ASTRA
Chapter 1 — The Girl Who Survived Heaven
The sky has been wrong for fifty years.
Even when it's blue.
Even when it's quiet.
Everyone who was alive during the Fall says the same thing — before the first Angel descended, the clouds moved against the wind.
Then the air screamed.
Reina was not born yet.
But she dreams about it anyway.
---
The Astra Facility stood in the middle of what used to be northern Tokyo. The rest of the city had been leveled during the Third Descent. Only the reinforced military zones remained — steel bones of a civilization that refused to die.
Deep underground, alarms pulsed in slow rhythm.
Not an emergency.
Just a reminder.
The sky was still watching.
Reina stood alone inside the synchronization chamber.
The room was circular. White. Sterile. The walls were lined with neural ports like metallic thorns. In the center, suspended by mechanical arms, was Astra-1's core sheath — pale, organic, faintly translucent.
It looked like skin stretched over something breathing.
Because it was.
Even after fifty years, Angel tissue never truly died.
It waited.
Reina removed her gloves. Her fingers were covered in faint silver scarring — neural burn residue from repeated synchronization.
Twenty-seven years old.
Two hundred and thirty dead partners.
Forty-eight Angels erased from the sky.
She touched the Astra sheath.
It pulsed in recognition.
"Good morning," she whispered.
The technicians outside the glass pretended not to hear.
---
"Gazer Alpha Reina. New Vanguard candidate has arrived."
The voice came through the intercom — careful, neutral.
Reina didn't turn.
"They always do."
A pause.
"Compatibility rate is unusually high."
That made her look up.
"How high?"
"Eighty-seven percent."
Silence filled the chamber.
Anything above seventy was considered exceptional.
Above eighty was rare.
Above eighty-five…
That meant the mech would bond deeply.
Deep bonds were powerful.
Deep bonds were fatal.
"Send him in," she said.
---
The chamber door hissed open.
He stepped in without hesitation.
No trembling hands.
No stiff posture.
Early twenties. Broad shoulders. Calm eyes. A faint scar across his jaw like he'd seen trouble before the program.
He looked at the Astra core.
Then at Reina.
Not with awe.
Not with fear.
Just assessment.
"You're shorter than I expected," he said.
The technicians outside froze.
Reina blinked.
"…You're braver than the others."
He shrugged. "If I'm going to die, I'd rather not do it awkwardly."
There it was.
The word.
Die.
Most of them avoided it.
"What's your name?" she asked.
"Kazuo Ardent. Vanguard Candidate 512."
"Do you know how many candidates came before you?"
"Yes."
"And?"
"Two hundred and thirty."
He didn't look away when he said it.
That was new.
Reina studied him carefully now.
Usually they tried to reassure her.
Told her it wasn't her fault.
Promised they were different.
He made no promises.
"Why volunteer?" she asked.
Kazuo glanced up toward the ceiling — toward the sky they couldn't see.
"My city was erased by a Rank Two when I was fourteen," he said. "I watched Astra-3 fight it. The Vanguard died in under three minutes."
His voice didn't shake.
"But it worked," he continued. "The Angel died too. So if the math says one life for a million…"
He met her eyes again.
"I'm fine with that."
Reina hated that answer.
Because it was the same logic she used to survive.
---
"Begin neural handshake," the technician ordered.
Mechanical arms descended.
Cables unfolded like metallic serpents.
Reina stepped into her interface harness — a skeletal frame that locked against her spine and skull.
Kazuo entered the Vanguard anchor cradle — a heavier exoskeletal seat built to distribute impact trauma.
The Astra core lowered between them.
Its surface rippled.
Hungry.
"Synchronization in three… two… one…"
The world shattered.
Reina felt it first — the cold flood of alien perception. The sky unfolded inside her mind. She saw gravitational distortions, electromagnetic trails, distant orbital signatures.
Angel sight.
Then—
Impact.
Kazuo gasped as the physical feedback struck him. His muscles locked. Veins flared beneath his skin as the Astra's power coursed through him.
Reina braced for the scream.
For the neural rupture.
For the flatline alarm.
It didn't come.
Instead—
She felt him.
Steady.
Present.
Not drowning.
Their neural patterns aligned.
Perfectly.
The Astra core flared with blinding light.
Technicians shouted outside the glass.
"Synchronization climbing— 91%— 93%— stabilizing at 95%!"
Impossible.
Reina's eyes widened inside the harness.
Ninety-five percent meant near-total harmony.
That level had only ever been recorded once.
With Astra Minus.
And that pilot had died within hours.
Inside the shared neural space, she heard his voice.
Not through speakers.
Through thought.
So this is what you see every day.
She turned in the mental void.
He stood there — not physically, but as a projection of consciousness inside the Astra's core field.
Most Vanguards appeared fragmented. Blurry.
He was solid.
"You're not breaking," she said.
Neither are you.
The Astra pulsed again.
Not violently.
Curiously.
As if recognizing something familiar in him.
Outside, alarms suddenly shifted tone.
Urgent.
A technician's voice cracked over the intercom:
"Long-range detection just spiked— unidentified descent signature entering atmosphere—"
Reina's heart slowed.
"How many?"
A pause.
Then—
"…Rank One."
Silence consumed the chamber.
Kazuo smiled faintly in the neural field.
"Well," he said quietly,
"Guess we're not doing practice runs."
Reina closed her eyes.
For fifty years, the sky had been wrong.
And now it was opening again.
"Launch Astra-1," she ordered.
The hangar above them began to unfold.
Steel doors split apart.
Clouds churned unnaturally overhead.
The Angel was descending.
And for the first time in her life…
Reina didn't feel alone inside the machine.
The end.....