Chapter 1

POV: Mira

The scream cut through the silence of the alley like a blade, sharp and sudden. It wasn’t loud—it didn’t need to be. In Newhaven, volume wasn’t what drew attention. It was fear. The kind of fear that hung in the air now, heavy and stifling.

I froze, my breath catching in my throat. The flickering light above me cast erratic shadows on the damp walls, their jagged movements mimicking the knot tightening in my stomach. Somewhere ahead, the scream had turned into muffled pleas, barely audible over the steady hum of an Enforcer drone. My legs tensed, a primal instinct to flee warring with the harder, colder voice in my head.

Keep walking. Don’t look. Don’t get involved.

But my feet stayed rooted. Because I knew this city, and I knew what happened next. A sharp zap. The acrid smell of charred flesh. Silence.

I clenched my fists until my nails bit into my palms. You can’t save them, Mira. You can’t save anyone.

But what if it was Jace?

The thought surged through me like lightning, hot and unrelenting. My younger brother’s face filled my mind—his defiant green eyes, the way his jaw would tighten whenever the drones passed too close. He never looked down, never cowered like the rest of us. It was a miracle he hadn’t been caught yet.

I forced myself to move, each step as heavy as the air around me. The pleading voice faded into the distance, swallowed by the city’s indifference. I couldn’t help them. I couldn’t stop this. But I could make it home before Jace did something reckless.

The streets of Newhaven whispered despair with every jagged corner and shattered cobblestone. Trash clung to the edges of the gutters, dampened by a constant drizzle that did little to cleanse the city but soaked everything else. The air reeked of oil and decay, mingling with the sour, acrid stench of burnt-out circuits—a smell that seemed to seep into my very skin. Over it all, the metallic tang of fear clung like a second sky, sharp and suffocating.

I pulled my scarf tighter, its coarse wool scratching my chin, an irritating but grounding sensation against the gnawing cold. It was better than nothing, even as the wind slipped through the threadbare patches. Above me, the hum of drones pulsed, relentless and invasive, their red lights casting jittery shadows that made the alley walls seem alive. The city felt alive too, but not in the way of something breathing and growing. No, Newhaven was a beast—hungry, oppressive, and impossible to escape.

The graffiti etched into the walls added splashes of rebellion to the otherwise muted tones of the Human Quarters. Most of the symbols were crude: clenched fists, X’s slashed across drones, the occasional curse word scrawled with hurried defiance. But one design caught my eye. It was subtle yet intricate, a phoenix rising from a nest of gears, its wings half-erased by an Enforcer’s laziness or by someone bold enough to restore it after the purge. Its presence made my stomach twist, the sharp pang of something unspoken. I slowed my pace, my boots crunching against stray shards of broken glass and ash.

I stared at the phoenix for too long, my heart heavy with questions I didn’t want to answer. The rumors of rebellion, of a "chosen" human who could supposedly topple the regime, had been whispered in the alleys for weeks now. They were stories, fairy tales meant to stoke hope where there could be none. But still, I lingered. Could someone really rise against all this? Could Jace?

The sharp crack of a scuffle nearby jolted me from my thoughts. Two men argued at the corner of the next street, their voices low but heated. One shoved the other into a wall, the sound of flesh meeting stone reverberating through the alley. An Enforcer drone hovered above, its red light zeroing in on the movement, and for a terrifying moment, I thought it would strike. But the drone jerked abruptly, its motion halting as it sputtered and emitted a high-pitched whine. Malfunction. Both men froze, their fear palpable in the still air. One muttered a prayer under his breath before both scattered into the shadows.

I didn’t wait to see if the drone recovered. My pulse hammered as I quickened my pace, the ash beneath my boots crunching louder in the silence of my panic. The sensation of unseen eyes burned into the back of my neck until I reached the ramshackle building I called home. Its peeling paint had surrendered to the grime of the Quarters long ago, leaving a surface that felt slick under my fingers as I grasped the door handle.

Inside, the air was stale and thick, laced with the smells of sweat, damp wood, and something faintly sour—possibly the stew my mother had been stretching across days. The faint warmth of the cramped interior did little to ease the chill clinging to me.

“I’m not going to sit here and let them treat us like dirt!” Jace’s voice rang out, sharp and electric.

I shut the door softly behind me, letting the argument filter through the walls before stepping into the dimly lit kitchen. Jace stood rigid in the center of the room, his fists clenched, his green eyes blazing. His voice crackled with the defiance that had become as much a part of him as his name.

“You have no idea what you’re talking about,” my mother countered, her tone raw with exhaustion and something close to pleading. She hunched over the stove, stirring the thin broth with trembling hands, her shoulders drawn tight against Jace’s verbal assault.

“Protests don’t solve anything—they just get people killed!” she finished.

“They get attention!” Jace shot back.

“Attention doesn’t put food on the table, Jace,” I said, stepping into the room. My voice was weary, the sharp edge cutting through their argument. He turned, his eyes narrowing at the sight of me.

“Great. Mira’s back,” he muttered, his words heavy with derision.

His jab stung, but I didn’t rise to it. I set my scarf on the counter and let my silence speak for itself. It was Jace who broke the quiet.

Years ago, during one of the first purges, Jace had done something reckless. He’d been barely ten when an Enforcer drone cornered a scrawny boy in the alley near our old apartment. The kid had tripped, his ankle twisted, the drone closing in for the kill.

Without hesitation, Jace had grabbed a rusted pipe and hurled it at the drone. The clang of metal against metal echoed as the pipe knocked the drone just off-balance enough for the boy to scramble away.

“Jace!” I’d hissed, yanking him back into the shadows as the drone spun erratically. “What were you thinking? You could’ve been killed!”

“I couldn’t just stand there,” he’d said, his voice calm but his hands trembling. “What kind of person does that?”

Back in the present, his words still haunted me as I stared into the bowl of broth on the rickety kitchen table. Jace hadn’t changed. His fire, his defiance, his stubborn refusal to look away—they were both his strength and his greatest danger.

And I couldn’t leave. Not as long as he needed someone to pull him back from the edge.

Outside, the faint red glow of a drone pulsed against the window. The city whispered despair. But somewhere out there, someone had painted a phoenix rising from gears, its wings defying erasure.

Not hope, exactly—but the memory of it.