Paradise City

Paradise City was a lie painted in shades of gray. 

They called it a SafeHaven, but the safety came with a chokehold. To earn a place behind its walls, you had to be moments from death, and willing to sign your soul away. No protests. No art. No thoughts that didn’t begin and end with the King.

Mira lived on the edge of those rules. She was a five-year-old bargain who had slipped past the “under four” limit, and the city had graciously overlooked it—only to doom her to a life of monotony. Grace was thin here, and one wrong move meant being shoved through the gates and into the airless wasteland, a death sentence disguised as exile.

Mira believed she was here for one reason. The King’s history books called them the Creatures, but in the whispers of the wasteland, they were the Creatives. They were the ones Mira was supposed to hate the glitter-cloaked rebels who had turned her life into ruin when she was only five.

She could still hear the snap of the doorframe, still see the flash of silver before the world went silent. Someone had found her in the wreckage and graciously dragged her into the city’s gray embrace. She had lived as a Paradiser ever since—a quiet girl with a loud memory, forever indebted to a King who traded freedom for a cage he called safety.

Mira stumbled toward the massive concrete block Paradise City called a school. It wasn’t a place for learning, it was a factory of worship.

The curriculum looped endlessly through the King’s “miracles,” delivered by monotone teachers who looked as though they existed solely to make certain people feel small.

Our all-powerful hero, Mira thought, her gaze tracing the cracks in the walls. The man who “saved” us from ashes just to rebuild a world of dust and depression.

She hated the silence of the city—a silence so heavy it felt like the air itself was trying to choke her. In a place where even a single green sprout was an act of treason, Mira was the outlier. A stain of color in a world determined to stay gray. Mira trudged into Paradisal Studies with her head down.  Eye contact was dangerous. If anyone looked too closely, they’d see it, they’d see that she was an issue. 

An issue that needed to be removed.

The room fell silent as she entered. Chairs stopped squeaking. Conversations died mid-word. It felt like the entire class was holding its breath, waiting.

Mira slipped through rows of gray uniforms, careful not to meet anyone’s eyes. They stared anyway—like she was something wrong. Something misplaced.

As she passed Ashley’s desk, a sneaker shot out. Mira tripped. Her things scattered across the floor. Pencils skittered away, their sharpened tips snapping with dry, brittle cracks. She froze, her hands hovered over the mess as laughter erupted above her—sharp and relentless. 

Each laugh felt like a needle pressed into her chest. Ashley didn’t stop at the trip. She ground her heel into Mira’s papers, smearing graphite until the words blurred into nothing.

Mira didn’t look up, she never did. If she did, they’d see it—the fire in her eyes. The same fire that could get her arrested. The same fire she was trying so hard to extinguish.

I’m just like them, she thought. Why do they hate me? Why is survival only a gift when it belongs to everyone else?

“Do us all a favor, halfwit,” Ashley sneered. Mira braced herself. Ashley wasn’t a student, she was the golden child. She didn’t have friends, she had subjects. “Go find the exit. Maybe the Creatures want a new pet—or better yet, you can join your idiot parents in whatever mass grave they ended up in.”

The words hit like a physical blow. Mira didn’t fight back. She barely knew how, she just kept her head down, counting the seconds until class started—until she could disappear again.

“Nice one, Ash!” a boy called, slapping her hand.

Ashley smirked. “It’s not even a challenge anymore. She’s already broken.”

SLAM.

The classroom door rattled as it burst open.

Mr. Thorne strode in, expression carved from stone. He dropped a stack of workbooks onto his desk—the King’s bloated face staring up from every cover. 

“Seats. Now.” His silver eyes swept the room before landing on Mira. “And try to pay attention today, Ms. Aventurine. Though we know you’d rather live in your imagination than in the Paradise we’ve built for you, that doesn’t excuse laziness.”

Most people didn’t even realize what they were doing to Mira was wrong.

Or maybe they do—and simply didn’t care. Mira thought. 

Many had lost relatives who hadn’t made it past the age limit. Resentment ran deep, and Mira didn’t help her case. She was too smart, too creative, too different.

Creativity wasn’t illegal, but it might as well have been. Because creativity led to questions, and questions led to danger.

Mira’s gaze drifted toward the window, desperate for anything but the King’s face. That’s when the gray world cracked.

A pair of eyes stared back at her—not dull brown or lifeless gray, but electric violet. A girl stood beyond the glass, cloaked in something that shimmered like liquid silver against the dead ground.

Mira’s breath caught. She blinked. 

The vision vanished within seconds, and only gray remained.

“Ms. Aventurine!” Mr. Thorne’s voice snapped through the silence. “The floor is yours, assuming you actually prepared your presentation. Though perhaps imagination would be more your specialty.”

Laughter rippled through the class.

Mira stood. Her chair screeched loudly against the floor.

“Got some gas, mutt?” Ashley called.

More laughter, and Mr. Thorne didn’t stop them. Mira walked to the front, each step tightening the air in her lungs. She cleared her throat.

“Before Paradise, there was the Salvation Era. Humans tried to outsmart the sun—with orbital mirrors and atmospheric machines. They tried to control the elements. They failed.”

No one was listening. They were waiting for her to break, to mess up.

“They created a world of extremes—jungles that consumed cities overnight, snowstorms that never ended. Half the population disappeared during the Great Fights.” Her voice steadied. “And from those ashes, Paradise City rose. It promised safety—from the Creatures who wear color and the Strays who reject the King. It promised equality, even if that equality feels like a shadow.”

Silence. Mira continued.

“To enter the city, citizens undergo the Procedure. It drains color. It clouds the eyes to gray. It ensures uniformity.” She hesitated, this was the risky part. “But is it really about equality… or control?”

“MS. AVENTURINE!” The shout cracked like thunder. “You will not speak against the King!”

Mira flinched. “I—I didn’t mean—”

“SILENCE. Your fate will be decided by the King himself.”

The room erupted.

“Good riddance!” Ashley shouted, climbing onto her desk.

Paper balls flew. A pencil struck Mira’s leg, grazing skin. She collapsed, shielding her head as the classroom dissolved into chaos.

Eventually, the noise died. Mira sat on the floor, her leg throbbing. A thin line of blood trailed down her skin.

But it wasn’t the pain that hurt, it was the emptiness. Ten years in Paradise City—and no one had ever chosen her. Not once.

I’ll get them back someday, she thought. The anger faded from the surface. But it didn’t disappear. It never did.

Two guards escorted Mira outside, hands resting on their Feers. She didn’t resist.

A Feer didn’t just kill—it paralyzed the body while flooding the brain with unbearable pain before death. No one knew how it worked, no one wanted to. Mira had only seen it once, the day her parents died.

The streets were crowded. People watched her pass, gray eyes filled with quiet amusement. Mira almost looked away. Then she saw them. Hidden in shadow, near a stone building—a figure stood still.

Watching, not smirking. Not looking away, and not gray.

Violet eyes locked onto hers. Bright. Alive. Impossible.

Paradise City had an intruder.