TIMELINE ZERO: Saran's Wake

The moon was cracked, and the sky wept light through the gaps.

Lyra Elryn stood at the edge of Sector Veil, looking out beyond the barrier wall where fractured earth met open space. The Cradle Rings above shimmered like glass serpents, coiled around the remains of a once-whole moon, holding gravity in place through humming pulses of forgotten technology.

Below her, the vast planet Maraxis churned with endless stormclouds—violet, gold, and gray—its swirling mass thick with ash and electric fury. No one lived there anymore. Some said the planet was cursed, poisoned by a war so ancient it had left only ghosts behind. Others whispered it still breathed in its sleep, dreaming of the sky it once held close. Waiting for the moon to fall.

Lyra didn't care about myths.

She only cared about the dreams.

Last night, she had drowned in blood again. Not hers—never hers—but that of soldiers who followed her into battle wearing colors she didn't recognize. Their screams were like dying birds, sharp and distant. Her hands were slick with red. Her face painted in ash. Not frightened. Not even sad.

Just… used to it. Like she had done it before.

Many times before.

She looked at her fingers now, bare and clean, and curled them into tight fists.

Why do I always remember the end of the battle, but never the beginning?

"Are you daydreaming again?" a voice asked behind her.

Lyra blinked and turned.

Dain, the tower's watchguard, leaned against the arched corridor's edge. Tall, tired, and armored in faded security gear, he wore the same look he always did—mild concern blanketed beneath quiet fear.

Everyone feared the children like her. The Revenants.

"Curfew bell's about to ring," he said.

"I like the silence out here," Lyra replied.

"There's nothing silent about the void," he muttered, then turned and walked off, his boots clinking faintly on the alloy tiles.

She didn't move. Not yet.

Wind stirred along the corridor behind her—cold and faint. Not real wind, of course. Not in a sealed habitat like this. It was artificial, generated by the tower's ancient systems to mimic weather cycles. Another illusion.

Like the digital stars that blinked in the artificial sky dome. Like the gardens with plastic roots. Like the counselors with empty eyes.

But the voices in her head? They were always real.

The curfew bell rang—deep and resonant, like a heartbeat echoing from the hollow core of the moon.

Lyra turned away from the shattered sky and slipped into the corridor with silent steps. Her boots made no sound. Her shadow walked beside her like a loyal ghost.

Inside, the tower stirred like a living thing.

Children of various ages moved through the sterile white halls in silence. Most didn't speak. Most didn't smile. Some clutched memory tokens—rings, journals, faded photographs they claimed belonged to past lives.

Revenants.

Living children haunted by echoes of ancient deaths.

One boy once jumped from the observatory spire, claiming he remembered how to fly.

He didn't.

Lyra's room was small, square, and cold. The bed was made. The desk untouched. A soft blue glow hummed along the ceiling in a futile attempt to make the space seem gentle.

She didn't use the bed. Or the desk.

Instead, she sat on the floor, back against the wall, knees drawn up to her chest. Her eyes stayed fixed on nothing, her breath quiet and even. She was listening.

Not with her ears—but behind her eyes.

Saran.

That was the name that echoed again. The one that had clawed its way into her dreams months ago, carved into a bloodied banner flapping atop a broken citadel.

General Saran the Red.

Breaker of the Fifth Gate. Slayer of the Pale Wyrm. Traitor Queen.

She had led armies across blackened plains and drowned cities in molten fire. She had burned temples. Crushed legions. Betrayed kings. And smiled while doing it.

Her name, Lyra suspected, was still etched into the bones of lost worlds.

But here, on this shattered moon? She was just a girl.

Fifteen years of age. Quiet. Alone. And growing more dangerous by the day.

There was a knock at her door.

Lyra didn't answer. It opened anyway. A girl entered, barefoot and smiling—a rarity in Veil Tower.

"Hey. I brought snacks," the girl said, holding up a tin. "Technically contraband, but I'm morally flexible."

"Juno,"Lyra said, her voice flat. "You're going to get yourself incinerated by a hall drone."

"I'd rather go out in flames than by cafeteria stew," Juno replied, closing the door with her foot and flopping down beside her. "Besides, this stuff's imported. Smuggled straight from Eden Vault. Real fruit."

"You paid someone?"

"Technically, I bartered with my soul."

Lyra gave a soft huff. It might have been a laugh, or just her breath catching for a moment.

Juno had that effect.

She was the only other Revenant Lyra trusted—if trust even existed here. Juno remembered being a healer once, in a time long gone. A quiet, gentle woman who wandered battlefields tending to the wounded. She called her memories a gift.

Lyra called hers a curse.

"Did you dream again?" Juno asked, her eyes softer now.

Lyra didn't answer at first. Then she nodded.

"Same one?"

"No. Worse. I burned a city this time. Ordered it. No war. No enemy. Just... punishment."

Juno didn't speak. She just popped open the tin and handed Lyra a slice of dried pear.

"You weren't really her, Lyra," she said quietly. "Maybe just... echoing a possibility."

Lyra took the fruit and stared at it.

"I remember the heat," she whispered. "I remember the screams. I remember the smell of burning hair and stone. I remember standing on a balcony and watching it happen like it was art."

"Maybe that version of you is asking for redemption."

"I don't want redemption," Lyra muttered. "I want answers."

And then the lights in the tower flickered.

Once. Twice.

Then the red sirens ignited, washing the hallways in pulsing crimson.

Juno stood immediately, all humor gone from her face.

"A containment drill?" Lyra asked, standing too.

"No." Juno's voice was grim. "They only do this when a new one awakens."

A chill spread across Lyra's spine.

Another Revenant.

A voice echoed over the intercom—calm, female, automated.

"All Sector Veil residents: please remain in assigned quarters. An emergence has been detected. Do not engage. Do not observe. LUNEX retrieval en route."

Silence followed, but it was heavy. Breathing.

Lyra's hands clenched into fists. "Where?"

"I don't know," Juno said. "But they'll take them to the Observation Wing first."

"They always do," Lyra said softly. Her gaze turned to the sealed window near her desk. Outside, nothing could be seen—just darkness and stars.

And yet, somewhere beyond those walls, a child was screaming.

She could feel it. Not with ears. Not even with mind. But with something else. Deeper.

A resonance.

Later, when the lights returned to normal and the hall doors unsealed, Lyra slipped out of her room and moved like a shadow through the corridors. Juno didn't follow this time. She didn't need to.

Lyra knew where she was going.

The Observation Wing sat on the upper ring, one level beneath the tower's Core Nexus. Most weren't allowed access. But Lyra had found the ventilation shafts long ago.

She climbed now, silent as breath, until she reached a small grating. The room beyond was wide, filled with white light, glass walls, and humming machines.

Inside, a child sat strapped to a reclined table.

A boy. Maybe nine. Brown skin. Curly hair matted with sweat. His eyes were wide open—staring up at the lights. Terrified.

Surrounding him were three figures in black.

Not guards.

LUNEX Retrievals.

Tall, slender, faceless beneath reflective masks.

They moved without sound, like machines wrapped in flesh. One placed a gloved hand on the boy's forehead. He screamed once. Not in pain. In memory.

"My name is Ednel," the boy gasped, voice broken. "I was… I was the last prince. The flame-holders came. I… I remember dying."

The Retrievals said nothing. One injected something into his neck.

He went still. Lyra watched, frozen.

She couldn't explain the feeling rising in her chest. It wasn't pity. Or fear. It was something older.

Recognition.

He remembers. Just like her. 

She didn't sleep that night. Neither did Juno. They sat in the dark, facing the wall. No words spoken. No plans made.

There would be more. They both knew that now.

The Revenants weren't just fragments of history. They were returning. And Lyra was no longer the only echo in the dark.