air like glowing threads.
With a flick of my wrist, the energy gathered into a small spiral and zipped toward a nearby tree. With a small crack, the bark blackened slightly where it struck, a thin line of smoke rising from the point of impact.
Not exactly Voltwing level – Ella's dramatic name for the thunderbird – but still, it was something.
"All right, last one," I said, my curiosity piqued now more than ever. I steadied my breath and reached inward again.
This time, I touched Void Creation.
I expected another rush of energy, another sensation to wrestle into submission. But instead, it met me like a hand slipping into mine. There was no resistance. Just… understanding.
Dark energy flowed from my palm, slow and silent, coalescing into a swirling black orb that hovered in the air as if it had always belonged there.
I stared at it, entranced.
It wasn't like the lightning. It wasn't loud or sharp. It had a quiet yet familiar feeling.
I reached out, and the void obeyed.
With little more than a thought, it stretched and hardened, shaping itself into a knife. The blade's edge shimmered like light trapped at the edge of a black hole, but I could feel the weight of it. It felt dense and powerful, yet completely harmless if I willed it.
I twisted my hand, and the void reshaped itself:
The knife became a short sword.
Then a set of gauntlets.
Then a whip, curling with slow, sinuous motion.
It moved with me. Reacted as fast as I could think. It didn't feel like summoning a weapon. It felt like extending a limb I hadn't known I had.
I tried for armor, but it slipped through my fingers, dissipating before it could fully form.
Still, the ease of it unsettled me.
"See?" Henry groaned, throwing his hands up dramatically. "I knew it… he's got both quality and quantity."
I didn't respond. My eyes were still fixed on the remnants of the void, now curling slowly back into my palm like liquid in reverse.
The lightning. I had to fight for that. Wrestle it into obedience.
But the void…
It wanted to be used.
And somewhere deep in my gut, I knew this wasn't the first time I'd touched it.
I let the void fade, releasing the dark energy with a slow exhale. It unraveled like smoke caught in wind, disappearing as if it had never existed at all.
When I looked up, everyone was still watching me. Their faces were lit with something close to awe. But behind it, I caught a flicker of something else. Not fear exactly, but… caution, almost Wariness.
I couldn't blame them.
They'd seen what I could do. Hell, I had seen what I could do, and I didn't even fully understand it yet.
And I wasn't sure I was ready for what came next. But we still had things to do as we gathered everything, said our last goodbyes to Owens' resting place, and eventually headed north.
It was honestly good to get away from there. The more distance we put between that nightmare and us, the better. I only wish we could have given Owen a better resting place. But despite all of that.
I was restless.
The core had given me something to change the outcome of our fates. I could feel it building just beneath the surface, coiling like a spring begging to snap. I wanted to test it. Really test it. In a fight, but with nothing around to throw myself at, all I could do was try to control it.
So I did.
As we pushed through dense undergrowth, I drifted to the back, letting the others guide the way as I split my focus. With a slow breath, I held out one hand and focused inward.
A crackle answered me.
A current of lightning coiled to life in my palm and then between my fingertips, buzzing faintly like a swarm of angry bees. It jumped from finger to finger in a way that felt alive, as if it had a mind of its own. I watched it dance for a moment, then flicked it upward. It arced through the air and landed cleanly in my other hand, hovering just above my palm.
My lips twitched into a grin.
Again.
I tossed it higher, this time shaping it slightly, flattening the bolt like a disc before letting it collapse into a spark in my palm. Each try brought more clarity. I was starting to understand it, not just how to summon it, but also how it moved and what it felt like.
It was an interesting process. For most of the trek, I had to split my focus between the path and using my powers. It was hard to use my powers when I had to watch out for the occasional low-hanging branch. I had already had my fill of being slapped with branches. Henry, on the other hand, was having the time of his life as he purposefully made his way ahead and positioned breaches right in my path. Ella snorted softly but didn't look up from her journal.
Except later, when she did.
At one point, during a longer pause to catch our breath, I let the current build again, but this time I didn't catch it. I let it flow outward, just slightly, letting it circle me.
The bolt spun once. Then twice. A slow, deliberate orbit.
I wasn't even sure I meant for it to do that.
Ella had stopped writing. Her eyes were locked on me, wide with a mix of caution and fascination.
I didn't say anything. Neither did she.
I just let the bolt keep circling, feeling the rhythm of it.
Eventually, the trees thinned, and the trail gave way to a wide hill. We climbed it together, the forest loosening its grip behind us. At the top, tall grass swayed in the breeze, and for the first time in hours, the world opened up.
I sank into the grass and let the breeze wash over me. It was cool and clean, not like the damp air below. Up here, the forest's suffocating grip loosened. I hadn't realized how much I needed to breathe.
I mean, the forest was fine and all. It beat the desert heat quite a bit, but it was still nice to just breathe in the open air of the sky.
Buzzz.
A faint noise cut through the wind, barely there, like the crackle of static on an old radio.
I sat up. "What was that?"
The sound came again, louder this time. Definitely static. I turned toward it and saw Emily, her eyes wide as she clutched something in her hands.
Owen's radio.
It hissed with low, broken noise, and then a voice cut through, Garbled and choppy. Not clear enough to make out, but definitely human.
Emily adjusted the dial slowly, unsure if she was hearing what she thought she was. But the voice kept playing, glitching between bursts of static and fragmented syllables.
"No way…" Henry breathed utterly astonished.
"There are other people here?!" Ella said, finishing the thought he was afraid to speak aloud.
Benjamin exhaled sharply, the weight of it all catching up to him. For a moment, no one moved.
All this time, we'd been wandering. Grieving. Surviving. But now…
We weren't alone.
But the questions came just as fast:
Was it the colony?
Or something else entirely?
And if there was civilization out there…
Where?
As if reading all our minds, Amelia finally asked the question lingering in the air.
"Ella, is there any way you can figure out where the signal's coming from?"
Ella hesitated, frowning down at the radio still sputtering faint static in Emily's hands. "Maybe," she said slowly. "If I can scavenge some parts, I think I can turn it into something that tracks the signal's direction."
My attention sharpened immediately. "What do you need?" I asked, already unbuckling my bag.
Ella looked thoughtful, scanning our scattered supplies. "Emily, I'll need the other radio. And… weird request, but I need a boot. Like, an actual shoe."
Henry raised an eyebrow. "Your science scares me sometimes." But he didn't hesitate as he pulled off his boot and tossed it to her.
"Thanks," she muttered, already laying out her parts like a surgeon prepping for an operation.
I sat beside her, watching as she cracked open both radios, prying loose bits of copper, wire, and circuits with delicate precision. From my pack, she pulled a few stray metal pieces—screws, a snapped blade, even a coil of wire she hadn't asked for but immediately put to use.
Then she looked up at me.
"Atlas… could I borrow one of your Void knives?"
"Sure."
With a thought, I summoned the knife. Its black edge flickered faintly in the light as I handed it over. She accepted it carefully, as if it might bite her, but after a breath, she sliced cleanly into the boot's side. A thin support wire curled out like a thread from a spool.
"Got it," she whispered.
Minutes passed as she tinkered. No one said much. Even Henry kept quiet. The only sounds were the rustle of wind and the soft click and snap of Ella rebuilding the device.
When she finally snapped the back panel shut, she held the radio up in both hands.
It was… mostly still a radio.
Mostly.
The front still had the dials and speaker grill, but thin wires now trailed out the sides, and the stubby antenna had been extended with a twist of boot wire and copper threading. And on the side, a few bent metal bits were jammed onto the casing like jagged fins.
Ella took a breath and pressed the power button.
For a second, there was nothing, making everyone worried that Ella might have messed it up, but then there was a burst of static.
The voice returned, faint and glitchy, buried beneath the static. And now, accompanied by a soft beeping.
She twisted the dial.
The beeping slowed when she turned south. Then sped up when she rotated toward the north, where the jagged silhouettes of distant mountains pierced the sky.
Beep. Beep. Beepbeepbeep.
A grin broke across her face as she lifted the Frankensteined radio triumphantly. "What can I say? I'm a genius…"
We didn't waste another second, packing up and heading straight for the distant mountains, finally chasing something real. Ella led the way, practically running. Her radio guided her like a compass as she darted around trees and vaulted roots.
We trailed after her, ducking under low-hanging branches and pushing through thick curtains of vines. The forest, which had once felt suffocating, now rushed past in a blur. For a while, no one spoke. All other worries fell to the side.
There was only the goal.
Ella didn't slow even when the terrain started to shift underfoot, roots giving way to rocky outcroppings and patches of flattened earth. Her breath came faster from anticipation.
Then she broke through the treeline.
The forest suddenly opened into a wide, uneven clearing, bathed in the warm glow of the late afternoon sun. Light spilled in from above, casting long shadows across the stone-littered ground.
We caught up just as she came to a halt.
In the center of the clearing, something stood.
It was small, no taller than a child, but it was clear from the first glance that it wasn't human. Its body looked sculpted by the forest itself: overlapping plates of rough, earthen stone layered over a core of tangled moss and roots. Deep cracks split its limbs like natural fault lines, and vines wrapped tightly around its arms and legs, twitching faintly with life. Tiny wildflowers sprouted along its back, swaying gently in the breeze as if the forest had claimed it as its own.
Its face was eerily still, its features more suggested than sculpted: two deep-set, hollow eyes glowed with dim, flickering light.
Ella was the first to break the silence.
"Oh my god, look how cute it is!" she squealed, as if she had forgotten all else, stepping forward with wide-eyed wonder.
For a moment, we all just stared. The strange little creature blinked, if you could call it that, and tilted its head slightly.
And then suddenly jerked back, startled. Its eyes flared brighter, and the plants around its feet twitched. A moment later, thick roots shot out of the ground, lashing toward us with surprising speed and force.
"Whoa!" Henry shouted, diving to the side as one snapped past his shoulder.
Amelia reacted instantly, her hands snapping forward as a stone barrier erupted from the ground, intercepting the next strike. I leapt back, electricity buzzing across my skin as I braced for a fight.
The golem loomed, its vines pulled taut like drawn wires. Its eyes narrowed, studying us, weighing whether we were a threat.
Then the roots stilled. Tension hung in the air like a held breath.
Henry, catching his breath, broke the silence. "Uh… what's our next move?"
"Get ready to attack," Amelia barked.
But Ella stepped forward, hands raised slightly. "Wait. Look at it… It's just defending itself."
She was right. The creature wasn't advancing. Its body language, if stone and vines could have such a thing, was more defensive than aggressive. The light in its eyes had dimmed again, and the roots had slunk back into the soil.
"Maybe we should give it some space," I said quietly, still on edge but trying to match Ella's calm. "See what it does."
Amelia hesitated for a second, but after a moment, she gave a reluctant nod. "Ella's right. It doesn't seem like it wants a fight. Let's see what happens."
We slowly stepped back. One by one, giving the creature breathing room.
The golem relaxed.
Its posture shifted to something less guarded. The glow in its chest softened, flickering gently. It tilted its head again, like it was trying to understand us.
And then, it did something none of us expected.
Its stone body shivered, then cracked open. Plates of rock and vine fell away from its core like a shell breaking apart. The creature collapsed in on itself and vanished into the ground, melting into the earth in an instant.
All that remained was a quiet pile of stone.
"What the…?" Henry started, stepping forward.
He didn't finish the sentence.
A green slime shot down from the trees above, landing on the rocks with a disgusting splat. The acidic hiss that followed made it clear the slime was dissolving the stones, and in a flash, tentacles of green goo whipped out in all directions.
"Kill it!" Ella shouted, her usual calm replaced by genuine alarm.
Benjamin hesitated, his brow furrowing as if he was considering whether we should even engage it. "Maybe it won't attack unprovo–"
The slime lunged at Henry before Benjamin could finish his thought. A stone wall shot up just in time to block the creature, as the thing practically splattered acrost the stone like a rotten tomato before beginning to reform and take shape once more, its sludge-like body eroding the stone as wisps of smoke rose from it.
Henry, ever the genius, stepped forward, his hands reaching out to poison the slime. "Got it!"
"Wait—" I tried to warn him, but it was too late. The instant he touched the corrosive slime, it clung to his hand, eating through his skin in moments. Henry cried out, yanking his hand back, but then the slime darkened, shifting as if it had reacted to the poison.
Before we could fully grasp what was happening, a chunk of the infected slime shot off toward Henry, hitting him square in the leg. He screamed again, collapsing as Amelia smashed the offending slime with a slab of rock.
"Great, now it's reforming!" Emily shouted, her voice high with panic as the blob of emerald goo started pulling itself back together, wobbling like a sentient Jell-O mold of doom.
This wasn't over.
Thinking fast, or so I thought, I raised my hand and fired off a bolt of lightning straight into the center of the mass.
The result was... immediate.
And very, very wrong.
The second the lightning connected, the slime didn't just convulse. It exploded.
With a wet, thunderous SPLORCH, green, acidic goo erupted outward in all directions like some grotesque party popper from hell.
I barely had time to raise my arms before I was hit. The slime splashed across my chest and arms, burning through fabric and singeing skin. I hissed and stumbled back, frantically brushing the goop off before it could eat through further.
I was mostly okay.
But Henry…
His scream cut through the clearing. I turned just in time to see him flailing on the ground like a man possessed, covered head to toe in slime. It sizzled on contact with his clothes, melting holes into the fabric like acid through parchment.
"Why is it always me?!" he howled, rolling around in panic.
Benjamin appeared beside him, utterly unfazed, holding a bunch of broad leaves like he was about to swat a fly. "Stop screaming like a child. You're fine," he barked, smacking at Henry's arms and legs with the leaves in an effort to scrape the goo off.
"Fine?! I'm being digested alive!"
Benjamin didn't even blink. "You're being dramatic!"
I couldn't hold it in anymore. I burst out laughing, wincing a little as the movement pulled at the burns on my side. Most of us had been hit by the splash, but Henry… Henry looked like a failed science experiment.
His shirt was Swiss cheese. His pants weren't faring much better. Green splotches covered him from head to toe like some kind of cartoonish jungle disease.
He sat up and glared at me. "Does this look funny to you?"
I barely managed to keep a straight face. "You're really rocking that polka-dot look, Henry. I think we've found your superhero name. Polka Dot Man."
"I'm this close to strangling you," he growled, holding up two fingers, barely an inch apart, like he was physically gripping the last thread of his restraint.
I grinned. "Careful, Polka Dot Man. You don't want to give me a reason to call you Strangler instead."
Emily snorted. Ella tried and failed to hide her laughter as she helped dab Henry down with a cloth. Even Amelia cracked a tiny smile as she conjured a quick rinse of water to help clean us all off.
Despite the burns, the stinging, and the smell, which, for the record, was something between rotting spinach and battery acid, we laughed. Loud and real.
It felt good.
For a moment, we weren't a squad of battle-weary survivors trudging through a monster-infested world. We were just friends—tired, slime-covered, and kind of miserable—but alive and still able to laugh about it.
And after everything we'd been through, that felt like victory.
As things settled, I took a moment to refocus.
The chaotic aftermath of the fight still buzzed in my mind, but beneath the laughter and sizzling goo, I felt a shift. A quiet pulse of energy inside me.
I'd leveled up twice.
I now had six attribute points to allocate, and with them, the weight of a new responsibility.
I exhaled, already running calculations in my head. The others joked behind me, Henry still grumbling about his ruined pants.
After a moment's pause, I made my choices.
One into Strength. Just enough to give my hits a little more weight.
Two into Agility. The last fight had shown me how slow I really was when it counted.
Two into Endurance. I wasn't going to let myself burn out again mid-battle.
And the last… Dexterity. I didn't fully understand it yet, but something told me it mattered.
The screen faded from view, and I stood there for a beat, listening.
Nothing felt different at first. No dramatic surge of energy. No glowing aura or cinematic transformation.
Then I moved my fingers, flexed my arms.
Wait…
I ran a hand along my bicep, down to my forearm. The muscle felt tighter. Not bulkier, but more refined. Compact. Like tension waiting to snap loose. Even the way I moved felt different.
I crouched slightly and shifted my weight to the balls of my feet. The motion felt smoother, while also being easier. Like the delay between thought and action had shortened just a little. My center of gravity had adjusted barely, but I noticed it. Everything about my body felt more... connected. Like each part was finally working with the others, rather than dragging behind.
As I took stock of these changes, I noticed Henry off to the side. His posture seemed different, more relaxed, and he moved with a surprising nimbleness that hadn't been there before. Curious, I couldn't help but comment.
"Hey, Henry, you're looking lighter on your feet."
Henry's face lit up, a proud grin spreading across his face. "Oh, you noticed, huh?" he said, clearly pleased with himself. "All I did was throw a couple of points into Endurance and one into strength, and boom! It's like I shed a layer of lead. I feel like I could run laps around all of you!"
His enthusiasm was contagious, and soon, the rest of us were chiming in, eager to discuss our own stat distributions.
"Speaking of leveling up," I said, glancing over at Amelia, "how did you distribute your points?"
She paused, thoughtful. "I put four into Intelligence," she said after a moment. "I wanted to boost my powers. But I didn't want to be completely fragile, so I dropped one into Endurance and one into Vitality."
Her answer made sense, and judging by the quiet nods around the group, everyone agreed. She'd clearly thought it through, focusing on enhancing her abilities while making sure she could still take a hit if things got messy.
The conversation naturally flowed from there, drifting into deeper talk about our abilities. And eventually back to the topic of getting to the mountains.
After some time, we decided to move on, pushing through the thinning trees until the forest opened up to a rocky expanse. The terrain shifted, the dense canopy giving way to more open space. The sense of relief was palpable as we realized we had finally found a suitable place to set up camp.
"Let's stop here for the night," Amelia suggested, her voice carrying a bit of fatigue. No one objected. We were all tired, and the idea of rest was too tempting to resist.
The camp came together quickly. Amelia took the first watch while the rest of us set up around the fire. The flames flickered, casting a warm glow on the rocky terrain, illuminating our tired faces. The crackling of the fire added a soothing backdrop to the evening, and I found myself staring into the flames, lost in thought.
Tending the fire, I watched the others settle in around camp.
Ella was helping Emily lay out makeshift bedding. Henry lay on his back nearby, arms folded behind his head, grinning up at the sky like the stars were giving him compliments. He hadn't stopped talking about how fast he felt ever since boosting his stats. Benjamin was already on the move, circling the perimeter in silent routine, checking the shadows for threats before they could find us first.
I stayed close to the fire, poking at the embers with a stick as the flames danced and hissed. The warmth felt good against the creeping cold of the night. The flickering light cast long, shifting shadows across the trees, reminding me that the forest never truly slept.
My gaze dropped to the firewood, but my mind drifted.
If I had these powers back then…
Every fight we'd barely survived replayed in my head. All the close calls. That first desperate run. The ambush in the night. The twinsight bear. Dam, especially the bear. We'd nearly been torn apart by that thing. If I'd had this strength then… that agility… if I could've just done this back then…
I scoffed to myself. It would've been over in half the time.
The image came unbidden: my blade snapping mid-fight, leaving me with nothing to defend myself. But now?
I could summon another without hesitation.
Curious, I shifted in place and held out my hand. The darkness curled and shaped itself with barely a thought, and in moments, a void blade shimmered into existence in my palm, its edge sharp and endless, pulsing faintly with that impossible lack of light.
I turned it slowly in the firelight, watching how the blade drank in the glow instead of reflecting it. My grip tightened.
Can this… actually break?
Gripping both ends, I pressed in, trying to bend it. It flexed easily… too easily. For a moment, disappointment flared in my chest.
Then I froze.
Wait… it bent because I wanted it to.
I blinked, reshaping it in my mind. I need it to be rigid, unyielding, and forged to endure. I gripped both ends again and strained.
Nothing.
The blade didn't give an inch.
I leaned into it, jaw clenched, muscles taut.
Still nothing.
A slow grin tugged at the edge of my lips.
I could work with this.
A soft rustle pulled me from my thoughts.
Looking up I find Ella settling down beside me, curiosity glowing behind her eyes.
"Hey, want to see something cool?" she asked, a sly smile creeping across her face as she pulled her bag onto her lap.
"Sure," I replied, curious as to what she wanted to show. She rummaged through the bag for a moment before pulling out a core and a magnifying glass.
"Here," she said, handing them over to me. "Look at the core closely with this."
I raised an eyebrow but did as she asked, holding the magnifying glass over the core. At first, it just looked like any other core we'd found, glowing faintly with that ethereal light. But then, as I adjusted the glass and focused on its surface, I saw it—tiny, intricate patterns etched into the core's surface, so fine they were almost invisible to the naked eye.
"That's... impressive," I muttered, leaning in to get a better look. The designs were complex, almost like circuitry, but organic in their flow. "What do you think they are?"
Ella's eyes sparkled in the firelight. "That's the question, isn't it? These patterns... they're not random. They're present in all the cores we've found. But the fact that they come from creatures, not something crafted by human hands or even advanced tech, is what makes them so fascinating."
I leaned back, handing her the core and the magnifying glass, staring into the fire as I processed her words. "So, what, you're saying these cores might be some kind of natural code? Something embedded into these creatures?"
"Exactly," she nodded, her tone filled with the thrill of discovery. "What if the cores are more than just power sources? What if they're repositories of knowledge or information? Like, these creatures are carrying around ancient tech, but it's woven into their biology."
The implications were huge. If we could understand the patterns, crack the code, there was no telling what we might unlock. "If we figure it out... who knows what we could learn," I murmured.
"That's the beauty of it, Atlas," Ella said with a soft smile. "If we can just figure out how it all works, I cant imagine what it could do for us."
For a moment, we just sat in silence, the fire crackling between us. The excitement of the discovery lingered in the air, but then my thoughts shifted to something heavier. "Ella," I started cautiously, "how's Emily holding up? After... everything with Owen."
Ella's expression softened as she turned her gaze to the fire, the flickering flames reflected in her eyes. "It's been hard on her. Losing Owen... it hit her harder than I think even she expected. They were close…"
I nodded, feeling a strange detachment when it came to Owen's death. I could see how much it affected the others, but for some reason, it hadn't hit me the same way. Still, I wanted to be there for Emily. "I'll do what I can," I said, my voice quieter than before. "It's tough watching someone you care about go through that kind of loss."
Ella turned to me, her eyes full of understanding. "It is. But sometimes, just being there is enough."
I nodded, letting her words settle. The heaviness between us slowly gave way to lighter talk, the kind that drifts and fades with the crackle of the fire. Before long, the camp quieted into a peaceful night. One by one, everyone found their spots to rest, the flames dwindling to a bed of glowing embers. As I lay on my makeshift bedroll, I couldn't help but fidget with my powers, conjuring a small black orb in my hand, its fluid texture shifting with the void.
With a flick of thought, I shaped it into different forms—a pan, a bat, a knife. The ease with which the void responded to my will was both fascinating and a little unsettling. It felt like it had been with me forever, like an old habit. I chuckled quietly to myself, wondering if I could cook with it, conjuring my own kitchen tools when necessary.
But my playful thoughts were interrupted by a sudden glimmer in the sky. I froze, my gaze fixed upward as a streak of light tore across the sky in what looked to be an asteroid, or something like it, blazing through the darkness, fiery and bright, its trail lingering long after it passed.
I sat up straighter, eyes fixed on the streak of light cutting across the night sky. For a moment, I was caught in its beauty.
But something was wrong.
It didn't burn out.
The meteor kept falling, disappearing behind the tree line without so much as a flicker. My pulse quickened. I shifted, trying to follow it, but soon lost track of it just beyond the trees.
Then, a couple of seconds later, the ground beneath me shuddered.
Not a violent quake. Just enough to feel it in my bones.
I stared into the dark where the light had vanished, my mind racing.
Hu…It didn't burn up. That's rare.
On Earth, it would've been unusual. But in the end, this wasn't Earth.