Fragmented Light

Chapter 4: Roots

Morning in the tunnels tasted like copper and crystal dust. Lyra watched her blood splatter the salvaged kitchen table in abstract patterns, tilting her head to admire the effect. "You know, in White Sector they pay good money for art like this."

"That's it." Aunt Milra's voice carried the edge it always got when she was trying not to show fear. She pressed a cloth to Lyra's nose with calloused hands—miner's hands, though she hadn't worked the deep tunnels since her accident. "I'm going to comm Senna."

"What, and interrupt her morning routine of pulling miners out of machinery?" The words came out thick and wet. More blood joined her artistic endeavors. "Besides, pretty sure this is just delayed karma from mouthing off to corp kids. Totally normal. Practically traditional."

"Normal?" Milra's laugh held no humor. "Your headaches are getting worse, you're burning up with fever, and now these nosebleeds won't stop. This isn't just your usual... condition."

"Could be crystal lung." Lyra tried for her best corporate health and safety voice. "Studies show that ninety-eight percent of tunnel residents experience symptoms within their first decade of—" She broke off coughing, blood coming down her throat as the familiar pressure built behind her eyes like an overcharged power cell.

"This isn't crystal lung." Milra's fingers brushed Lyra's forehead, checking for fever. They both pretended not to notice how her hand trembled. "I've seen what the dust does to people. This is something else. Something to do with your Olais levels, maybe."

Heat bloomed in Lyra's chest. That familiar, unexplainable burn. But lately, it felt different. Stronger. More urgent. Like something trying to burn its way out.

"Senna's busy," Lyra protested, watching golden sparks dance at the edges of her vision. Probably just another symptom. Hopefully just another symptom. "The clinic's always full of real emergencies—"

"You are a real emergency." Milra's tone left no room for argument as she activated their battered comm unit. Her fingers flew over the keypad with the precision of someone who'd memorized this frequency. "Your parents trusted me to look after you, and I'm not about to—" She caught herself, but the words hung in the air like crystal dust.

Not about to lose you too.

"Fine." Lyra pushed herself up from the table, immediately regretting the sudden movement as the world tilted sideways. "But I'm walking there myself. Bad enough being sick without getting carried through the tunnels like some corp kid's broken drone."

Ten minutes and three near-falls later, she was seriously reconsidering that decision. Luckily for her, Aunt Milra was tailing her closely behind. How wonderful. The fever made tunnel lights blur and swim, casting strange shadows on the walls. Or maybe they weren't shadows at all. Sometimes, when the pressure behind her eyes peaked, she thought she saw... something. Patterns in the air. Ripples in reality itself.

Milra's hand stayed steady on her elbow despite Lyra's nonstop protests. They made their way through cramped passages that seemed to twist in new ways, the familiar routes of Yellow Sector suddenly alien and wrong.

"Almost there," Milra murmured, guiding her around a corner. "Just hold on."

The Utility Tunnels stretched before them, a maze of maintenance shafts and jury-rigged infrastructure that housed this corner of Galri's vital services. And at their heart, Doc Senna's clinic—a haven of salvaged equipment and stubborn hope. Crystal dust swirled through shafts of flickering light as they approached, and the clinic's makeshift sign creaked on rusted hinges with a sound as familiar as breathing.

Through the haze of fever, Lyra caught fragments of an argument drifting through the clinic's thin walls. Senna's voice, usually so controlled, carried notes of frustration she rarely let slip: