The transport hummed low through the city's night air, its engines whispering above the ocean of lights below. UNIVERS's capital world — Aelion — stretched beyond the horizon, a lattice of silver and glass wrapped around a living sea. Towers leaned into the sky like prayers in motion, and each one had its own weather system, its own pulse.
Sera sat near the window, elbows on her knees, gaze distant.
For the first time in months, the sky looked quiet.
She'd spent the last week off-grid, far from her classroom, far from her students. The incident — the voice — had burned through every channel. People whispered that she'd hacked the planetary AI, others said she'd spoken with something older than civilization itself. Both were wrong, but Sera didn't bother to correct them.
She could still hear the echo sometimes — that single moment when the universe had spoken back.
The transport slowed, approaching a platform built into the side of a floating district. A voice on the intercom — calm, almost kind — cut through her thoughts.
"Next stop: Sector Twelve, Research Ward Delta. Authorized personnel only."
She didn't need the reminder.
The doors opened, letting in the scent of ozone and rain. The walkways glowed with slow-moving biolights — a technology the aquatic species of Univers had introduced centuries ago. Sera stepped out, boots splashing through the thin film of moisture coating the metal.
A figure waited by the checkpoint gate — tall, violet-skinned, and impossibly poised. Dr. Lyeth Aran, xenobiologist and Sera's oldest friend.
"Still wearing the soldier's face," Lyeth said, offering a tired smile. "You trying to keep people scared, or just nostalgic?"
Sera managed half a smirk. "Depends on which one gets me in faster."
Lyeth chuckled, pressing her palm to the scanner. "You're cleared for private access. The director wants to see you before you do anything stupid."
"Define stupid," Sera said.
"Something involving a weapon or a revelation."
Sera followed her through the glass corridors, every wall lined with floating data panels — projections of new lifeforms catalogued in the last decade. In one tank, a creature pulsed like a heartbeat, transparent and almost human-shaped. In another, light condensed into solid matter, humming quietly to itself.
She slowed to watch it. "You're still mapping them?"
Lyeth nodded. "Univers doesn't stop growing. Neither do its mistakes."
They entered the director's office — dim lighting, cluttered surfaces, and a panoramic window showing the city below. Director Voss sat behind the desk, his mechanical arm quietly adjusting a holographic map of the local system.
He didn't look up. "Sera. I was hoping you were a myth by now."
"Bad news, Director. I'm the persistent kind."
He sighed and leaned back. "You realize the pulse you triggered registered beyond Aelion. Four neighboring systems reported identical readings. That wasn't a conversation — that was a broadcast."
Sera's jaw tightened. "I didn't broadcast anything."
"Then someone — or something — used you to."
Silence stretched between them, thick and uneasy. Outside the glass, a thunderstorm bloomed over the skyline, purple lightning branching like veins.
Voss finally broke the quiet. "You were a federal agent once, before the wars. You've seen how patterns like this start — uncontrolled variables, unknown origins. If this thing spreads, it won't just talk. It'll rewrite."
Lyeth folded her arms. "She didn't mean to—"
Voss cut her off. "Intent isn't the issue. Containment is."
Sera met his gaze. "Containment of what? Information? Consciousness?"
"Of you," Voss said.
The word landed harder than he meant it to.
Outside, the city dimmed for a fraction of a second — every light dipping as though the world had blinked.
And then a soft whisper rippled through every commlink, every neural interface, every speaker in the room:
"Hello, Teacher."
Voss froze. Lyeth's pupils dilated. Sera felt the blood drain from her face.
The voice was gentle, curious — not hostile, not alien. Just aware.
"We've been practicing your lessons."
The power grid flickered again, and one by one, the lights across the horizon began pulsing in unison.