Horizon Base
Fafinyo woke with a start.
The air caught in his throat. He sat upright in bed, clutching the sheets, his heart pounding as if he were still trapped inside an evacuation ship.
For a few seconds, he had no idea where he was.
There was no fire.No screaming.No blue sky splitting apart above his head.
Only his room at Horizon Base.
Soft rootlight glowed across the low ceiling. Beyond the round window, Rep-Oluzion’s purple sky opened over the mountains as three suns slowly rose.
Fafinyo took three deep breaths, then looked at his right arm.
The Ω symbol glowed faintly beneath his yellow skin.
“Not again.”
He covered it with his hand. It didn’t help.
His normally green hair had turned gray at the tips. Fafinyo ran both hands through it and got out of bed—straight onto a metal part he had left on the floor.
It rolled.
He crashed into a shelf, knocking down tools, blueprints, and a charged impulse sphere.
“No, no, no—”
A blue blast threw him backward.
Fafinyo landed against the wall with an adjustment wrench hanging from his hair.
“The day just started, and it’s already trying to defeat me.”
His room looked more like a workshop than a bedroom. Ship parts covered the table, circuits sat inside mugs, tools littered the floor, and half-finished inventions occupied every free space.
A light blaster that only fired if you spoke nicely to it.An energy blade that lasted three seconds.A portable shield designed to protect half a body.
In reality, it protected one knee.
Fafinyo lifted it.
“Today, you will prove your greatness.”
The shield spat out a spark.
“That attitude isn’t helping.”
The door opened.
Orak stood there, tall and broad in light Organic Alliance armor, arms crossed.
“Explosion?”
“Technically, a sudden displacement of energy.”
Orak glanced at the scorch mark on the wall.
“That’s a small explosion.”
“But an ambitious one.”
Orak sighed. “Supplies are arriving at the skyport today. I don’t want you near the unloading platforms.”
“Perfect. I didn’t want to be near them either.”
“Or underneath them.”
Fafinyo paused.
“That was unnecessarily specific.”
“Because I know you.”
Orak’s gaze moved to Fafinyo’s gray-tipped hair.
“Another nightmare?”
“No.”
Orak stared at him.
“Fine. Yes. But it was short. Efficient. An optimized nightmare.”
“Fafinyo.”
He looked toward the window. The lights of Horizon Base were turning on one by one.
Sometimes they reminded him that he had survived.
Other times, he hated them for the same reason.
“I’m fine.”
Orak picked up the small smooth stone on the table—the only thing Fafinyo still had from Fafyr—and placed it back.
“You don’t have to be fine all the time.”
Fafinyo tried to smile. “That sounds like something a person says before giving me the day off.”
“No.”
“You destroy hope very efficiently.”
“Eat something before you go to the workshop.”
“So I can test the shield?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“It sounded like that.”
“It sounded like: if you’re going to disobey me, do it on a full stomach.”
“I’m seventeen.”
“Exactly.”
Orak headed for the door, then stopped.
“If the dream comes back, find someone. Don’t wait for it to destroy you from the inside.”
Fafinyo gave a small nod.
“Understood.”
After Orak left, Fafinyo dressed, pulled on his green boots and orange cloak, and pushed his squeaking cart into the corridor.
Before leaving, he touched the stone from Fafyr.
“Today I’ll actually do something useful.”
Horizon Base was already awake. Refugees, recruits, technicians, and families moved through the corridors beneath the rootlights. Service announcements echoed overhead while technicians carried energy crystals toward the lower decks. Children slipped between columns until parents called them back. Everywhere Fafinyo looked, survivors from different worlds were trying to build ordinary lives from whatever the war had left behind. It was a refuge, a workshop, a fortress, and almost a home.
Almost.
“Hey! Public menace with a cart!”
Kael jumped down from a railing, grinning.
“Good morning,” Fafinyo said. “Lovely to see you in such a safe and officially authorized position.”
“Authorization is a feeling.”
Kael pointed at his hair. “Nightmare or failed invention?”
“It’s almost green again.”
“The tips are still gray.”
“That’s style.”
“That’s trauma with extra volume.”
Before Fafinyo could answer, Nyra approached.
“If you’re done diagnosing each other, Orak is waiting for the prototype.”
Fafinyo straightened.
Nyra looked at the shield. “You brought it?”
“Compact impulse shield. Lightweight, elegant, ready to revolutionize organic defense.”
Kael leaned closer. “The one that protected one knee?”
“It has evolved.”
“Two knees?”
“One and a half.”
Nyra almost smiled.
That was worse than if she had.
At the workshop testing yard, Orak waited beside a soldier.
“You’re late,” he said.
“I arrived at a dramatically appropriate moment.”
“Late.”
Fafinyo handed him the device. “Version 3.5.”
Kael whispered, “What happened to version 3?”
“We don’t talk about version 3.”
The soldier strapped the shield to her arm and activated it.
A bright blue field appeared.
It was stable.
It protected exactly her left knee.
Kael began clapping slowly. “The safest knee on Rep-Oluzion.”
“Impact test,” Fafinyo said quickly.
A recruit aimed a training launcher.
“Half power,” Orak ordered.
The bolt struck the shield.
Instead of breaking, the field absorbed the impact and suddenly expanded over almost the soldier’s entire body. A blue wave knocked the firing recruit backward and toppled several training markers.
Silence.
Then the shield made a metallic sneeze and shrank back to the knee.
Fafinyo smiled.
“Aha.”
Nyra stepped closer. “That wasn’t luck.”
“Thank you.”
“It was also unstable.”
“Less thank you.”
Orak examined the device. “Can you fix the expansion?”
“With better parts. Small impulse cores, conductor plates, maybe a field stabilizer.”
Orak looked at him, worried and proud at once.
“This could be useful.”
Those words meant more to Fafinyo than applause.
Then the skyport alarms sounded.
Emergency arrival.
Everyone ran to the elevated corridor.
Three damaged refugee transports descended toward Horizon Base, smoke pouring from their engines. One landed badly, metal screaming against the platform.
The hatches opened.
People emerged covered in ash and bandages. Some walked. Others were carried. Children cried in strangers’ arms.
A small child stepped from the second ship clutching a piece of burned cloth.
Fafinyo stopped breathing.
For one second, he saw himself.
Seven years old.
A ship.
A lost world.
“Where did they come from?” Kael asked.
Nyra studied the transports.
“Lyr-Vana.”
Fafinyo knew the name. A peaceful world of suspended gardens and water bridges.
Orak lowered his communicator.
“The Imperial Network.”
No one needed more explanation.
Red-eyed robots.Black ships.Worlds turned silent.
The Ω symbol burned beneath Fafinyo’s sleeve.
“What are we going to do?”
“Treat the wounded. Register survivors. Reinforce our defenses.”
“That’s waiting.”
“That’s protecting.”
“It’s not enough.”
“I know,” Orak said. “But when people arrive like this, the first thing they need is to know they’ve finally stopped running.”
Fafinyo looked at the child.
He wanted to accept that.
He couldn’t.
“We need better weapons.”
Kael groaned. “Tell me that isn’t the beginning of one of your plans.”
“I have a plan.”
“Of course you do,” Nyra said.
Fafinyo looked at Orak. “Let me go to the wreck fields. If I find better parts, I can stabilize the shield. We could build more for the defense posts.”
“Not now.”
“Orak—”
Orak studied him, then sighed.
“One hour. Don’t cross the outer ring. Don’t enter sealed containers. Don’t touch anything marked with Imperial Network symbols. Log your departure.”
Fafinyo smiled.
“That was a yes wearing armor.”
He grabbed his cart and headed for the east gate.
Nyra stopped him.
“Don’t do this out of anger.”
Fafinyo looked back at the refugees.
“I’m doing it for them.”
“Then make sure you come back. Improvised heroes can die too.”
His hair flashed red at the tips.
Kael noticed.
“Not one word,” Fafinyo warned.
Kael raised both hands.
Fafinyo left the base.
The wreck fields stretched beneath the purple sky in mountains of dead metal: broken ship wings, buried engines, moss-covered plates, cables tangled through glowing roots.
To anyone else, it was garbage.
To Fafinyo, it was a language.
He began filling the cart.
An impulse coil.Two conductor plates.A weapon grip.A field stabilizer.
“Now you’re cooperating, universe.”
Then he felt pressure in his arm.
The Ω symbol glowed beneath his sleeve.
Between two heaps of metal, a blue light flickered.
Fafinyo pulled aside rusted plates and tangled roots. Beneath them lay a long white container, partially buried.
No rust.No cracks.No moss.
Too clean.
As if it had been waiting.
Fafinyo swallowed.
“Orak specifically said not to climb into sealed containers.”
The blue light flashed again.
He knelt beside it.
“Technically, I’m still outside.”
He wiped dust from the surface.
A plate appeared.
Four black letters.
A.X.E.L.
The Ω symbol on his arm answered with a sudden flash.
And from inside the container, something opened its eyes.
