—Sir, I don't recall Headquarters notifying us about sending a private transport to escort you —Omega's voice resonated directly in Dorian's cerebral cortex, as crisp as if someone were whispering in his ear in an empty room.
Dorian narrowed his eyes, observing the imposing metallic structure floating above his terrace, dimming the light of Helion's three suns.
"Hmph, maybe they sent the notification back in prehistoric times," Dorian replied with acrid sarcasm through their internal communication. "Perhaps I should have dug through archives from millennia ago to see if they left me a message among the ancient legends."
Behind him, Nairo stood motionless. His older brother said nothing, but his gaze was heavy—a mixture of relief at the security deployment and a deep concern he couldn't quite hide.
"Young Dorian," a synthetic, authoritative voice emerged from the ship's external speakers, slightly distorted by the high-altitude wind. "Please board."
"Shit…" Dorian muttered to himself. He didn't like being dictated to, especially not in front of his home.
The ship's rear platform began its opening sequence. Metal whirred with a sophisticated hydraulic sound, revealing an interior lined with dark alloys and dim LED lights. Dorian didn't wait for the ramp to touch the ground. He crouched slightly, loading tension into his muscle fibers. Distance wasn't a challenge for his biological capabilities, so he decided not to waste his boots' charge.
He jumped.
His feet touched the metal of the ramp with unnatural delicacy. No thunderous sound, no vibration, no echo. It was as if a sponge had fallen from a skyscraper—a ghostly landing that defied the laws of inertia. As soon as his boots were inside, the hatch sealed hermetically, shutting out the outside world.
Dorian slumped into one of the polymer seats, crossing his legs with annoyance.
"How strange. I thought the other team members would already be here. Apparently, I'm the first… or the only one they decided to pick up personally," he thought, feeling the slight pull of acceleration.
"What a nuisance. Those Council people always do whatever they feel like," he said aloud, letting his voice bounce off the sterile cabin walls.
"Perhaps they considered this method the most efficient to avoid delays, Sir," Omega interjected.
"Well said: they thought it was better," Dorian retorted, his tone bordering on hostility.
"Still, what difference does it make?" Omega continued, trying to soothe its bearer's temperament. "It's not like we're going to that place alone, anyway."
Dorian exhaled a long sigh, closing his eyes as the ship cut through the atmosphere.
"Veridia," he murmured. The name of their destination weighed on his tongue like lead.
A few minutes of absolute silence passed.
"Young Dorian, we'll arrive at Headquarters shortly," the pilot announced through the intercom.
"Sir, we're already over the coordinates," Omega confirmed a minute later. "Just need to initiate the vertical landing maneuver."
Dorian stood up, adjusting his onyx trench coat. He could have ordered Omega to hack the system and force the hatch open, but he didn't want to waste breath giving explanations to security officers afterward. He walked to the cockpit and knocked on the dividing panel.
"Open the rear platform again," he ordered the pilot.
The man at the controls turned his head, stunned.
"What?! You want to disembark from here? We're still at deployment altitude!"
Dorian gave him a smile. A "good boy" smile that, beneath the surface, distilled a wild and dangerous arrogance.
"Yes. Open it."
The pilot swallowed. He had seen many warriors, but there was something in that young man's green eyes that allowed no argument.
"Alright…" he murmured, flipping the switch. "These youngsters nowadays are insane… but, after all, he is a Sun warrior."
The metal split apart once more. The blinding light of Helion's three suns flooded the cabin, striking Dorian's face with familiar warmth. This wasn't the central headquarters where he'd received his medal; this was a high-security branch, a cutting-edge circular structure isolated from urban chaos, surrounded by an abyss of clouds and wind.
The landing platform looked tiny, hundreds of meters below.
"I should make an epic entrance, don't you think?" Dorian thought, as the hurricane wind danced through his black and orange locks.
"Sir, does this remind you of something?" Omega asked, with a hint of calculation in its tone.
"If you're talking about the Mockingbird Swarm…" Dorian paused, gazing into the void. "Then yes. It's exactly the same."
Without a shred of doubt, he extended his left foot over the edge and let gravity claim him.
The trench coat spread behind him like the wings of a mechanical crow. But Dorian didn't trust his life to the alloy fabric. The instant his falling speed increased, an aura of electric blue began to envelop his feet. There was no conventional technological activation; no "safety cradle," no emergency braking protocols.
The cyan light flowed upward, covering his entire body in a torrent of pure energy. His hair now pointed toward the sky as he plummeted headfirst toward the platform.
Dorian felt every nerve ending, every tissue, every drop of blood pumping at a different frequency. The air, compressed by the speed and weight of his descent, roared around him—but it wasn't the wind holding him aloft.
It wasn't advanced technology gleaming in his eyes as the ground rushed up at a suicidal speed.
It was Helion in its fullest glory. The energy of a star flowing through the veins of a man.