10 Years Later.
The girl who had trembled in the maintenance closet was gone. In her place stood an attractive young woman of twenty, her hair pulled back into a clinical, tight knot so severe it seemed to pull the very expression from her face. Her white medical tunic was crisp, devoid of the grease stains that had defined her childhood, and her face was a mask of practiced indifference. To the world of the Orbit, Evelyn Harper was the crown jewel of the Academy, the top medical officer of the Eradication Initiative and a loyal daughter of the machine.
Inside, however, the "glitches" had become a symphony.
She stood in the Sector 7 residential bay, a place that had aged far more rapidly than its inhabitants. The walls, once a proud, sterile white, were now jaundiced and streaked with the weeping condensation of failing pipes. She was watching her father, Thomas Harper, who had become a shadow of the man he had once been. He sat in a chair bolted to the floor, his frame skeletal and hunched. His hands, once strong enough to wrench open pressurized doors and manipulate the heavy gears of the oxygen scrubbers, now shook with a rhythmic, neurological tremor as he tried to adjust the oxygen intake on his personal respirator.
"The air is thinner today, Evie," Thomas wheezed, his voice sounding like dry leaves skittering over rusted metal. Each breath was a visible struggle, a desperate negotiation with the failing life-support grid. "The scrubbers in Sector 7... they're failing. I can smell the CO2 buildup. It's sweet, like rotting fruit. Vane isn't fixing them. He's letting the lower tiers suffocate."
Evelyn knelt beside him, her movements precise and clinical. She checked the digital readout on his wrist monitor. His saturation levels were dipping into the dangerous blues. "He's diverting resources to the 'Return,' Dad," she said, her voice hollow, echoing the professional detachment she had to maintain even here. She reached out, her gloved fingers checking the seals on his mask, ensuring the pressurized seal hadn't been compromised by his trembling hands. "He says the Orbit is running out of time. That the structural integrity of the outer rings is degrading. He claims Earth is the only way forward for the species."
"It's a lie," Thomas whispered, his hand suddenly darting out to clutch her forearm. His skin felt like cold, translucent plastic, thin enough to see the sluggish crawl of his blood beneath. "He doesn't want to save us. He wants to strip the world of whatever is left and move on. He's a locust, Evelyn. He spent ten years turning you into his finest instrument. Don't let him use you to finish what the Great Collapse started."
The public murmurs had turned into a dull roar over the last decade. The "Purity through Technology" philosophy was crumbling under the weight of reality. People were tired, exhausted by the recycled water that tasted of iron and ancient pipes, the artificial light that never felt warm on the skin, and the constant, looming threat of "Recycling" for anyone whose body could no longer keep pace with the station's demands. The promise of Earth, of real air, real soil, and a sun that didn't come through a filter; was being dangled like a carrot by Vane's propaganda machine to keep the masses from rioting as their oxygen was rationed.
"I don't have a choice," Evelyn said, her voice a mere breath. Her eyes drifted to the small, silver crescent scar on her shoulder, hidden beneath the reinforced layers of her officer's uniform. The glow was silent now, dormant under the thick chemical patches she applied every four hours, but the "Tether" was stronger than it had ever been. Time and distance had only served to sharpen the connection.
She could feel Ren. He was no longer the scared boy in the woods; he was a dark, brooding storm in the back of her mind, a presence of raw power and ancient sorrow. He was older now, his heartbeat a steady, heavy drum that she felt in her teeth. He was waiting. He had always been waiting.
The sliding door hissed open, admitting a man who looked like he hadn't slept since the graduation ceremony 2 months prior. Leo had grown into a man with deep, bruised circles under his eyes and a nervous habit of tapping his fingers in rapid binary code against his leg. He had survived Vane's threats by becoming "useful"; a systems architect of such brilliance that the Director couldn't afford to recycle him. By day, he maintained the Orbit's security; by night, he built the backdoors and "Digital Ghosts" that allowed the internal resistance to breathe.
"The transport is prepped," Leo said, his voice tight, his eyes darting toward the security sensor in the corner of the room. He walked over, pretending to check the medical monitors, but his hand brushed Evelyn's shoulder in a silent gesture of solidarity. "Commander Jax is waiting at the hangar. They're loading the heavy ordnance, Evie. Pulse-rifles, incendiary charges, biological containment units. They aren't going down there for a medical assessment. This isn't a mission of mercy. It's a hunt."
Evelyn looked at her father one last time. She saw the fear in his eyes, but also a flicker of the man who had hidden her "glitches" in the dark all those years ago. Then she looked at Leo, whose brilliant mind was the only thing keeping the resistance from being erased. The "Cold World" of the Orbit was dying, gasping its final, metallic breaths, while the "Primal World" below was screaming for blood and justice.
"I'm not going down there to hunt," Evelyn said, her voice finally regaining the spark, the wild resonance that she had buried under a decade of compliance. She stood tall, the clinical mask finally cracking to reveal the sovereign bridge she was born to be. "I'm going down there to find the boy in the dark. I'm going to find the Alpha who has been sharing my heartbeat since I was a child. And if Vane thinks I'm his tool, if he thinks he can use me to pave the way for his harvest, he's forgotten one fundamental thing."
"What's that?" Leo asked, a small, grim smile touching his lips. He knew that tone. It was the tone of a system about to crash.
Evelyn reached into her medical kit, her fingers brushing the specialized dermal-patch she still wore every day; not to hide a sickness, but to contain a power.
"Tools can be used to build," she said, her eyes flashing with a silver light that no artificial lamp could replicate. "But they can also be used to tear everything down. If Vane wants a bridge to the Earth, I'll give him one. But he might not like what comes across it."
She turned and walked out of the residential bay, her boots clicking with a new, purposeful rhythm. As she moved through the sterile, grey corridors toward the hangar, the silver mark on her shoulder began to glow with a fierce, defiant light, burning through the chemical sealants and the fabric of her uniform. The time for hiding was over. The time for compliance was dead.
The Luna was going home, and she was bringing the storm with her.