Jaxon’s legs struggled to keep up with his mother’s desperate pace as she pulled him through the ruined streets. The air was thick with smoke, burning his lungs with every ragged breath. The taste of ash and blood clung to his tongue. Explosions rocked the district, shaking the ground beneath them, while the screams of the dying filled the air—soldiers shouting orders, civilians wailing, the inhuman screeches of the invaders tearing through the night like the wails of a waking nightmare.
His mother’s grip on his wrist was painful, but he didn’t complain. Not when people were dying all around them. Not when every second counted.
They ran past a collapsed overpass, where a transport vehicle lay twisted in the wreckage, flames licking at its shattered windows. A woman was still inside, slumped over the controls, her lifeless eyes staring at nothing. Jaxon tried not to look, but his gaze lingered too long. He wasn’t used to seeing the dead.
He could barely understand what was happening.
One moment, he had been in their residence , watching his father—a militia officer, nothing more than a man—suit up in his old combat gear, his mother whispering urgent prayers under her breath. She had told him to pack a small bag, just the essentials. Food, water, his datapad. He hadn’t understood why—until the alarms had blared.
A city-wide emergency alert ordering all civilians to evacuate.
Then the explosions had started.
Now, everything was fire and ruin.
His mother’s grip on his wrist was painfully tight as they ran.
“Don’t look back,” she begged, voice cracking. “Jaxon, please—don’t look back!”
But he did.
The district’s outer barricades had already fallen. Xerath warforms poured through the breached walls, grotesque creatures of twisting limbs and chitin, their eyeless heads snapping in unnatural angles as they tore through the defenders. Men and women of the mortal legions fired their rifles in desperate bursts, but it was like trying to hold back an ocean with bare hands.
Jaxon saw one of the beasts lunge into a squad, its bladed arms slicing through body armor like it was paper. Blood sprayed across the pavement. The remaining soldiers barely had time to react before another Xerath emerged, its grotesque, segmented limbs moving too fast for something so large.
A soldier turned to run.
The xerath was faster.
Its scythe-like appendage cleaved through the man’s spine in a single, horrifying stroke.
Jaxon screamed.
His mother yanked him forward, faster. They had to reach the shelter. The underground transit hub was close—just a few more blocks. They dodged past wrecked vehicles, broken bodies, collapsed buildings. The city he had known his whole life was nothing but smoke and flame now.
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Then the barricade ahead erupted in an explosion of fire and shrapnel.
Jaxon was thrown off his feet.
The world flipped. His ears rang as his body crashed into something hard. The impact knocked the air from his lungs, and for a moment, all he could do was lay there, stunned, vision swimming.
His mother groaned beside him, blood trailing down the side of her head.
She was still alive.
Before relief could settle in, a shadow loomed over them.
Jaxon’s heart seized.
The thing that stood before them was massive—easily three meters tall. Its elongated body was covered in blackened, carapace-like plating that shimmered with an unnatural, organic sheen. Its arms were long and bladed, razor-sharp scythes instead of hands, twitching as if eager to strike. Where a face should have been, there was only a grotesque, gaping maw lined with rows of needle-like teeth.
Jaxon knew what it was.
A Xerath Reaper.
Jaxon had seen holo-footage of them in school. He had seen diagrams, read reports. None of it had prepared him for the real thing.
The Reaper let out a clicking screech.
He couldn’t breathe.
His entire body locked up in pure terror as the monstrous figure loomed over them.
His mother moved first.
She threw herself over him, shielding his small frame with her own.
Her breathing was ragged, panicked, but she didn’t hesitate. Jaxon could feel the desperate rise and fall of her chest, the way her fingers clutched him so tightly they trembled.
The Reaper let out a clicking screech.
It raised its scythe-like appendage.
Jaxon shut his eyes.
A wet sound—blade slicing through flesh.
His mother shuddered.
A sharp gasp escaped her lips.
Then, slowly, her grip loosened.
She slumped over him.
Warmth spilled across his face.
Jaxon opened his eyes.
All he could see was red.
His mother’s body lay across his own, shielding him even in death. Her blood dripped onto his cheeks, onto his tunic, onto the broken pavement beneath them.
A high-pitched ringing filled his ears.
He didn’t scream.
He couldn’t.
The Reaper reared back for another strike—
Gunfire.
Explosions.
A booming voice—“GET DOWN!”
The weight of his mother was suddenly yanked off him as something heavy slammed into the Reaper, tackling it away in a whirlwind of thrashing limbs. A rapid burst of high-caliber rounds tore into the monster’s carapace.
Jaxon’s vision swam. His head was spinning. He barely registered the figure kneeling beside him—a massive soldier clad in black combat armor.
Not militia.
Not mortal legion.
Jaxon had heard of them before—elite warriors, enhanced far beyond normal human limits. Genome Soldiers.
The visor of the man’s helmet reflected the flames around them. The insignia of the Sol Imperium—a silver coiling serpent biting it’s own tail burned bright on his shoulder plate.
“Kid—” The soldier’s voice was muffled, distorted by the chaos. “—stay with me! We have to move!”
Jaxon stared at him, unblinking, unresponsive.
The soldier cursed and scooped him up effortlessly, cradling him against his chest like dead weight. Jaxon barely felt it. His gaze remained locked on his mother’s lifeless body, growing smaller and smaller as they ran.
His fingers twitched.
Then, finally—he screamed.
The Evacuation
They reached the transit hub.
The underground station was a chaotic mess of fleeing civilians, wounded militia, and hastily arranged barricades. Alarms blared overhead. The station’s blast doors were closing, sealing off the tunnels that led deeper into the city’s underbelly. Last chance for evacuation.
The genome soldier carried Jaxon through the frenzied crowd.
“Medic!” he barked. “Get this kid checked!”
The moment they arrived, medics rushed to pull Jaxon away—but the boy thrashed wildly in their grip.
He clawed at the soldier’s armor, trying to break free.
“No!” Jaxon screamed. “I have to go back! My mom—she’s still—she—”
The words broke into choking sobs.
His mother was still out there.
She was still lying in the street.
She couldn’t be gone.
She couldn’t.
“Kid—” The soldier’s voice softened, but there was no time.
A sharp prick against Jaxon’s neck.
His body instantly weakened. His vision blurred.
His struggling faded into nothing.
The last thing he saw before the darkness took him was the soldier’s faceplate, visor flashing in the dim light.
Then—nothing.
