The sun should not exist here.
That's the first thing he notices.
The forest beyond the Academy is always drowned in cloud cover—permanent dusk, engineered climate shields humming invisibly above the treetops. The air is usually damp. Heavy. Quiet.
But today the sky is violently blue.
The light is wrong.
Too sharp. Too clean. Too alive.
And Lyra is burning.
She collapses against him beneath the skeletal shadow of an oak tree, her fingers clawing into his coat. Smoke curls from the exposed skin of her cheek where sunlight slices through the leaves. At first the scent is faint.
Then it isn't.
"Mars—"
Her voice fractures, splintering into the air.
He catches her before she strikes the forest floor. Warm blood floods his hands.
Bullet wound.
Right side. High.
Not immediately fatal.
If treated.
If they survive.
Across the clearing, six men in black tactical armor emerge from the darker treeline. Human. Heartbeats rapid. Formation disciplined. Sunlight flashes along the edges of modified rifles.
Behind them, mounted between two reinforced steel cases, a humming device pulses upward into the sky—a rotating prism array scattering artificial sunlight through thinning clouds.
They brought the sun with them.
Lyra's skin blisters wherever the light touches. Red creeps along her collarbone like spreading ink. Her breath grows shallow.
"Mars," she whispers again.
This time, it isn't fear in her voice.
It's warning.
He shifts them deeper into shadow. Calculates distance. Wind direction. Six shooters. Elevated ridge behind them. No clear escape route without crossing exposure.
His breathing remains steady.
Too steady.
The men advance.
"Target is weakened," one mutters into his comm. "Secondary target compromised."
Secondary.
Mars' jaw tightens.
At the edges of the clearing, dark figures gather.
Ghosts.
They bleed through the trees like mist—translucent silhouettes, pale faces split by curious smiles. Some hang upside down from branches. Some crawl across the forest floor without disturbing a single leaf.
They are watching.
They are always watching.
One drifts closer, its voice sliding like cold fingers across his spine.
They're going to take you apart.
Another giggles. We like this one.
Lyra trembles in his arms. Sunlight catches her hand.
It begins to char.
Mars presses her against his chest, shielding her with his body.
"Don't," she breathes.
He doesn't know if she means don't move—
or don't become something else.
Don't become him.
The gunmen raise their rifles.
"On my mark—"
The ghosts fall silent.
All at once.
As if something deeper in the forest has inhaled.
Mars feels it.
A shift.
A door inside his mind creaking open.
Finally, a voice murmurs behind his thoughts—calm, cold, patient.
I will not die here.
His vision narrows.
The sunlight flickers.
The world tilts—
And everything goes black.