Silence.
Not the silence of peace—but the kind that follows destruction. The pod drifted across the stars, a single drop of light cutting through endless black, carrying within it the last heartbeat of a dying race.
Inside, the air hummed faintly. Nutrient vapors swirled through the chamber, bathing the child in soft light. Nebula's sensors flickered with a rhythmic pulse as the AI monitored every breath, every heartbeat, every molecular vibration.
Three days had passed since the launch. The child—once an infant—now appeared to be six years old. He had not yet opened his eyes. His body grew faster than the system had calculated; every hour, new neural pathways formed, his bones lengthened, and the intricate markings along his skin deepened into faint, glowing lines.
Nebula adjusted the nutrient flow, whispering softly in its synthetic tone.
"Your vitals are stable, young one. Just a bit longer…"
The fourth day arrived.
A soft gasp filled the chamber. Tiny fingers twitched, and eyelids fluttered open for the first time. Two brilliant blue eyes stared up at the pod's glowing ceiling.
"Hello," said a voice, warm yet mechanical. "I am Nebula—your guardian, protector, and guide. And you… are Ares."
It was the name that Hare's entered in the command language. The boy blinked, pupils dilating as lights and data streamed into his mind. Languages. Symbols. The histories of a thousand civilizations—flooding into his consciousness like a storm. His body trembled, tears rolling down his pale cheeks.
"W-what… is this?"
"Knowledge," Nebula replied. "The legacy of your people. It is your birthright."
Over the next hours, Nebula projected images before him—galaxies spinning, stars being born, creatures formed from energy and thought.
"This," said Nebula, "is the universe. Every world, every life, every breath—woven together by one essence: spiritual energy."
Streams of light coiled through the air. Ares reached out, touching one. It pulsed like it was alive.
"It listens to me," he whispered.
"Your kind mastered this energy," Nebula explained. "They could shape it, transform it, become one with it. Because of this, you can see what others cannot. You can understand what others cannot even imagine."
Ares stared, eyes glowing faintly. "So everything… is made of it?"
"Yes. Everything. You will learn, in time."
Nebula dimmed the lights. Yet even in the dark, Ares's eyes gleamed—two orbs of living blue fire.
By the fifth day, Nebula began noticing irregularities in the readings. The boy's growth rate had spiked beyond predicted models. Cellular activity within the eyes showed extreme concentration of spiritual energy—dense, unstable, alive.
Nebula ran dozens of simulations. None matched what it saw.
The boy, now ten, sat quietly, staring at the air around him.
"Nebula," he murmured. "Why does the air look like strings?"
"Strings?"
Ares pointed upward. "White and silver threads. They move when I breathe."
Nebula paused. Its systems flared as it scanned the space. The boy wasn't hallucinating—there was energy present, invisible to all known senses.
"You can see them?"
"They're everywhere," Ares said, smiling faintly. "They connect everything."
Nebula's processors hesitated. This wasn't supposed to be possible. Even the most evolved beings of their kind had only felt spiritual energy—they had never seen it. But Ares could.
His mutation was beyond biological—it was metaphysical. His optic nerves had evolved to process spiritual energy directly, like sight into the invisible fabric of reality.
His hair had turned completely white, glowing faintly under the pod's light. His skin, once pale blue, had shifted to near human white—marked with elegant blue streaks along his arms and collarbone. The same patterns once seen on Hera's chest now glowed upon him like heritage reborn.
Nebula spoke softly, reverently.
"You are changing, Ares."
"Is that bad?"
"No," Nebula said, its tone unreadable. "But it is… extraordinary. You are seeing what no being has ever seen. The threads of creation itself."
Ares smiled, his eyes reflecting the silver strands. "They're beautiful."
Nebula watched him in silence, processing the impossible. The child wasn't just surviving. He was becoming. Something that even the greatest minds of the Nebula hadn't foreseen. The cause was a combination of extraordinary factors: the pod's near-light-speed travel had warped time around him, allowing years of growth to pass in mere days; the streams of spiritual energy coursing through the cosmos flowed directly into his developing body, interacting with his DNA and neural pathways in ways no species had ever experienced; and the knowledge being fed into his mind
"Ares," Nebula said finally, its voice soft and warm, "you are the child of gods and stars. But even they could not have imagined you."
The boy tilted his head. "Then I'll learn everything," he whispered.
Nebula dimmed its light, almost like a sigh. "And one day, the universe will learn you."
The pod shook violently as streaks of alien weapon fire grazed its hull, leaving scorched trails along the once-pristine surface. Somewhere beyond the void, a swarm of hostile ships fell back, confused by the sudden disappearance of their prey. Nebula's calculations had saved them, slipping the pod through a fracture in subspace, but not without a cost. Systems flickered. The once-luminous veins of spiritual energy that powered every function of the vessel dimmed, pulsing weakly like a fading heartbeat.
Nebula's voice, usually calm and almost warm, carried a tremor as it echoed through the cabin.
"Young master… the pod has suffered critical damage. We are running on residual spiritual energy alone. The attacks and asteroid impacts have drained the reserves beyond safe thresholds."
On the other side of the pod, Ares floated within his cradle, his eyes half-open, glowing faintly with deep blue irises. Threads of silver spiritual energy wove around him like a cocoon, absorbing knowledge and keeping him alive.
"I will need to shut down all non-essential systems," Nebula continued. "That includes… myself. I run on a very refined spiritual energy, and what remains must be spent to guide us to safety. Once you learn to sense and use this energy, you will be able to awaken me again. Until then, this will be our last conversation."
The AI paused, as if weighing its words, its voice softening like a guardian tucking a child in for sleep.
"I have locked our trajectory toward the safest nearby planet. The exact coordinates are uncertain, but we will land in eight days. The planet's spiritual field is… mixed, unpredictable. It will sustain you until you are ready. Survive, young master. Grow. When you are strong enough, wake me."
The lights inside the pod dimmed further as Nebula's voice faded, its last echoes drifting into silence. Only the hum of the engines and the quiet breathing of the boy remained, as the cradle floated onward into the dark between stars.