Andromeda

  The silence of the VIRELIA wasn’t emptiness.

  It was focus. Constant. Familiar. A quiet hum that mirrored my thoughts.

  I stood in the central observatory, watching the stars stretch across the viewport like threads of glass and fire. My reflection shimmered faintly, long black-purple hair cascading past my shoulders, deep violet eyes rimmed with electric light. According to AUREL, I had my mother’s grace and my father’s stare.

  But tonight, something changed.

  "Systems stable.

  Magic pulse normal.

  External drift: negligible.”

  AUREL’s voice chimed, calm and clinical. "Captain, it is now exactly midnight Galactic Standard Time. As of this moment, you are sixteen years old."

  I nodded. "Noted."

  There was no ceremony. No celebration. Just another shift of time in our drifting sanctuary.

  Until pain bloomed across my spine.

  I staggered forward, catching myself on the railing as heat coursed through me like molten light. My breath caught. Every nerve in my back flared. My skin burned, but not as if it were being wounded. It was... unfolding.

  Light erupted behind me, casting violet arcs across the polished floors. I screamed; a short, sharp sound cut off by sheer disbelief.

  Wings!

  Black-violet and massive, they burst free from me in one pulse of magic, not tearing through skin but phasing into reality from beneath it. They shimmered like folded space, moving with weight and grace I didn’t understand.

  Then came the second change.

  My ears itched. I touched them, and froze.

  Pointed.

  Sharpened. Subtle but undeniable.

  "AUREL," I breathed, voice hoarse. "What’s happening to me?"

  Before the AI could respond, another gasp rang out.

  Kali stood at the doorway, eyes wide, silver hair tousled from sleep. "Andromeda?"

  Then it hit her.

  She collapsed to her knees, hands clenching the floor as silver light burst from her back. Wings of glowing time-threaded silver spread behind her in luminous arcs. Her breath shook, and I saw the same shift ripple through her ears, elongating them to a pointed grace.

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  We stared at each other, two beings halfway through becoming something else.

  "AUREL," Kali whispered, voice trembling. "What are we?"

  The AI responded without hesitation. "Subjects Andromeda and Kali, exhibit definitive markers of Class III hybridization. Phenotype and mana signature match known traits of the fairy subspecies native to the planet Elantheris."

  "Fairies?" I echoed. "We're part... fairy?"

  "Correct. Your latent heritage remained dormant until the age of maturation. Activation of wings and ear morphology was triggered by your internal mana threshold crossing critical alignment."

  Kali’s voice cracked. "Why didn’t we know? Why didn’t you tell us?"

  AUREL paused, then answered calmly, "This data was encoded within the ship’s locked archives. Protocol required biological emergence before disclosure."

  We looked at each other again. Wings glowing. Ears tingling. Breath shared across a widening chasm of identity.

  "So who are we really?" I asked, quietly.

  AUREL’s tone softened. "Only one way to find out."

  A new map glowed to life on the console behind us, its trajectory aimed into unknown space.

  "Captain. Vice-Captain. It is time to begin exploring."

  I stood slowly and helped Kali to her feet. We turned together, wings slowly folding behind us, toward the helm.

  Our hands found each other instinctively.

  We didn’t speak.

  But our eyes said everything.

  We were going to find the truth.

  Even if it shattered everything we thought we were.

  The ship responded to our presence like it had been waiting. Panels lit softly under our fingertips. Mana circuits shimmered as our wings passed through their field.

  Kali adjusted the sensor feed, her movements shaky but precise. "Where do we start?"

  "Anywhere that isn't mapped," I said. "We’re not going to find answers by retracing paths."

  AUREL chimed in. "A star system thirty-two light years from our current location shows residual magical readings that do not match known civilizations. It is uncharted."

  Kali looked at me. "Sounds perfect."

  I nodded. "Set the course."

  Engines rumbled beneath us. A low, familiar pulse. But everything felt different now, clearer, sharper, more real.

  As the warp drive activated, I closed my eyes. The hum of magic flowed through the ship. My magic.

  Our magic.

  We were born on a dying planet. Stolen from it. Raised in the silence between stars.

  But now?

  Now we were awake.

  And the universe will be our playground.

  The jump had just begun when Kali nudged my shoulder, her silver eyes lit with curiosity. "Hey. Think these wings do anything besides look cool?”

  I arched a brow. "You mean besides nearly knocking over half the observatory earlier?”

  "Exactly." She grinned, then stretched her arms and gave a little twirl. Her wings flexed behind her, sharp-edged and graceful. "Let’s find out.”

  We made our way to the simulation chamber. A circular arena with walls lined in mana sensitive alloy. The room shimmered to life as AUREL recognized our presence.

  "Simulations ready. Magical resistance calibrated to current threshold. Environmental variables stable.”

  The moment we stepped inside, our wings twitched.

  The air felt different here, denser, sharper, alive with possibility.

  I gave mine a test beat. A single flap sent a gust across the chamber, throwing Kali's hair over her face.

  "Whoa," she said, brushing it back. "These things are strong."

  She lifted off the ground experimentally. Her movements were shaky, uneven, but she hovered. I followed, my wings responding with instinctive control. The sensation was intoxicating, like flight wasn’t something learned, but remembered.

  "Let's test casting," I said. I summoned a small sphere of spatial magic in my palm.

  The moment it formed, my wings pulsed. The orb expanded, its density doubled.

  Kali conjured a time-loop distortion and launched it at one of the simulation drones. It hit and then rewound mid-strike, hitting again a heartbeat later.

  "That's new," she said, blinking. "It amplified itself."

  "Our wings are amplifiers," I muttered. "They channel mana like natural conduits.”

  Kali touched her ears thoughtfully. "What about these?"

  I stilled, listening.

  There! A sound. Faint. A heartbeat. No, multiple. The drone's energy core. I could hear it pulsing from across the room.

  "Enhanced perception," I said. "We can hear mana flows. Maybe more."

  We tested for another hour. Flight speed, casting reflexes, even joint casting with our wings overlapping. Every result confirmed it: we weren’t just changed.

  We were evolving.

  "Fairies," Kali whispered, panting as she landed beside me. "Whatever this means for us... it makes us dangerous."

  I didn’t deny it.

  But I didn’t fear it either.

  —

  We returned to the observation deck as the final stages of the jump approached.

  "I keep thinking about what AUREL said," Kali murmured as she leaned on the glass. "Fairy traits. Pointed ears. Wings. We were born on Earth, right? So... how?”

  "I don’t know," I admitted. "But if our parents are out there, they probably know. Or at least... they’re looking for us.”

  Kali nodded slowly, eyes still locked on the stars. "Do you think they’re like us? Or... completely different?”

  "We’ll find out eventually," I said. "We have to."

  She turned to me. "Do you think the people on that planet will recognize what we are?”

  I gave her a faint smile. "Let’s hope they’re friendly enough to ask before shooting.”

  She snorted. "You always know what to say to calm me down."

  "I’m your big sister. It’s in the job description." The uncharted system loomed ahead, its faint signal now growing stronger on the scanner.

  "Arrival in sixty seconds," AUREL announced.

  Kali leaned on the railing beside me, eyes fixed on the approaching stars. "You think we’ll find something out there?”

  I didn’t answer immediately. The weight of our wings, the pulse of our blood, the echo of that transformation still lingered beneath my skin.

  "I think we’re going to find everything we’ve been missing."

  The stars stretched. The warp corridor shimmered.

  And in the blink of a breath, we dropped back into realspace.

  A planet filled the viewport. Blue-green, glowing faintly with a magical signature neither of us recognized.

  Our first destination.

  Our first step into the truth.