Helios Gate Station
Harbor Crown District
New Boston, North Atlantic Federation
United Earth Federation
2435 A.D
They decided to divide the workload, each taking a piece of the widening mystery. The bombing was no longer a matter of random terrorism—too precise, too deliberate. Somewhere behind the shattered glass and smoldering halls of the Forum of Light, there was intent. And the key to that intent, Elias believed, began with the man who'd died in the blast: Malcolm Hynes.
Ellira and Naia were assigned to dig into his life—to peel back the layers of politics and policy that surrounded him. Hynes had been more than a negotiator; whispers in the GSA database described him as a liaison between the UEF and the Luminia Enclave, a man who had the ear of both sides. If someone had wanted him dead, it wasn't because of his speech—it was because of what he knew.
Elias took a different path. He would hunt the killer. The attack had been too cleanly executed, and his instincts told him the assassin hadn't left the city. New Boston had gone into full lockdown under Amber Vigil protocol: sky lanes grounded, hover rails suspended, all exits sealed beneath layers of military-grade shielding. The city's usual neon pulse was now muted under emergency curfews, the skyline dimmed by the amber-tinted barriers humming across the perimeter.
Under normal procedure, now that the bombing was classified as an assassination rather than terrorism, the lockdown should have been lifted. GSA would have restored traffic flow and released the citizen sectors from the emergency state. But Elias had made a different call.
He had walked into Director Varrin's office, still wearing the cracked plating of his field armor, the faint scent of ozone clinging to him, and said flatly, "Keep New Boston sealed." His reasoning was simple: if the killer was still here, he wasn't going to let them vanish through the cracks of bureaucracy. Varrin hesitated—locking down an entire city of twenty million came with political fallout—but one look at Elias's eyes, sharp with conviction, made it clear there was no room for debate.
Meanwhile, Naia and Ellira's path led them beyond the city's burning horizon. They would travel east across the TRR Spur line to Auralis Haven—the shining heart of the Luminia Enclave. There, among spires of crystalline alloy and sunlight-filtering domes, lay the headquarters where Malcolm Hynes had worked.
As their transport prepared for departure, the contrast was striking. New Boston stood behind them, shrouded in amber gloom, its sky thick with grounded drones and silent sirens. Ahead lay Auralis Haven, a city of light and order, where human and Luminian architecture wove together in living harmony. The mission ahead wasn't simply about uncovering facts—it was about crossing a threshold between two worlds: one ruled by fear, and the other by the fragile hope of cooperation.
Harbor Crown Arc was the crown jewel of New Boston's lower skyline—a half-moon district built along the gleaming curve of the eastern bay. From above, it looked like a titanium crescent embedded into the shoreline, its inner layers alive with motion and color. Docking spires jutted toward the clouds like polished harpoons, their surfaces wrapped in holographic billboards and kinetic glass panels that shimmered with passing light.
The air here always smelled faintly of salt and ozone—the mingling scents of ocean wind and the pulse of mag-rail engines. Cargo skiffs drifted across the upper lanes while passenger ferries glided through aerial arteries outlined by neon guidance beams. Beneath it all, the ground level never slept. Vendors sold synth-tea and prism fruits to travelers while mechs hauled cargo crates onto freight elevators that descended toward the subterranean bays.
At the heart of it all rose Helios Gate Station—a structure so vast it seemed less like a terminal and more like a vertical city in itself. Its architecture fused human steelwork with Luminian light design: tall arcs of photonic glass intertwined with crystalline buttresses that refracted dawn into spectral rainbows. Streams of people flowed through its layered concourses—commuters, soldiers, gem-traders, and engineers—each moving beneath a canopy of kinetic light that adjusted hue according to the hour.
The TRR Spur Line—Trans-Regional Rail—ran directly beneath Helios Gate's lower decks. Its platforms were vast circular conduits of alloy and plasma rail coils, humming with the soft vibration of Lumenis-powered engines. The Spur was the lifeline of the continent, its primary arteries branching toward Auralis Haven, Solmarch, and Kinshasa's Verdant Belt. When a train departed, the entire station would tremble faintly, and streaks of molten light would chase along the magnetic rails, vanishing into the horizon like comets piercing the sea.
Security checkpoints surrounded the Spur terminals, especially after the Amber Vigil lockdown. Patrol drones floated along the airways, their photonic lenses scanning every passenger. Broadcasts echoed through the vaulted ceilings—soft female voices layered with digital tones—reminding citizens that departures were restricted to government clearance only.
For most travelers, Harbor Crown Arc was a symbol of human progress—where ocean met sky and technology met light. But to those like Elias and his team, it had become something else entirely: a choke point. Every gate, every scanner, every drone was another wall sealing New Boston in amber glass.
And yet, amid that containment, the station remained beautiful—a living monument of humankind's reach for the stars, its domes still reflecting the morning sun like a thousand tiny worlds afloat on the sea.
The transport hub was louder than it should have been under lockdown. Voices overlapped in the vaulted concourses—anxious, tired, impatient. People argued with station officers, waved clearance chips, and begged for permits that no longer mattered. The air shimmered with tension, faintly charged by the hum of security drones that drifted above like watchful wasps.
Naia and Ellira stepped into the main platform corridor, their reflections rippling along the mirrored floor. Even through the crowd, Naia moved with silent focus, her posture straight, her gem prosthetic glinting beneath her coat sleeve with each stride. Ellira followed beside her, eyes wide beneath the soft glow of her Luminis circlet. She had never grown used to the human stations—their sheer density, their noise, the weight of so many emotions pressed together.
"Harbor Crown's different when it's sealed," Naia murmured. "Feels like the city's holding its breath."
Ellira nodded faintly. Above them, a massive screen projected the amber crest of Amber Vigil Protocol. Beneath it scrolled a warning: All outbound transports require GSA authorization. Departures are limited to Priority Clearance Alpha.
Naia slipped her identification card into the holo-kiosk beside the checkpoint. The terminal's light swept over her features, followed by Ellira's, then blinked green. They were cleared—Elias had seen to that before leaving for his own mission.
The platform opened before them like a cathedral of glass and metal. Helios Gate Station was a marvel of both design and purpose—a towering nexus of curved arches where sunlight filtered through photonic domes and broke into cascading spectrums. The TRR Spur Line dominated the lower deck: three immense rails of molten alloy coiled in circular symmetry, each rail pulsing with waves of Lumenis energy.
When the next train arrived, the air pressure shifted. A tremor rippled through the platform as the sleek vessel descended along its mag-rail track. Its body gleamed white and gold, a serpent of compressed light wrapped in kinetic plating. The front visor opened, releasing a plume of condensed mist that danced like starlight in the filtered sun.
Ellira's eyes glowed faintly at the sight.
"Every day I'm amazed by humanity's ingenuity," she whispered, unable to hide the wonder.
Naia smiled slightly. "With a bit of Luminian help. The rail core runs on hybrid flux."
They boarded through a pressure gate, stepping into the translucent corridor. Inside, the hum of the train was soothing, almost musical. The glass walls gave them a panoramic view of Harbor Crown Arc: the spires, the shimmering bay, and the fleets of drones tracing patterns over the amber barrier that sealed the city like a dome of honeyed glass.
As the countdown began, a station voice echoed:
"TRR Spur Line—Auralis Haven route, departing in sixty seconds. All personnel prepare for the compression phase."
Naia looked out at the city she was leaving behind. The horizon was painted gold and orange, yet she felt the weight of unease beneath the beauty. The bombing had fractured more than the Hall of Radiance—it had cracked the fragile trust between species.
"Are you ready?" Naia asked quietly.
Ellira's hands clasped together. "I think so."
The rail ignited. The train launched forward with a sound like thunder folding in on itself. The view of New Boston stretched and warped into streams of light. The Amber Vigil dome shimmered behind them, growing smaller until it became a faint glimmer over the ocean.
Ahead lay Auralis Haven—the radiant heart of the Luminia Enclave, where the dead man's secrets waited.
The hum of the TRR Spur line was steady and hypnotic, a low vibration that seemed to thread through the walls, through their bones. The car's glass corridors pulsed with bands of golden light as the train cut across the Atlantic suborbital tube, a luminous artery linking New Boston to the European Zone. Every few minutes, the lights dimmed, replaced by streaks of blue as the vessel breached one relay zone after another.
Naia sat by the transparent panel, one elbow resting against the armrest as she watched the blurred ribbons of light outside. The world beyond the glass looked unreal—stretched into color, soundless and distant. Across from her, Ellira sat with her hands folded over her lap, gaze flitting between the window and her reflection. She looked composed, almost serene, but the faint flicker in her Luminis crest betrayed the anxiety she was trying to suppress.
Naia noticed it immediately. Her bloodline gem—the Radiant Gem—let her sense the emotional wavelengths of others, subtle hues of feeling woven into their presence. Ellira shimmered in soft pastel flux, the color of restrained nervousness.
"You've never been on the Spur before?" Naia asked lightly, glancing over.
"I have," Ellira said, forcing a small smile. "It's just....with everything that's been happening in New Boston..." Ellira thought of the person she had followed out of the chamber of Oaths before the bomb...something about it still bothered her.
Naia studied her for a moment before replying. "It's not the easiest time to travel, I'll give you that."
Silence followed for a while, filled only by the rhythmic hum of the rail coils. Then Ellira spoke again, voice quieter: "Have you been to the Alpine Enclave before?"
Naia turned her head. Ellira's voice carried that mix of curiosity and caution Luminia often had when asking personal questions.
"Once or twice," Naia said. "My father's stationed there—Field Commander of the Vasselheim military forces. He works closely with the GSA outpost. When I was a kid, he used to bring me along on inspections." She smiled faintly, eyes softening with memory. "I remember the mountains. The air there's different. Clearer… almost musical."
"I go there for school," Ellira said, a hint of pride flickering in her tone.
"Oh?" Naia arched an eyebrow, intrigued. "What kind of school?"
"Zurich Tech University," Ellira said, adjusting a strand of her hair that had come loose. "I wanted to understand human engineering—how your energy systems and lattice grids operate alongside our Luminia flux tech. Integration fascinates me."
Naia's lips curved. "You study tech but end up stuck doing political work. Sounds familiar."
Ellira laughed softly, the sound almost like glass chimes. "It's temporary. I'm technically an envoy-in-training. Marienne is an acquaintance of my… well, you could call her my mother. She recommended me for this internship. Said it would give me 'perspective.'"
Naia leaned back, crossing her legs. "So you're still a student. How old are you?"
"Twenty," Ellira replied.
Naia tilted her head, mildly surprised. "In Earth years?"
Ellira's expression softened, and her gaze fell to the floor. "Yes. I was born here, actually."
The words were simple, but something about the way she said them—the hesitance, the almost guilty tone—made Naia glance at her more closely. She didn't need her gem's perception to feel the weight behind that confession. It was rare to meet a Luminian born on Earth; most who lived here were centuries old, remnants of the Revelation era who had watched humanity's astonishment fade into weary coexistence.
"I see," Naia murmured. "You're one of the few, then. Most of your people born after the Revelation stay within the enclaves. I can't imagine that's easy."
Ellira's shoulders lifted in a quiet shrug. "It's… complicated. Sometimes the older ones treat us like children of a mistake. Others see us as the bridge to the future." She looked out the window, her reflection fractured by streaks of light. "Maybe they're both right."
Naia was silent for a long moment, watching the younger woman's expression. Then she asked, "So why take this internship? You could have stayed in Zurich, focused on your research."
"I wanted to do something that mattered," Ellira said. "To help our people integrate with yours. I thought if I could understand humans better, maybe I could help others understand us, too. Marienne believed in that."
Naia smiled faintly. "You talk like someone twice your age."
Ellira chuckled. "We Luminia age differently, remember?"
"Fair enough," Naia said, a dry note in her voice. She turned her gaze back to the window. "Dynasty-born children like me don't attend universities. We're educated at home by family tutors, raised on politics and gem theory until we can recite the Vasselheim protocols in our sleep. But when I joined the GSA…" She paused, a wistful look crossing her face. "The Academy was the first place that actually felt like a choice. Brutal training, impossible exams—but it was mine."
Ellira listened intently, then asked, "Did you enjoy it?"
Naia gave a small laugh. "Enjoy isn't the word. Survive, maybe. But yes—part of me did."
Outside, the horizon shifted from molten gold to a soft, silvery glow—the color of dawn diffused through high-altitude mist. The train's hum deepened, its rhythm slowing as it prepared to breach the suborbital corridor. The walls trembled with faint pressure ripples, and the light around them grew sharper, cooler—Europe was just ahead.
Ellira watched the change in silence, her reflection wavering across the glass. "It's strange," she murmured after a pause. "A few minutes ago, I thought I might faint from nerves. But now, talking with you, it's like it all just… faded away."
Naia turned her head, studying the Luminian girl's face. The flush in Ellira's cheeks and pointed ear wasn't just from the cabin lights—it was warmth, genuine and human in its honesty.
"I suppose that's what happens when you connect with someone," Naia said softly. "Anxiety doesn't vanish, it just… loses its voice for a while."
She smiled—small, effortless, and real. Ellira blinked, then quickly looked away, embarrassed by how much that smile eased the tightness in her chest. The gesture felt disarming, almost intimate. For the first time since the bombing, she didn't feel like an envoy or a representative of a people under suspicion—she simply felt like herself.
The train shuddered again, the pressure around them releasing with a low hiss. A burst of pale light flooded the compartment as they broke into open air. Clouds scattered beneath them like broken glass on velvet, and beyond the horizon, the Alps gleamed—ridges of white and blue encircling a city that shimmered with living radiance.
Auralis Haven rose ahead like a crown of crystal, its spires refracting sunlight into sweeping arcs of color. Between the peaks, floating rings of photonic glass rotated lazily, casting moving rainbows over the valleys below. To Naia, it looked like a dream carved from light and discipline; to Ellira, it looked like home—distant, beautiful, and heavy with expectation.
****
Elias returned to the Fracture Belt district under the cover of dusk, the fractured skyline still smoldering faintly from the chaos of his last visit. The Orchid Forge lay in ruins—a half-collapsed shell of alloy and glass, its scorched edges glittering faintly in the neon reflections of the industrial sector. The air was heavy with the scent of burnt lumenis and oil.
He stood beside his hoverbike, a matte-black model with glowing blue trims that pulsed softly with idle resonance. The hum of its engine blended with the low throb of nearby reactors. In one hand, he held a vapor tube, drawing in a long breath before exhaling a plume of crystalline vapor that fractured the air into shimmering prisms. The smoke drifted upward, catching the faint crimson light from the district's failing signs.
Elias checked his Lumenpad. The display flickered with data streams and timestamps, the GSA's encrypted network pulsing quietly in the corner. He glanced at the time—past midnight. The city had gone quieter, but the undercurrent of tension in the Fracture Belt was always there, pulsing beneath the noise of machinery.
He had made his choice earlier that day—leaving the Malcolm Hynes investigation to Naia and Elira. It wasn't a matter of trust; it was about containment. He'd seen enough to know the case was turning volatile, and keeping the Luminian diplomat away from the Belt's underbelly was the only sensible move. Naia could handle the politics. Elira… needed to stay out of the crossfire.
He took one last drag from the tube, then crushed it beneath his boot. The ember inside hissed out, scattering faint sparks across the ground.
The sudden whine of a high-frequency engine caught his attention.
From beyond the cracked tram overpass, a hoverbike swept into view—sleek, silver-edged, its thrusters emitting a deep sapphire glow. The machine slowed as it approached, cutting through the thin fog that hung over the district. Elias straightened, eyes narrowing as the rider dismounted.
The man pulled off his helmet, and a cascade of cobalt-blue hair spilled free, catching the stray lights like molten crystal. His eyes—sapphire, sharp and cool—glinted with a faint reptilian sheen as they met Elias's.
Ryn Koras.
Even among GSA specialists, Ryn stood apart. He was tall—nearly seven feet—his physique lean but undeniably powerful, every motion fluid and precise. His black-and-silver GSA mantle was cut close to the body, its edges traced with pale luminescent filaments that pulsed faintly with his internal resonance.
"Ryn," Elias said, his tone somewhere between greeting and relief.
Ryn gave a low nod, his voice calm but gravel-edged. "Vasselheim." His gaze swept over the remnants of the forge, taking in the jagged heat scars and frozen residue from the earlier battle. "You've been busy."
Elias crossed his arms, smirking faintly. "You could say that."
Ryn crouched beside a charred support beam, running his gloved fingers along its surface. A faint trail of blue light flickered beneath his touch—residual tracking resonance activating as he used his powers.
"Still hot," Ryn muttered. "Whoever you fought here left a signature. Faint, but traceable. Good thing I came when I did."
Elias studied him briefly, then asked quietly, "Are you sure you can track it?"
Ryn grinned—a flash of teeth and mischief, gone almost as soon as it appeared. "You know me," he said, voice low and confident. "I can sniff out a resonance trail halfway across the planet."
Elias smirked faintly, eyes shifting toward the distant skyline. The fractured towers of the Fracture Belt shimmered under the smog-dimmed lights, glass and alloy bending in the night haze like the ribs of a dying beast. The city never slept here—only groaned, breathed, and waited. A faint hum filled the air as Ryn crouched, one gloved hand pressed to the scorched metal of the ground.
"Hmm… this is interesting," he muttered. His pupils narrowed, irises brightening into an electric sapphire glow. Then his bifurcated tongue flicked out—quick, serpentine—tasting the air with small, deliberate movements.
Elias didn't interrupt. He'd seen it before, but it never stopped being uncanny—how Ryn's movements walked the line between man and something older. The air around him shimmered faintly as if the atmosphere itself responded to his presence, light bending in waves.
"Catching something?" Elias asked quietly, his gaze locked on Ryn, who remained crouched near the edge of the platform, forked tongue flicking out slowly into the air.
Ryn's eyes narrowed. He tilted his head slightly, as if adjusting his internal resonance to something more precise. "Residual trace. Strange…" he murmured. "There's an anomaly in it. A slight fluctuation in the harmonic rhythm. You said the killer was probably a Luminia, right?"
"Yes," Elias said flatly, his tone edged with certainty.
Ryn's sapphire eyes pulsed once with inner light as he shook his head. "This isn't Luminian energy. This signature—it's human. Human-based resonance. No sign of a Lumenis Core. Whoever killed your bombmaker... wasn't Luminia."
Elias blinked, the words hitting a wall inside his logic. "That can't be," he muttered. "The killer used Flux Style."
His mind replayed the encounter in sharp detail—each fluid motion, each seamless attack. There had been no Facet Arts, no Gem cut delays, no socket-activation lag. Just pure, flowing energy channeled like a living current. It had screamed Luminia.
But then he remembered what Elira had told him—about how humanity had begun to imitate certain Weaving techniques. Barrier Weave. Summoning Weave. Reinforcement Weave. But those were just basic techniques that any low evolutionary tier Gemcrafters can use. The Killler had used none of that, instead using offensive flux style. Controlled. Accelerated. Deadly. And no human should be capable of that.
Elias's voice was low, uncertain. "We haven't even cracked that level of Weave usage. The closest we've come is defensive patterns and support matrices. Nothing that channels raw, destructive output like that. That kind of combat weaving—it's exclusively Luminia. Only a Lumenis Core could handle the internal resonance pressure."
"Well, according to what I'm sensing, it's a human scent. Though there's some oddity about it." Ryn said. "Trust me, I can tell the difference between a human and a Luminia." He rose, straightening his tall frame, the lamplight sliding across the lines of his black-and-silver GSA mantle. The faint luminescence of his skin, normally subtle, pulsed once under the collar—a soft cobalt shimmer that betrayed his Resonant lineage.
Ryn Koras was not human. Not entirely. Centuries of Gem radiation had not only altered mankind—it had rewritten the DNA of life itself. Flora and fauna had absorbed the world's resonance fields, their evolution reshaped by the song of Gems. The creatures born from that transformation became known as Resonant Lifeforms—or simply, Gemcreatures.
Ryn was one of them. A descendant of the Tide Serpent tribes of the Pacific Rim—amphibious, scaled shapeshifters who had adapted to the world's new balance of light and energy. His body still bore traces of that heritage: the faintly scaled texture that glimmered at his throat when the light hit just right, the heightened musculature tuned for hydrodynamic motion, and that bifurcated tongue, which he used not just for taste, but for tracking resonance signatures through trace minerals and ambient humidity.
The Tide Hue Gem embedded in his chest was the source of his power—a living crystal that pulsed in rhythm with his heart, granting him dominion over water resonance. But Ryn's true gift wasn't in combat; it was in his scenting, an ability to detect and decode energy patterns left behind by Gemcrafters, Luminia, and even atmospheric distortions. Now, as he stood over the wreckage of the Orchid Forge, the faint glow of his eyes reflected the rippling residue in the air.
"The killer's trail runs towards the western sector," he said at last, his tone shifting into the sharp cadence of a tracker.
Elias swung a leg over his bike, the engine roaring to life with a burst of gold light.
"Let us go to them," he said, and the two of them tore off into the night—twin streaks of gold and sapphire cutting through the fractured dark of the Belt.