When the Ruvos of old ceased to be, the ancient cosmos perished with them.

The Cosmos had once been like a rich orchard with habitable planets like fruits, ripe for the taking.

The Ruvos had shaped it as such, and they had seen it was good.

The Firstborn spent eons tending to their orchard with diligent love and care. But nothing lasts forever. When their end was prophesied, the Ruvos saw it was unavoidable. All they could do was take measures to try and turn their death into something temporary.

The Ruvos built a Veil and within it hid a seed. A seed which would sprout a new generation, destined to restore order in the endless sea of stars.

While the seed gestated, the prophecy was fulfilled. Demons seeped in through the cracks of reality and feasted on the souls of the Ruvos.

With its caretakers gone, the orchard slowly withered. Chaos took root and drove the various races still living in the dead trees mad.

Yet despite all the madness and all the suffering, the seed sprouted.

The new generation was born, but they were nothing like their ancestors: They were young and primitive, lacking in wisdom and patience. The Reborn were ill suited for the destiny that had been bestowed upon them.

The Firstborn were aware of this, for they had once been young and primitive, too.

Thus the Ruvos had given their seedlings five great angels. Five Oracles sent to tend to the Reborn as the Ruvos had tended to the cosmos. The Oracles would guide and teach the seedlings until the day they were worthy of the name Ruvos. until then, the Reborn would be known as the Runora.

And now, over five millennia after the death of the Ruvos, Noah stood face-to-face with all five Oracles. They towered over him, regal in their stature and noble in their expressions. The young boy went to his knees and prayed to them all with a smile on his face.

“Thank you, gentle Ishaï, Arch-Saint of Delenis. Thank you for the sustenance and healing you provide.”

“Thank you, mighty Harir, Gilded Champion. Thank you for being our fearless sword.”

“Thank you, mysterious Neith, Keeper of the Veil. Thank you for keeping the insidious Demons at bay.”

“Thank you, Ingenious Reine, Great Engineer. Thank you for giving us the stars.”

“Thank you Regal Catae, Oracle-Mistress. Thank you for guiding us to our holy destiny.”

Noah opened his eyes and looked up to the five great Oracles. These were not the real ones, of course. They were but depictions carved in rock. Whoever had created these statues had obviously taken no small degree of artistic freedom. That was fine. It was the symbolism that mattered. The Oracles would hear his prayers, if he only had enough faith.

“Holy angels, please watch over my people in these hard times. Help us remain united in the face of the alien invaders.

“Grant strength to our troops, grant strength to Cai. Watch over him and keep him safe, please.” He felt a tear form in the corner of his eye.

“Please, grant strength to my parents too. You know how difficult it has been for them. And, please… watch over me.”

He knew of nothing more to ask or to say, so he sat in content silence for a few minutes. Other believers came and went to say their prayers or to offer tribute to the Oracles, though few stayed as long as him.

Faith, to the Runora, was a simple thing. The Angels they worshiped walked amongst them, so it was hard to not believe to at least some degree. The Oracles never explicitly opposed the faith itself, although they had outlawed organized religion. With no dedicated churches or temples, Idols and statues like these would often act as improvised places of worship.

Noah had never seen these specific statues himself, and that while they were only about two blocks away from his usual route. So far he considered it the only bright side of the detour Rosa had dragged him along.

“Right then. Here you go.” Rosa’s voice came from behind. She circled around and offered him a hand, using her other arm to carry what looked like two buckets labeled Selem Chef. He reluctantly accepted her outstretched hand and allowed her to pull him to his feet.

“Do you think any of them are gonna come help us?” He asked her.

“Who?” She asked, turning around to follow his eyes. “Ah, them.”

That was something else in which Noah and Rosa were polar opposites. He knew he was a little on the pious side, while she was anything but. In that respect she resembled his brother quite a lot.

She seemed to mull his question over for a few moments, then simply shrugged.

“Maybe, if they really thought it was necessary. More likely the closest one’s just gonna send a few of their Kinsworn.”

Kinsworn. Just to hear the name of the legendary group of warriors each of the Oracles had amassed made him swell up with patriotic pride

“Woah… do you think I’ll get to see any?!” He asked excitedly.

“Wouldn’t count on it. Here, eat up.” Rosa said and handed him a bucket. The bigger one, he noted.

Noah peeled the lid open and was hit in the face by a greasy wave of hot steam. He peered inside and found the jar filled to the edge with what seemed like mushroom noodles with actual meat and veggies.

“What’s this?” He asked his companion quizzically. Such a meal was worth a small fortune. Something to be eaten on holidays or, if he was lucky, his birthday. Not out here on the street after a normal day of work.

“It’s food." Rosa said, opening her own bucket with a pop and fishing a fork from under the lid. “Good food at that. Don’t go telling me now that you don’t like it.”

“No, I just thought that…” Noah began, but he stopped himself. Rosa’s money was hers to spend. If she wanted to treat him then the last thing he should be doing is ask for an explanation. “Thanks. I was getting kinda hungry.”

“Bet so. Suup told me we shifted a record load of rock today. Deserves a little celebration, yeah?“ Rosa said. She shoveled a clump of the thick noodles into her mouth and started walking down the station square. Her sudden departure caught Noah off guard. He thought they would have at least sat down to eat. He hurriedly caught up with her and tried to fish out some of his own food. Turns out that handling a fork while walking was a lot more difficult than he’d thought.

“Sho where’sh you off to?” Rosa asked with a mouth full of noodles. She finally swallowed and looked back at him. “Home? Or you’ve got somewhere else to be?”

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“Dunno…” He answered quietly. “I was thinking of visiting my sister.”

“Cool, want me to come with?” Rosa asked as if she hadn’t already decided. She

took another bite of her food and belched in the most unladylike manner. If it was meant as humor, it missed the mark.

“Dunno…” He repeated himself, keeping his voice shallow. “It’s kinda private.”

“That’s fair. I can just wait outside the door.” She said. Noah accepted with a nod.

They walked down a flight of stairs, leaving the calm square and the statues of the Oracles behind. The passageway they now entered was a lot busier. People entering and exiting the Levilines stuck to the edges of the hall like two rivers flowing past each other. Little shops dotted the walls, blaring their advertisements out into the crowd through mismatched sets of audio equipment. It was rush hour, prime time for these independent retailers.

A lanky-looking shop owner wearing a leather apron came out of nowhere and took Noah by the arm. The man wasted no time in advertising his product, though Noah couldn’t really understand him over the drone of the ads and the never-ending stream of people.

He got a vaguely flashlight-shaped object shoved in his face, along with several assurances that it would be the perfect tool for a miner like him. Noah put his hands in front of him and tried to politely tell him off, but he couldn’t get a word in. He was starting to consider just buying the product to escape the pushy vendor, but another strong grip closed around his shoulder and pulled him away before he could make the decision.

“Gotta be careful with these station types, they’re real dodgy.” Rosa said as she dragged him along. Noah took one last look back at the man, just in time to see him make an obscene gesture before turning to his next potential customer.

“I’m sorry.” Noah said, not really knowing what he was apologizing for. He decided to just turn to his meal and seem too busy for anyone to bother with him. Rosa didn’t let go of him this time, so he just let her guide him through the mass of people until they left the crowded passageway and entered the station proper.

Noah looked up and nearly choked on his food. The main station was enormous: The hall they just entered was well over four kilometers in width, eight hundred meters high, and stretched on for so long that Noah could see the horizon. It made the small passenger station he and Rosa had just come from seem like an afterthought. These stations were for the bulk-transporters: Magnetically levitating cities –they couldn’t really be called trains anymore– transporting trillions of tons of ore from the planet’s various mines and quarries to the processing plants and then the space elevators, ready for transport to other systems.

To someone who spent most of his life in spaces where he could touch both walls at the same time, it could be pretty nauseating to see something like this. Noah swallowed and shook his head to shrug it off. He’d been here plenty of times before, he had managed to adjust. The wide, open space had just taken him by surprise this time.

He went through the steps he was taught: First, he looked at his boots. He steadied his breathing and ran his workskin’s environmental diagnostics. Once the skin had assured him that the air, air pressure, and temperature were all safe, he slowly brought his eyes up until they were level with the wall. He was good to go now, though he still avoided looking along the station’s length. The horizon was pretty when viewed from behind the safety of armorglass. He didn’t need to see it here.

Still, there was one sight here worth risking losing his dinner over: Noah craned his neck and stared at the ceiling, nearly a kilometer above his head. Like nearly every building in the labor districts, the station hall had been designed with a purely utilitarian mindset. Not a thought had gone out to decoration of any kind, but the necessities of architecture had given one part of the station a beauty all of its own.

Steel pillars the size of skyscrapers reached up and curved into beams to support the weight of the ceiling and the city above, their spires interlocking in complicated triangular patterns which provided the station with incredible structural strength and created a visual spectacle. The fact that the latter feat was unintended only made it more impressive to Noah.

His neck was starting to feel sore so he returned his gaze to ground level, only for his eyes to be assaulted by an explosion of bright colors that didn’t help one bit with his nausea: The station might at one point have been a perfectly square box daubed in gray, but those days had long since passed.

Freelance artists, more commonly known as vandalists, had turned nearly every surface of the hall into their canvas. What had once been an eyesore of boring uniformity was now an eyesore of a thousand mismatched colors and pictures, spray-painted over every wall and floor. It had been like that for most of its lifespan, so station authorities were long past trying to restore the building to its former lack of colors. All they focused on nowadays was the removal of the most affronting pieces and the never ending chase of the paintgun-wielding delinquents..

Only the ceiling had been spared that radical makeover. Noah didn’t know whether the self-appointed interior designers had appreciated the innate beauty of that structure like he did, or whether it was simply too high up for them to reach without getting caught. Whatever the reason, he was glad the ceiling had so far been left alone.

A train rushed past on one of the magnetic tracks and his eyes instinctively followed it. Too late he realized his mistake and he doubled over gagging, barely managing to keep Rosa’s expensive meal down.

“Don’t come here too often, do you?” She asked with a laugh as she turned around. She seemed completely unaffected by the fear of open spaces many Sindrionites shared. Yet another strange thing about her, Noah thought as he wiped his mouth. He took another deep breath and shuddered, making sure he wouldn’t puke as soon as he opened his mouth before answering.

“Nah, I usually leave through the passenger platforms. This is the other way from…” A cold fear gripped Noah’s heart as he said those words. Somehow saying that out loud had unlocked a question that had been gnawing at the back of his mind. Why were they heading the complete opposite direction from where he needed to go?

He’d gone along with Rosa because she warned him from unseen danger. But what if SHE was the danger?

He suddenly realized that she was little more than a stranger, yet a few kind words and a bucket of free food had been enough for him to trust her blindly. He was stupid, STUPID to have followed her out here.

His pace slowed and he looked around nervously. He could probably make a run for it. She was faster than him, but he could lose her in the mass of people before she noticed he was gone. Unless any of her accomplices were hiding in the crowd. She probably made sure all routes of escape were blocked off. Noah swallowed. His head was spinning with all the possibilities, making him lose sense of rational thought. In mere moments his suspicion of Rosa had cemented itself in his brain, turning what had been a hunch into undisputable reality.

He didn’t know what to do or how to escape, so his brain put him in lockdown and he stopped walking altogether. Rosa didn’t immediately notice. He prayed that she would just keep going without looking back.

Please, please, please, please. He chanted to himself, but if the Oracles heard him they didn’t listen. Rosa finally turned around, looked at him quizzically, then marched right back. She seemed hurried, the arms of her workskin dangling at her sides. It made the suspicious parts of Noah’s brain flare up in biased enthusiasm.

See? They yipped triumphantly. She’s obviously up to no good if she’s coming at you that fast. She’s scared you’ll get away.

He wanted to run, wanted to flee from the girl who’d been nothing but nice to him, but his limbs refused to obey his commands. He stood frozen, and Rosa bridged the small distance between them in no time.

“What are you doing?” She hissed at him through gritted teeth. Noah saw a slightly concerned look in her eyes. “I thought you wanted to go see your sister?”

Noah still didn’t move a muscle. After a few moments he saw the lines in Rosa’s face soften, then she nodded in understanding.

“You’re wondering if you can trust me.” She asked, and Noah nodded. “I’m gonna be real honest with you there buddy, you’re a bit late with that.”