First Contact
A kid with an anomalous stat, a rift that shouldn't be this big, and the night everything the system flagged about him turns out to be true.
Kes has one unusual stat. The Integration system flagged it four years ago and has been waiting ever since. He's tired of waiting. There's a Class 2 Flux rift three kilometers outside the settlement perimeter. His theory: proximity should produce a measurable response. The system will confirm what it's been sitting on. He'll finally know if the anomaly is real. He brings Harko because Harko's his best friend. Harko thinks this is a terrible idea and says so repeatedly. Nev finds out through Harko. Nev says she's coming. What follows: a Class 2 rift that becomes something else entirely, three people trying to get out of a situation that's responding specifically to one of them, and a stat that stops being a question mark. Releasing in six chapters. Standalone, Integration Era.
// Characters in this serial ▶
First Contact - Part 1
For four years, Kes Marrow's only flagged stat hasn't moved. Tonight he's slipping past the colony fence with his two best friends, hiking to a Flux rift to find out what he actually is.
First Contact - Part 2
Kes Marrow has carried a flagged Flux reading for four years. One half-second of variance, one own-goal in a school playoff, and the system has been waiting on him ever since: Reassess upon measurable engagement. Tonight he's slipping past the colony's sensor gap with his crush and his most cautious friend, hiking three klicks to a Class 2 rift. Kes is done waiting.
First Contact - Part 3
Four years ago, Kes Marrow's only flagged stat moved for half a second — long enough to score an own-goal in front of his entire school. Since then, the Integration has waited on him: Reassess upon measurable engagement. He hasn't engaged. He hasn't been able to. Tonight, with his two best friends, he's sneaking past the colony's sensor gap to a Class 2 Flux rift three klicks beyond the perimeter. He needs to know what his Flux really is. He needs the system to look at him again. What he doesn't expect is that the rift will look back. That it will keep climbing — Class 3, Class 4 — the longer he stands inside it. That it will be his proximity, not the night, that pulls something terrible toward the only home he's ever known.
First Contact - Part 4
For readers who love the affinity-awakening beats of Cradle, the stat-screen pressure of He Who Fights With Monsters, and the single-night, three-friends intimacy of Stand By Me — but tightened to a knife's edge. First Contact is a coming-of-age progression piece set in The Integration: a flagged stat, a forbidden Flux rift, two friends who shouldn't be there, and a boy who has spent four years not practicing what he actually is. Three kids walk into the dark. The system reclassifies what walks back out.
First Contact - Part 5
For readers who love the affinity-awakening beats of Cradle, the stat-screen pressure of He Who Fights With Monsters, and the single-night, three-friends intimacy of Stand By Me — but tightened to a knife's edge. First Contact is a coming-of-age progression piece set in The Integration: a flagged stat, a forbidden Flux rift, two friends who shouldn't be there, and a boy who has spent four years not practicing what he actually is. Three kids walk into the dark. The system reclassifies what walks back out.
First Contact - Part 6
For readers who love the affinity-awakening beats of Cradle, the stat-screen pressure of He Who Fights With Monsters, and the single-night, three-friends intimacy of Stand By Me — but tightened to a knife's edge. First Contact is a coming-of-age progression piece set in The Integration: a flagged stat, a forbidden Flux rift, two friends who shouldn't be there, and a boy who has spent four years not practicing what he actually is. Three kids walk into the dark. The system reclassifies what walks back out.