Night withdraws slowly, giving way to an artificial light that slices my face clean in half. The other side disappears into withered grass, into stubborn tufts that still dream of turning green again—like the ones from a lifelong forgotten.

  Face-down amid scraps of white rubber padding and dust, I wonder how we kept surviving—and learned nothing.

  Pandemics. Chemical weapons. The Great Reset of 2085.

  Every time, we clawed our way back up—smaller, weaker, more dependent on the very things that were supposed to save us. And now, more than two centuries later, we’re staring at extinction in the face again.

  Dirt coats my tongue. My camouflage uniform is shredded into rags.

  I can’t move a muscle. My left knee won’t respond, and my shoulder might be gone, too. I’m afraid I broke every bone when I made that insane jump in midair.

  Ten days ago, I was just a kid from the Cloud.

  Then everything changed.

  Maybe I should’ve stayed on the drone.

  A cough scorches my throat. The pressure on my sternum becomes unbearable. From top of my class in robotics to a wreck in uniform—what a pathetic trajectory.

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  And yet I feel like smiling. A tear slips down and catches on a blade of grass.

  Then engines close in. A distant voice—thin, but real.

  "Isaac, hang on! We’re coming!"

  My eyelids flutter.

  A vehicle brakes hard behind me, kicking up a halo of dust. Doors slam. Footsteps—closer, closer.

  "Isaac, we’re here!"

  I’m not dreaming. It’s them. Real voices. Familiar. Another cough, and the metallic taste of blood floods in, mixing with dirt.

  If I had the strength, I’d throw up.

  A steady ringing fills my ears. Then a young woman’s scream punches the air out of my lungs.

  "Isaac!"

  Alexian… is that you?

  I squeeze my eyes shut. The tears come back, hot.

  "Please… hold on!"

  Hands—shaking—lift me. They jostle me as they strip away what’s left of the protective padding. They slide me onto a stretcher. They try to be gentle, but pain clamps down on my lungs anyway.

  I force my eyes open, but I can’t make out who’s in front of me. Everything’s blurred.

  "Hang in there, buddy!" a soldier says.

  Buddy.

  "On three!"

  Another jolt.

  I manage to open my right eye a fraction more. Smudged shapes. One of them has long blonde hair.

  Maybe it’s a mirage at the end. Or maybe it’s really her.

  A touch brushes my forehead.

  "Alexian…"

  "Don’t push yourself."

  I swallow hard. My strength is leaking out of me.

  She wipes the blood from my mouth. Her tears land on my face like warm rain.

  "The core…" I whisper.

  Her hand slides under my chin, gentle as a wordless lie.

  With the last of my strength: "Alexian, I need to know if it was… stopped."

  She doesn’t answer.

  I close my eyes.

  Then silence.

  Did we change humanity’s fate—or did we seal its doom?

  In the event of a conflict between humanity and technology, humanity will win

  Chandler Moore — Year 155 a.G.R.