Talon Gray moved through the ruins like someone who'd forgotten what safety felt like. The broken city stretched around him in jagged silhouettes, each collapsed tower leaning like a warning finger pointed at the sky. The air tasted like dust and old metal. Even the wind seemed tired of passing through this place.
He pulled his jacket tighter, though it barely helped. The fabric was so thin it might as well have been a memory of warmth. Hunger gnawed at him with the persistence of an old enemy. He couldn't remember his last real meal. Yesterday? The day before? Time blurred when your stomach was empty and the world had stopped caring.
He ducked under a fallen beam and slipped into the overturned transport truck he'd been using as shelter. The metal creaked under his weight, complaining like it had one foot in the grave. Talon crouched low, listening.
Silence.
Not peaceful silence — the kind that makes you feel like the world is holding its breath, waiting for something to go wrong.
He sat with his back against the cold wall of the truck. His breath fogged in the air, curling like smoke from a dying fire. He rubbed his hands together, trying to coax warmth into them. It didn't work.
A faint crunch echoed outside.
Talon's eyes snapped open.
Footsteps.
Slow. Deliberate. Not scavengers. Not desperate. Someone who walked like they belonged here — which made no sense, because no one belonged here.
The steps stopped right outside the truck.
"Talon Gray."
His heart slammed against his ribs. Hearing your name in a dead city feels like someone pulling back a curtain you didn't know was there.
He pressed himself deeper into the shadows, but the figure crouched down and looked inside. A hood covered most of their face, but their voice carried a strange calm — the kind that made you feel seen whether you wanted to be or not.
"You look rough."
Talon didn't answer. Words felt dangerous.
The figure reached into their coat and pulled out something small. A pendant. Dark, smooth, shaped like a shard chipped from the night sky itself. It pulsed faintly, like it had a heartbeat.
Talon stared at it. Something deep in him stirred — recognition without memory.
The figure held it out. "This belongs to you."
Talon shook his head. "I don't understand."
"You will."
Before he could ask anything else, a deep rumble rolled through the ruins. The ground trembled. Dust drifted from the truck's ceiling like falling ash.
The figure tensed. "We need to move."
Talon tried to stand, but his legs buckled. Hunger and exhaustion dragged him down like invisible hands. The world tilted.
A shadow moved at the edge of his vision — large, fast, wrong.
The pendant pulsed.
Darkness rippled around him, cold and sharp, like someone had sliced open the air. The world snapped out of focus.
Everything went black.
—
Warmth.
Talon woke to it like someone waking from a lifetime of winter. He blinked up at a ceiling he didn't recognize — smooth metal panels, soft lights, no cracks, no dust. A blanket covered him. Heavy. Clean. Too soft to be real.
He sat up slowly, half expecting the world to vanish if he moved too fast.
A crest was stitched into the blanket: a circle divided into four sections, each marked with a different symbol. He'd seen it before, on posters half‑buried in rubble.
The Academy.
A knock sounded at the door.
"Recruit Gray," a voice called. "Report for system evaluation."
System evaluation.
The words hit him like cold water. He didn't have a system. He barely had a life.
The door slid open. An instructor stood there — tall, uniform crisp, expression carved from stone.
"Move."
Talon climbed out of the bed. His legs were shaky, but he followed the instructor down a long hallway. The walls glowed softly. Recruits passed them, some whispering, some adjusting their uniforms, all of them looking like they belonged more than he did.
They reached a wide room filled with scanning platforms. Recruits lined up, stepping onto the platforms one by one.
A girl with silver hair.
SCAN COMPLETE.
CORE: ICE.
ENERGY SIGNATURE: CRYSTAL MANIPULATION.
A boy with broad shoulders.
SCAN COMPLETE.
CORE: EARTH.
ENERGY SIGNATURE: TERRAIN SHIFT.
Another recruit.
SCAN COMPLETE.
CORE: FIRE.
ENERGY SIGNATURE: IGNITION.
Each scan lit up the screens with bright colors and clean labels. Everything neat. Everything categorized.
Then it was Talon's turn.
He stepped onto the platform. The scanner hummed to life. Lines of light traced across his body.
The pendant under his shirt pulsed once.
The scanner flickered.
NO SYSTEM DETECTED.
UNREGISTERED CORE SIGNATURE.
UNCLASSIFIED ENERGY SIGNATURE.
Silence.
Not the polite kind. The kind that makes you feel like the floor just dropped out from under you.
Someone whispered, "Tier Four."
Another voice: "Why is he even here?"
The instructor sighed. "Gray, Talon. Tier Four."
Talon stepped off the platform, chest tight. He walked to the corner of the room, away from the others.
Something cold brushed his palm.
The pendant.
It pulsed again — soft, steady, like it was breathing with him.
Not a dream.
Not an accident.
Something inside him was awake.
—
Orientation blurred by. The instructor droned on about the academy structure:
Tier One: elite.
Tier Two: strong.
Tier Three: average.
Tier Four: lowest ranked.
Talon sat alone at the end of a row. The pendant warmed against his skin, like it was listening.
He didn't know what it wanted.
He didn't know what he was anymore.
—
The mess hall was loud. Recruits bragged about their cores, their signatures, their training assignments. Talon sat alone with a bowl of thin soup that tasted like disappointment.
A group of Tier Two recruits walked past.
"That's him," one whispered.
"No core."
"Why'd they even bring him here?"
Talon kept eating.
The pendant pulsed once beneath his shirt.
—
Training began the next morning.
Recruits lined up in the yard. Instructors called out names, pairing students for sparring.
Talon stood at the edge of the group, unchosen, unnoticed.
He hoped he could stay invisible.
But Rowan Hale — top of Tier One, sharp‑eyed, confident — pointed straight at him.
"You," Rowan said. "Tier Four. Let's see what you've got."
Talon stepped into the ring. His heart pounded. He raised his hands, unsure of what he was even defending himself with.
Rowan moved first.
Wind gathered around his arm. He struck. Talon dodged the first blow, but the second hit his shoulder. The third sent him stumbling.
The crowd laughed.
Someone clapped mockingly.
Talon pushed himself up.
Rowan stepped forward again.
The pendant pulsed.
A shadow strand flickered from Talon's hand — thin, unstable, barely visible. It snapped outward, blocking Rowan's strike for a split second before fading.
Rowan froze.
"What was that?"
Talon didn't answer.
He didn't know.
The match ended with Talon on the ground, bruised and breathless. Rowan walked away, but he kept glancing back, thoughtful.
Talon sat up slowly.
The pendant pulsed again.
A shadow strand curled around his fingers before fading.
Something inside him was awake.
And it wasn't going back to sleep.
---