Luke woke to the sound of screaming.
It took him three full seconds to realize the screaming was his own.
The branding slab was cold beneath him, the restraints already retracting, leaving behind bruises that throbbed in time with his pulse. His back felt like someone had taken a plasma torch to his spine and then sewed the wound shut with live wires. The smell of burnt flesh and ozone clung to his skin.
Across the room, the medic watched him with detached interest, her fingers tapping a rhythm against her datapad. "Primus-class resilience. You only screamed for twelve minutes. The last one made it to twenty before his vocal cords fried."
Luke rolled onto his side and vomited black bile onto the floor.
The medic didn't flinch. "Normal. The nano-tech's purging impurities."
He wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, staring at the inky fluid. It shimmered faintly, like oil under sunlight. "What the hell did you put inside me?"
"Evolution," she said simply, then jerked her chin toward the door. "Barracks 9. Move."
---
The hallway outside was lined with steel pillars, each one humming a low, discordant note that made Luke's teeth ache. As he passed the third one, his brand flared—a sudden, white-hot burst of pain—and for a heartbeat, the pillar's surface rippled, revealing lines of text carved deep into the metal.
THE CHAINS ARE WEAKEST HERE
Then it was gone, and the pillar was just a pillar again.
Luke didn't have time to dwell on it. A boot slammed into the back of his knee, sending him crashing onto the grated floor.
"Look at this. The gutter rat survived."
A face leaned into his vision—sharp features, dark eyes, and a smirk that promised violence. The Primus brand on the boy's neck pulsed faintly, the circuitry more intricate than Luke's, laced with gold filaments.
Veyd.
Luke had seen his type before. Noble-born, used to people bending the moment he scowled. The kind of bastard who thought pain was a language only peasants spoke.
"Did they tell you?" Veyd crouched, gripping Luke's chin hard enough to bruise. "About the other Primus recruits? The ones who don't make it past the first week?"
Luke spat in his face.
Veyd recoiled, wiping his cheek with a snarl. Before he could retaliate, a voice cut through the tension.
"Enough."
A girl stood in the doorway of Barracks 9, her white hair cropped short, her Primus brand flickering erratically along her collarbone. Lira. The one who'd taken down the Reaper with a power core.
Behind her, a lanky boy with a scar across his cheekbone leaned against the frame, arms crossed. Kieran.
Veyd scoffed but stepped back. "You defending him?"
Lira's expression didn't change. "I'm telling you to shut up before the instructors hear."
Kieran grinned. "And trust me, you don't want Instructor Kael noticing you this early."
Veyd's jaw tightened, but he shoved past Luke with one last glare. "Enjoy your last night, gutter trash."
---
Barracks 9 was a long, narrow room lined with bunks that looked like they'd been ripped out of decommissioned mechas. Up close, Luke realized they had—names and serial numbers were still etched into the metal, some scratched out, others left to linger like ghosts.
Kieran tossed Luke a thin blanket. "Don't think about it too hard. They recycle everything here. Even people."
Luke ran his fingers over the nearest engraving. LT. C. VAULT, MIA. "Who were they?"
"Dead." Kieran flopped onto his bunk. "Or worse. The Academy doesn't waste resources."
Lira sat cross-legged on the bunk opposite, her glitching brand casting erratic shadows across her face. "You threw up black, didn't you?"
Luke stiffened. "How'd you know?"
"Because we all did." She rolled up her sleeve, revealing thin black veins spiderwebbing beneath her skin. "The nano-tech's rewriting us. Faster for some than others."
Kieran propped himself up on one elbow. "Veyd's family owns the factories that make the branding machines. He thinks that makes him special."
"It makes him a liar," Lira muttered. "The tech isn't Federation. It's old. Older than the Academy."
Luke's brand throbbed. "How old?"
Kieran's smirk faded. "You ever hear of the Dead Sea Scrolls?"
Luke's fingers twitched. The Codex had the same markings.
"Supposedly, they're relics from before the Federation," Kieran continued. "Blueprints for things we aren't supposed to have. The branding tech comes from them. The nano-fluid in our veins? That's stolen."
Lira's brand glitched again, her pupils dilating for a split second before snapping back. "They say the Scrolls were written by the Caldrith. That they knew how to fuse man and machine without losing their souls."
Kieran snorted. "And look how that turned out."
Luke said nothing. The weight of the Codex's secrets burned in his chest.
---
That night, Luke dreamed of the battlefield again.
Mechas knelt in the ashes of a dying star, their hulls cracked open like eggshells, revealing pilots with no faces—just hollow sockets where their eyes should have been. One turned toward him, its voice a static-laced whisper.
"You are the key."
Luke woke with a gasp, his brand searing so hot he expected to smell burning flesh. The barracks were silent except for the quiet hum of the steel pillars outside.
And then—
A whimper.
Lira was convulsing in her bunk, her brand flickering wildly, black fluid leaking from her nose. Across the room, Veyd sat up, his face unreadable.
Kieran was already moving, pressing a folded cloth between Lira's teeth before she bit through her tongue. "Her system's rejecting the nano-tech."
Luke knelt beside them. "What do we do?"
"Nothing." Kieran's voice was grim. "If we call the medics, they'll take her to the labs. And she won't come back the same."
Lira's hand shot out, gripping Luke's wrist hard enough to bruise. Her eyes were wide, terrified. "They're listening."
Then, just as suddenly as it started, the seizure passed. Her brand stabilized, the glow dimming to a steady pulse.
Kieran exhaled shakily. "She'll be okay. For now."
Veyd, still watching from his bunk, said nothing. But when Luke caught his gaze, there was something new in his expression.
Not hatred.
Fear.
The morning air tasted like rust and ionized rain.
Luke stood at the edge of the training yard, watching the acid-yellow dawn bleed through the smog-choked sky. The Academy sprawled around him—a fortress of black steel and humming rune-cages, its towers clawing at the clouds like the fingers of a buried giant. The air smelled of ozone and the faint, metallic tang of blood from last night's cleaning crews hosing down the Crucible.
To the east, the obstacle courses stretched in jagged lines, their barriers studded with shock-plates and barbed wire. To the west, the sparring rings flickered with holographic combat drones, their skeletal frames twitching in standby mode. And at the center of it all loomed the Iron Chapel—a domed structure where the Federation's elite trained, its walls etched with the names of every Primus-class graduate who'd died in service.
Luke's brand itched beneath his fatigues.
---
"Move your feet, maggots!"
Instructor Tetrus's voice cracked like a whip across the training yard. The man was built like a siege engine—broad shoulders, knuckles fused with old mech-grade augmentations, and a face that looked like it had been hammered out of raw iron. He paced in front of the recruits, his boots leaving faint indents in the reinforced concrete.
"Today, you learn how to kill," he growled. "Not with your fists. Not with your teeth. With this."
He jerked his chin, and a rack of weapons slid up from the floor—pulse rifles, shock-batons, and slender, curved blades that hummed with dormant energy.
Luke's fingers twitched. He'd handled stolen guns in the Gutterline, but these were different. These were Federation—engineered to sync with a cultivator's brand.
Tetrus snatched up a rifle and tossed it to Luke. "Gutterborn. Show us what you've got."
The weapon was heavier than expected, its grip molding slightly to his palm as the bio-lock recognized his brand. A targeting array flickered to life in his peripheral vision, painting the distant practice dummies with glowing crosshairs.
Luke exhaled. Squeezed the trigger.
The recoil never came.
The rifle pulsed, its energy drawn directly from his brand, and the shot streaked across the yard—
—and missed entirely.
Laughter rippled through the recruits. Veyd's smirk was the sharpest.
Tetrus didn't laugh. "Again."
Luke adjusted his stance, letting the rifle's weight settle. This time, he didn't fight the brand's pull. He let the energy coil up his spine, through his arm, into the weapon.
The shot hit dead center. The dummy's head vaporized.
Tetrus grunted. "Lucky." But there was something considering in his gaze.
---
Swordsmanship was worse.
The training blades were dull-edged but wired to deliver shocks on contact. Luke's first sparring partner was a hulking recruit named Drax, whose brand flared crimson with every swing.
"Come on, gutter rat," Drax taunted, circling. "Show me how they fight in the slums."
Luke feinted left, then pivoted—
—and Drax's blade slammed into his ribs, sending lightning up his nerves. Luke hit the ground gasping, his brand flaring violet in protest.
Drax raised his sword for the finishing strike—
—and froze.
The blade's edge hovered a hair's breadth from Luke's throat, trembling. Drax's face twisted in confusion. His brand was flickering, the red light sputtering like a dying ember.
Luke didn't hesitate. He swept Drax's legs out from under him and pressed his own blade to the boy's throat.
Silence.
Then Tetrus's slow clap. "Not bad." He didn't explain why Drax's weapon had failed.
Luke had a feeling he wasn't supposed to ask.
---
The Academy's library was a vault of shadows and whispers.
Luke had expected rows of datapads, maybe a few ancient books behind glass. Instead, the walls were lined with memory crystals—shards of blue-black mineral that glowed when touched, their surfaces swirling with recorded knowledge.
He found the section on arrays easily enough. The crystals here were cold to the touch, their light dimmer, like they'd been drained.
Luke pressed his fingers to one labeled "Basic Runic Theory."
Images flooded his mind—a dizzying cascade of symbols, equations, and fragmented lectures. He sifted through them, searching for anything resembling the chains from his dreams.
And then—
There.
A diagram of a "Soulchain Array," its interlocking rings identical to the ones he'd seen in his vision. The description was incomplete, redacted in chunks, but one line stood out:
"Used by the Caldrith to tether living energy to mechaframes."
Luke's brand throbbed.
"Interesting choice of study."
The voice came from behind him—smooth, amused. Luke turned to see a lean man in scholar's robes, his left eye replaced by a mech-grade ocular that whirred softly as it focused.
Liam. The Academy's nano-array specialist.
Luke straightened. "Just trying to understand how the brands work."
Liam's smile didn't reach his mechanical eye. "Most recruits start with combat manuals. You're skipping ahead." He plucked the crystal from Luke's hand, examining it. "Soulchain theory is… controversial. The Federation prefers the term 'bio-circuitry.'"
Luke kept his voice neutral. "Why?"
"Because chains imply something is bound." Liam tapped the crystal against his palm. "And the Federation doesn't like to admit how much of its tech is built on borrowed shackles."
A chime echoed through the library—an alert. Liam's ocular lens flickered as he processed it.
"Ah. It seems we'll have to continue this another time." He handed the crystal back to Luke. "My advanced array class meets tonight. You should come."
Luke blinked. "I'm not cleared for that."
Liam was already walking away. "You are now."
---
The explosion hit just after dusk.
Luke was halfway to the Iron Chapel when the ground shook—a concussive blast that shattered windows and sent recruits sprawling. Alarms wailed, their shrieks cutting through the smoke.
Across the yard, a group of figures clad in tattered robes moved with lethal precision. Their faces were hidden behind masks of polished bone, their weapons glowing with forbidden runes.
Order of Hevelen.
The Church's terrorists.
One raised a hand, and the air rippled—a pulse-array detonating in midair, sending a wave of force crashing through the barracks wall.
Luke ducked behind a collapsed mecha frame, his brand burning. He'd heard stories of Hevelen's fanatics—zealots who believed the Federation's tech was blasphemy, that cultivation should be pure, untainted by machines.
A recruit screamed as a Hevelen blade carved through his chest, the weapon's runes flaring white-hot.
Luke's fingers closed around a fallen shock-baton.
Then—movement.
Lira and Kieran were pinned near the wreckage, Veyd crouched beside them, his brand flaring gold as he deflected blasts with a shimmering barrier.
Luke didn't think. He ran.
The baton crackled to life in his grip, its energy syncing with his brand. A Hevelen assassin turned—
—and Luke drove the weapon into his gut, letting the charge surge.
The man convulsed, his mask cracking to reveal a face covered in tiny, writhing runes. His lips moved, whispering something that made Luke's blood freeze:
"The Chains are breaking."
Then the assassin's body imploded, his flesh collapsing inward like a deflated sack.
Silence.
Then the distant wail of reinforcements.
Kieran hauled Luke up, his grip bruising. "We need to move. Now."
Veyd was staring at the remains of the assassin, his face pale. "That wasn't just an attack. They were looking for something."