The sound came first—a deep, resonant tremor that seemed to hum through the bones of the city. Then came the light.
Through the cracks in the emergency shutters, violet fire slashed across the skyline. The ground lurched as though the world itself had flinched. Sirens bled through every building; the polished serenity of New Avon shattered into chaos.
Briar stumbled down the stairwell with Dr. Solis close behind. The air vibrated, filled with static and the sharp taste of ozone. "What's happening?" he shouted.
Solis didn't answer. He was staring at the Pulse on his wrist—its display had turned crimson.
The tower shook again. Above them, the reinforced glass ceiling of the dorm atrium imploded, raining shards like a storm of diamonds. A car spiraled past, screaming metal and fire.
Solis grabbed Briar by the shoulder. "Shelter's on the sub-level! Move!"
They ran. The corridor blurred—cadets, teachers, civilians flooding toward the lifts. Every few seconds the world pulsed violet, followed by the hollow thud of distant impacts. The air shimmered with unstable aether energy.
"Dr. Solis!" a guard yelled from the checkpoint ahead. "Dome shields are failing! We've got breaches on the upper tiers—"
He never finished. A beam of light—pure and narrow—tore through the wall, vaporizing him mid-sentence. Briar froze as dust and smoke replaced a man.
"Keep moving!" Solis dragged him into the service elevator. The doors hissed shut just as another blast ripped the corridor apart.
They descended in silence, the only sound the rhythmic pounding of Briar's heart. His hands trembled. He'd seen footage of the ion War, had grown up on holograms and lectures. But the real thing was beyond imagining—too fast, too bright, too final.
When the doors opened, the world below was no better. The sub-level was a maze of emergency lighting and screaming voices. Soldiers of the Crimson Order were arming up—rifles glowing with blue cores, armor flickering as defense fields activated.
Solis shoved a hand through his hair, scanning the chaos. "Command center?"
"Two corridors down," someone shouted.
Briar caught sight of himself in a polished panel—soot on his cheek, eyes wide and hollow. He looked like a stranger.
Then the floor quivered again. Dust rained from the ceiling.
Solis turned toward the tremor. "They're not just bombarding the city," he whispered. "They're landing."
Outside, New Avon burned.
The once-silver towers were black silhouettes against a sky pulsing with violet fire. Ships the size of continents hovered above the clouds, their undersides crawling with light. They moved like living things—slow, deliberate, unstoppable. From their bellies descended smaller craft, black shards that stabbed downward through the storm.
The city's defense drones swarmed in response, a cloud of blue sparks racing to intercept. For a moment the night became a canvas of light—beams crossing, plasma detonations painting the air in ultraviolet streaks. Then, one by one, the drones blinked out.
The ions had returned.
Inside the command center, the air was thick with orders, static, and fear. Screens displayed grainy feeds of the invasion. Entire sectors were dark.
Solis keyed into the nearest console. "We need to reach Central Spire. If we can activate the Genesis Contingency, we might have a chance."
Briar frowned. "The Genesis what?"
Solis hesitated. "A failsafe. A new strain of the Genesis drug. Meant for… the next generation."
Briar's stomach turned. "Children."
"Anyone young enough to survive the bonding."
"You mean the last one wasn't enough?"
Solis met his gaze. "The last one bought us peace. Not safety."
A tremor rattled the floor again. The lights flickered, then stabilized.
Lyra burst into the room, her hair a wild halo of static. "Briar! You're alive!" She ran to him, gripping his arm. "Half the Academy's gone. Kael's leading evac on the north platforms."
Solis snapped his fingers to get their attention. "The two of you—with me. If we can reach the Spire, we can transmit the emergency signal to all defense networks. The orbital fleet's still operational; we just need to hold the uplink."
They sprinted through the service corridors. Sirens wailed above like dying animals. The air smelled of plasma and burnt metal.
Briar's pulse thudded in his ears. Every explosion shook the city's bones.
Ahead, the hallway opened onto a transport dock. Dozens of survivors crowded the platform, trying to cram into grav-shuttles. A plasma blast hit the upper structure, showering the area with molten debris. The crowd panicked.
Solis pointed to a smaller shuttle at the far end. "That one's still powered! Go!"
Lyra went first, using her light control instinctively—radiant bursts deflecting debris, dazzling the panicked civilians long enough to clear a path. Briar followed, helping pull a wounded soldier to his feet.
The ship's interior was cramped, flickering with red emergency lights. Solis took the pilot seat, hands flying over the controls. "Hold on!"
The shuttle rose sharply, breaking from the dock just as another explosion consumed the platform below. Through the viewport, the destruction of New Avon stretched endlessly—towers collapsing like glass, the Spire of Concord shrouded in smoke.
"Transmission link?" Lyra asked.
"Offline," Solis said. "They're jamming everything."
Briar looked up—and froze.
A massive silhouette blotted out the stars. It was the same ship he'd seen hours ago, its surface crawling with violet lines of energy. For a moment, the entire city glowed under its shadow.
Then the ship opened fire.
The blast hit a nearby tower; the shockwave rolled over them like a hurricane. The shuttle spun violently, alarms shrieking. Briar was thrown against the bulkhead. He saw Lyra's hand reaching for him, then darkness swallowed everything.
When consciousness returned, it came with the taste of blood.
He was on the floor, half-buried under wreckage. The shuttle's hull had split open, revealing the burning remains of a city below. Violet storms raged across the skyline.
"Lyra…" he coughed, pushing debris aside. She was there, slumped against the console but breathing. Solis was nowhere in sight.
Outside, heavy footsteps echoed—a sound too precise, too rhythmic to be human.
Briar crawled to the viewport. Through the shattered glass, he saw them.
ions.
They moved through the wreckage with an elegance that defied the chaos. Tall, lithe, armored as if sculpted from obsidian. Their eyes glowed with cold silver fire. One of them stopped, raising its head as if sensing him.
Its gaze locked onto the shuttle.
Briar's breath caught. His hand went to his wrist, to the dark Pulse—useless.
The ion stepped forward, each movement silent and deliberate. Energy coiled around its arm, forming a blade of violet plasma.
Briar backed away, grabbing a shattered piece of metal from the floor. The air around him vibrated as the ion drew closer.
"Lyra," he whispered. "Wake up…"
The alien reached the hull and tore it open as easily as paper. It stepped inside, its voice a resonant echo. "Human…" The word was almost musical. "Your kind still clings to existence."
It raised the blade.
Briar swung wildly—metal against energy. The clash threw sparks, and the force sent him sprawling.
The ion tilted its head. "Weak."
And then, from nowhere, a blast of golden light erupted. Lyra's hand, trembling but alive, flared with power. The beam struck the ion square in the chest, throwing it backward through the wreckage.
Briar stared as she collapsed beside him, gasping. "Run…" she managed.
The ground beneath them buckled. The shuttle, half-suspended over the edge of a ruined platform, began to slide. Briar grabbed Lyra and pulled her toward the opening. The ion was already recovering, rising with a snarl of fury.
He didn't think. He leapt.
They fell through smoke and light, wind howling past them. For an instant, the city looked like the end of the world—towers falling, the sky burning crimson and violet.
And then they hit water.
Briar's world became sound and pressure and cold. He dragged Lyra to the surface, coughing, lungs on fire. Around them, the canals of New Avon glowed with reflected flame.
In the distance, the Spire of Concord cracked down its center, its lights dying one by one.
Briar clung to a floating piece of debris, pulling Lyra close. "We're not dying here," he said through chattering teeth.
Above, the sky split again—violet energy folding in on itself like a wound reopening. More ships emerged from the clouds. Dozens of them.
The invasion had only begun.