The moon hovered over the luminous sky of Los Serafin. The neo-Romanesque city of North ELyssia glowed with vibrant lights in the cloudy night sky before a small dark circular tear manifested itself seemingly from thin air. Out of it, a fist sized silver orb dropped from the tear as before it finally vanished
As it fell, the orb let out a series of feint hymns in uneven rhythms sounding almost wistful in it's trajectory as it continued its descent. The weight of the object seemed to heat up as it entered the troposphere, creating a faint red glow but its mercurial shine did not fail.
It rang through the cloudy sky with incomprehensible vibrations as it caught the shimmering flow of the reflected street lights in the world below.
Within a district with dimmer lights the object continued its quiet descent at speeds that could break the sound barrier.
*THUMP*
The object landed with a quietness that betrayed its previous velocity as it rolled gently towards a green patch of tall grass—leaves split as it made its way in front of a large tree. It was a small park overlooked by a large modern pantheon. An elegant marble sign in front read "Los Serafin Mechanist Academy and Technology Institution".
Just then a figure emerged from the front of the academy passing the fine granite pillars in front followed by two other figures.
They appeared to be adolescents, one male wore a Blue denim jacket with dark hair while another male had curly auburn hair wearing a scuffed plaid shirt, a female followed behind him with a similar appearance to the second male—with wavy auburn hair and a blue striped short sleeved shirt with a grey jacket wrapped around her delicate waist. All of them carried backpacks.
"Can you believe instructor Dantons wants us to make a small working combustion engine for our advanced classes? It's ridiculous!" The auburn haired male expressed his outcry at the recent class.
The tall figure wearing the blue denim jacket just turned to the auburn haired male with a scoff as his face scrunched in his direction in what could look like bewilderment and slight amusement.
"You still haven't gotten it down? We've practically been working on something similar for the last two years… You've just been calling 'the help' every time you forget to insert a gasket," the dark haired youth jeered at his concerned friend.
"Hey! No fair, not everyone can get straight aurum in their mechanist theory rank three classes like you Lyson!" the auburn youth retorted with a slightly embarrassed expression.
"Dario, I've seen you work, don't forget I'm aurum in my undergraduate mechanist rank two big bro, you're been skating by more focused on mecha board competitions than your actual grades, don't think I haven't noticed," the auburn haired female behind him corrected her older brother, unwilling to give him an inch in on his perceived misfortune.
"You too Carina? When did you two start ganging up on me?" The auburn hair teenager expressed his discomfort before letting out a dejected sigh of resignation.
"We're not ganging up on you Dario, but you have to be more careful during assemblies, you like to rush through it and wonder why the motor is leaking, you realize you have to calculate the specified torque for each component you craft, otherwise you'll just break it or it will be leaky." Lyson tried to comfort his friends with his own constructive critique.
Dario just stopped in place as they made their way half down the granite steps to the mechanist academy hall, his face in frozen horror.
"Torque specifications? When was this a thing?" he spoke suddenly, unable to hide the pallor now draining from his face.
Lyson and Carina both stopped in their placed, their heads slightly turning in bewildered shock at what Dario had just said.
"Since always… You don't mean to say you've just been tightening the sockets liberally," Lyson asked with an unreadable expression on his face.
"No… I would…Never…" Dario commented, his face dropping with each word as it was evident he did not believe a single word he was saying.
Lyson's and Carina's face palmed in unison, shaking their heads as they witnessed Dario being… Dario.
"Well, looks like I have a ton of stuff to do I guess… Hey Lyson, did you make the gear we needed for the mecha board by the way?" Dario spoke somberly before turning to Lyson and shifting the conversation.
Lyson pondered something for a moment before his face lit up with a realization.
"Oh crap, yes I did but I left it back inside the classroom, I'll run back and get it, don't wait up!" Lyson said with haste in his voice as his body skipped back up the twenty stairs they had just walked down from.
Dario and Carina both turned their heads with some curious concern as the adolescent in the blue denim jacket ascended back up the stairs.
"Lyson… Wait, you're still coming straight to our place after right? So we can install the components? You know I can't do this without you," Dario asked with wistful concern in his voice.
Lyson smiled at his friend from up the stairs as he lifted his thumb with an approving gesture.
"And lose the mecha board competition? No way, wouldn't dream of it! I'll see you there in half an hour!" Lyson shouted at his friend with his confirmation before turning around and sprinting up the marble-like stairs.
Dario and Carina watched their friend disappear back behind the pillars of the pantheon before both turning their gazes to one another.
"Sis, are you and Lyson conspiring with one another against me again? This is the fifth time this week you took Lyson's side," Dario confronted his sister with an annoyed wistfulness as he turned to head down the remaining twenty steps, Carina following right behind.
"You know Lyson's always right about these things though, you just don't listen do yo…", Carina's and Dario's voices drifted as they made their way down the illuminated park with segmented Victorian era streetlamps brightening the rough granite pavement enveloped by dark greenery.
Inside the dark verdant field across the pantheon where the three students had just interacted, a fist sized mercurial orb sat before the massive structure as it hymned in indistinct musical tones.
A few sounds emanating from the orb were somewhat comprehensible
"Terra—burning," the sound reverberated.
The young man stopped himself for a moment as he listened in to his surroundings, hearing a faint sound of melodious beeps echoing from somewhere he could not discern before making his way down the forty steps with noticeable intrigue etched on his face,
"What is that?" Lyson observed the field carefully as his eyes squinted with palpable interest.
As he asked this, a tinnitus like ring suddenly overwhelmed his mind, a faint voice could be heard though its pitch was high and indiscernible.
"Help—Terra—danger—future," a distant sound echoed eerily.
"What is that?" The young man asked, looking around desperately at his surroundings but not noticing anything out of place.
"Oribel—too late—already—," the hymn continued to resound, almost urgent in its tone.
Nothing about this seemed right to Lyson. He had news reports about people using banned harmonic frequency devices in public settings and how they had been banned due to Raptor insurgents using them for ill gotten gains—he stepped back a little, hesitant at the scene before him.
"Leave—no—help—danger—danger," it rang, the sound almost echoing desperately despite it just being a series of uneven melodies—yet Lyson was able to understand it, despite speaking no words.
"Whoever this is…" Lyson hesitated, concerned but holding his principle. "These devices are banned for a reason—so if you're trying to pull a prank, it's not funny."
A few chimes echoed in what sounded like jubilation.
"Prank—funny—," the sound became darker. "—this—not—funny."
Lyson considered what to do in this situation; this was becoming absurd. To him it was obvious there was somebody playing a joke—but why now? He considered to contact the authorities which he was certainly going to do, but he couldn't just leave this thing here for others to stumble upon. It just wasn't the way he was raised.
Thinking about those memories made him melancholic considering the most recent change in his life—but he set it aside and focused on the issue at hand.
He stepped forward towards the large tree where the sound was resonating from. There was a small patch of grass where the sound that oddly reminded him of chiming bells was coming from.
"Caution—touch—danger—integration—danger," it rang softly.
Lyson just scoffed hearing this as he eyed a small silver orb in the patch of grass in front of him.
"Yeah… Nice try. I know you just don't want me to take your shiny toy." He jeered before carefully observing the pristine smoothness on the orb. "How much did this thing cost you anyway? Looks expensive."
"Not—fake—real—touch—caution—integration," the fist sized orb vibrated in the split grass, it almost sounded wary.
Lyson however decided to ignore the warning, figuring that it was just some harmless prank using potentially dangerous equipment, even if not immediately.
He bent down as his fingers simply grazed the reflective orb—a moment he immediately regretted.
A spark immediately flickered where his index made contact with the sphere as a surge of agonizing energy shot through his body.
"Aaaughh!!", Lyson screamed in agony with the abrupt jolt—but that wasn't the end of it. Because when he looked down, the device had gotten stuck to his skin.
The surface of the orb had stranded out and attached itself to his hand but there was a palpable change in the air as if static had replaced all the oxygen in a single instant. A faint smell of ozone permeated the air.
Then, the orb began to melt as if suddenly liquifying in front of the young man, his face pale with disbelief as he failed to comprehend what exactly had just happened. He flicked his wrist to try to get the thing off, but it was no use as the amorphous mercurial substance instead struck him in the face with his failed momentum.
"Danger—integration—initiated—pain—breathe." The now mercurial substance chimed as the silvery liquid substance began to cover more of the skin on his hand and his face.
Lyson collapsed to one knee as his breath was ripped from his lungs
"Caution—neural—override—breathe—conscious—stay" the chime echoed cleanly.
Lyson heaved on the grass as he forced himself to suck in air—his diaphragm was burning. The liquid now almost completely encompassed his skin as it reached the tips of his lips and his nostrils and poured in. His body felt heavier than anything he had ever lifted.
He let out one final desperate scream that seemed to bounced off every wall of the academy grounds. The sound pierced the air with agonizing terror.
He fell to the ground—his body convulsing as he lost all autonomy—then something flashed in his mind.
A gold coin with an eight-winged figure.
A large circular glowing gate.
A desert-like world with a red-warped sky.
Silver multi-faceted pincers ripping off a soldier's head.
Terra burned.
Then his vision went black, then he collapsed.
The chime continued to ring indifferently as a young man's body layed in the patch.
On the other side of the campus an auburn-haired young man and a wavy-haired female heard the echo of a scream in the distance.
Dario and Carina both froze as they heard this and turned instinctively towards the sound.
"Hey, isn't that the Mechanist Application Center where that just came from?" the young man asked his sister.
"Yeah… Lyson should have been coming out of there by now…" Carina's voice trailed as she answered.
Both siblings looked at each other knowingly with worried expression before running towards the noise.
A moment later they arrived back in front of the pantheon running, trying to catch their breaths. Dario observed the scene before he felt a pleading tap on his shoulder—his sister was pointing at a body of a young man wearing familiar looking clothes.
"Lyson!" Dario shouted as both him and Carina sprinted to his side and tried to shake him awake.
Lyson at this point was no longer convulsing, instead there was foam running down his mouth—his eyes rolled back, looking completely white.
"Carina, call the emergency line!" the auburn-haired man pleaded. "Lyson, wake up man! Please!".
Tears rolled down Dario's face as he tried to awaken his friend.
Meanwhile Carina pulled her pocket device to contact the emergency lines, but the call had not gone the way she expected.
Ring—then silence.
She waited for a moment to see if anyone would say anything before deciding to speak
"Hello—" she began to ask, but she was interrupted.
"We have people already enroute." A male voice answered from the other end before abruptly hanging up.
"What in the hells was that?" Carina shouted incredulously.
Dario turned back to his sister with a panicked expression.
"What? Is it going to take long?!" He asked impatiently.
Her pocket device shook in her hands as her soft face scrunched with disbelief.
"No… They…" She stammered, trying to find the words. "They said they were already coming and just hung up on me."
Dario looked at Lyson, then back at Carina with disbelief etched on his face,
"How… Is that possible?" His jaw quivered without understanding.
Several sirens suddenly echoed, becoming increasingly louder as a large yellow mecha stopped in the street across. Immediately, four men in hazmat suits burst out of the back of the transport—one immediately laying down cones and throwing flares.
Two men wearing black suits followed, stepping out of the front side cabin of the large yellow transport—they began walking towards the teenagers.
Carina and Dario both looked at each other simultaneously, a clear expression on their faces—concern and bewilderment.
The men stepped in front of the sidewalk before the patch of grass and waved the two kids over.
Dario and Carina looked at each other with uncertainty but proceeded forward with the men's order since they clearly had some kind of authority—even if it seemed like the wrong one for the situation.
They came face to face with the two agents. Both Caucasian but one was taller with a dark colored crew cut, the other one was shorter with a darker complexion with slightly disheveled dark hair.
"Good evening, I'm agent Serim," the taller man said before pointing at his partner. "This is agent Remir, we'd like to have a word," the man spoke plainly with an expressionless smile.