LukeMommen
The New Lie is sealed, but the escape is just beginning.
John Miller successfully anchors the Veridian psychic field, trading planetary chaos for perfect, terminal stability-a silent prison paid for with the consciousness of his sister, Elara. But his ultimate act of calculated coherence has one massive flaw: Kael, the boy who remains the last truly viable emotional variable.
Stranded above the beautiful, dead world he created, Miller and the Vydonian K'trel must scavenge a new vessel-the ancient, rust-eaten transport known as the Blackheart-from the deadly orbiting debris of the Planetary Graveyard. Their goal is simple: disappear into the deep void and bury the variable where the Custodian's system can never find him.
But stability attracts instability. The mission immediately collapses into a desperate, chaotic flight as they are tracked by Venn, a ruthless bounty hunter with a deep, personal vendetta against K'trel, who views Kael as the ultimate prize.
Forced to seek refuge in the lawless, teeming chaos of Aethel Station, Miller must sacrifice his own need for order and expose Kael to the unfiltered emotion of a thousand different species. As the Custodian closes in on Kael's unique signature, Miller realizes his ultimate betrayal of the New Lie is not the escape itself, but the act of protecting the very chaos he sought to destroy. The war for the future will not be fought with logic, but with the boy's untamed heart.