Aren Vale learned early that the ground was cruel.
The streets of Lower Crest were always wet—either from rain or blood—and the buildings leaned inward like they were ashamed of the people living between them. Sirens sang lullabies. Hunger taught patience. Fear taught speed.
But Aren didn't look down like everyone else.
He looked up.
Every night, he lay on the cracked roof of his home, hands behind his head, staring at the sky as if it might answer him back. The stars were faint here, drowned by smoke and neon, but they were still there. Still watching.
"Must be nice," he whispered, "to never touch the ground."
His mother used to scold him for that habit.
"Dreaming won't fill your stomach," she'd say, tired but smiling. "Feet on the earth, Aren."
He nodded every time.
And ignored her every night.
Because when the wind passed over the rooftops—when it whistled through broken antennas and rattled loose metal—something inside his chest pulled, like a hand reaching outward.
As if the sky was calling him by name.
The accident happened on a normal day.
Those were always the worst.
Aren was running errands, a bag of bread tucked under his arm, feet pounding familiar concrete. He ran everywhere—not because he had to, but because it felt right. The city blurred when he ran, and for brief moments, the noise in his head went quiet.
Then came the sound.
A deep crack, like the world snapping its spine.
A construction tower two blocks away folded in on itself, metal screaming as gravity claimed it. Dust exploded outward. People shouted. The air itself seemed to panic.
Aren didn't think.
He ran.
Faster than he ever had.
The street stretched unnaturally long. His heartbeat roared louder than the collapsing steel. He felt heat in his veins, a pressure behind his ribs—as if something was trying to tear out of him.
Then the ground vanished.
Not crumbled.
Not broke.
It simply… left.
Aren was falling—
No.
He wasn't.
The air caught him.
Wind slammed into his chest, wrapped around his limbs, held him upright like invisible hands. His feet kicked instinctively—
—and he launched forward, clearing the wreckage in a single breathless surge.
Time shattered.
Steel froze mid-collapse. Dust hung like stars. Aren shot through it, a blur of motion and panic, screaming as the world bent around him.
He landed hard on the other side, skidding across asphalt, breath ripping from his lungs.
Silence followed.
Then screams returned.
Aren pushed himself up, shaking, skin buzzing like it had been struck by lightning. He looked at his hands.
They were trembling.
"W-what…" His voice cracked. "What did I just do?"
Above him, the sky rolled with dark clouds.
And for the first time—
Aren Vale realized the ground had failed him.
And the sky had not.