Chapter 1: Unlicensed
The air in the Dregs always smelled of wet metal and decay. Kaelin moved through the shadows, her threadbare coat pulled tight. In her pocket, a single raw beast crystal hummed against her leg, its unstable energy a constant itch in her mind.
Her System flickered at the edge of her vision, a transparent blue interface only she could see.
[Surroundings: Nominal]
[Threats: None Detected]
It was a lie. The System was still learning.
Boots echoed on the grille-walk above. Heavy, synchronized. Enforcer boots.
She ducked behind a rusted coolant pipe, heart hammering. They weren't usually this deep in the Dregs unless they were hunting something. Or someone.
"Scan the sector," a voice filtered through a helmet comm. "Energy spike traced here. Could be an Unlicensed manifestation."
Manifestation. The clean word for a person using an Ability they weren't born into one of the Four Families to have. A death sentence.
The crystal in her pocket flared hotter. Yesterday, starving and desperate, she'd used a sliver of its power to mend a broken lock. She'd been careful. She thought.
A red beam of light swept across the alley, inches from her feet. Her System blinked, recalibrating.
[Threats: 4 Units. Class: City Enforcers.][
[Weapons:Standard-Issue Kinetic Rifles.][
[Recommended Action:Evasion.]
No kidding, she thought.
She bolted.
"Contact! Dregs-ward, now!"
Shouts. The hiss-crack of a kinetic round smashing into piping where her head had been. Steam burst, filling the alley with a screaming white cloud. She ran blind, her System painting a shaky wireframe map of the obstacles ahead based on some pre-fall database. It was glitchy, but it was all she had.
Another turn. A dead end. A high wall, slick with algae.
"End of the line, Unlicensed." Two Enforcers rounded the corner, rifles raised. Their polished black armor bore the crest of the Ironblood Family a fist gripping a lightning bolt.
Kaelin's back hit the wall. The crystal was burning now, a frantic pulse. Her System scrolled with frantic, panicked text.
[Crisis Protocol: Engage?]
[Ability-1: Energy Manipulation – Available.]
[Ability-2: –ERROR– Data Incomplete.][
[Warning:Dual-core activation may cause systemic cascade.]
Two Abilities. The impossible secret that had gotten her mother killed. She'd never tried the second. Didn't even know what it was.
She raised her hands, energy crackling at her fingertips. The Enforcers didn't flinch.
"Wild talent. Pity." One of them leveled his rifle. "Orders are cleanse on sight."
A deafening BOOM shook the alley from above. A chunk of the wall to their left exploded. Not from a kinetic round. From something heavier.
A figure dropped from the rooftop, landing in a crouch between Kaelin and the Enforcers. He wore scavenged leathers, not armor. A red bandana was tied around his upper arm, stamped with the rough symbol of a bull's head.
"Red Bull!" an Enforcer snarled.
The newcomer stood. He was young, maybe Kaelin's age, with sharp eyes that took in the scene in a millisecond. He didn't look at her.
"You boys are far from your shiny towers," he said, his voice calm.
He moved.
It was a blur. A punch infused with something that made the air warp. The first Enforcer's helmet crumpled. The second fired, but the rebel was already inside his guard, a brutal elbow shattering his rifle's power cell. The resulting blast threw both Enforcers back.
The rebel Saba, his name came to her System in a flicker of intercepted comms turned. For a second, his eyes met Kaelin's. He saw the fading energy around her hands. Saw her fear.
"You're not one of mine," he stated.
She couldn't speak.
He jerked his head toward a blown-open hole in the wall. "That way. Three lefts, then up the fire escapes. Gets you to the mid-levels. Run. They'll send more."
He was already turning back to the stunned Enforcers, pulling a crude, crystal-charged stunner from his belt.
Kaelin ran. She didn't look back. She took the alleys, the rusted ladders, her System guiding her with cold efficiency until the shouts and the smell of ozone faded.
She collapsed in a dank stairwell in the Warrens, her breath sobbing in her lungs. The crystal had cooled. Her System's alert was blinking.
[New Data Logged: Combat Styles.][
[New Data Logged:Rebel Faction 'Red Bull' Identified.][
[Status:Survival Probability Increased.]
And underneath it, another line, faint, as if her System was ashamed to show it.
[Ability-2: Status… Available.][
[Designation:UNKNOWN.]
She pushed herself up, trembling. Tomorrow was Admission Day. The mandatory test for every 17-year-old in the city. The day the Academy would scan her, taste her potential, and assign her a licensed future or mark her for culling.
They would only find one Ability. They had to. She would make sure of it.
She had to survive. Even if it meant walking into the lion's den.