It started on a Tuesday.
Not with thunder or fire or the sound of war. Just… a shimmer in the sky, like a ripple in water suspended overhead. People didn't notice it at first. They were too busy—late for work, stuck in traffic, scrolling through noise.
But James noticed.
He was sitting on the floor of his apartment, back against a chipped wall, arms draped loosely over his knees. The light was off. The fridge buzzed softly. Rain tapped against the window like it was asking to be let in.
Outside, New Chicago stirred in growing panic. He could hear sirens now. Screams. Something was happening.
He didn't move.
He just listened.
Thirteen Years Earlier
When James was twelve, his father left without saying goodbye. No note. No explanation. Just silence.
His mother started drinking again after that. Sometimes she would stare at the wall for hours, waiting for someone who was never coming back. The cupboards went empty. The bills piled up. James learned quickly that needing things made you weak. He stopped needing.
At fourteen, he stole his first meal. At sixteen, he hacked a corporate vending system just to prove he could. At eighteen, he turned down his acceptance to an engineering university and took a job writing code for a black-market AI dealer.
He didn't want to be someone.
He wanted to be free.
Back to Present — 2055
The sky tore open.
A black slit hovered above the city, crackling with violet energy. Thunder without sound. Light without heat. People ran. Drones lost signal. Cars crashed into each other like dominoes.
Then the pulse came.
A surge of green light—cool, precise—swept over the skyline. Everyone it touched stopped moving. Frozen, eyes glowing faintly, heads tilted back like puppets.
James flinched as the wave hit him.
A sharp static hum rang in his ears.
And then… text appeared.
Not on a screen.
In his vision.
[CLASS INTERFACE INITIALIZING...][Analyzing subject...][Error: Standard classification failed.][Override detected...][Legendary Class Assigned: CYBORG][Do you accept integration? Y/N]
His breath caught in his throat.
This wasn't AR. It wasn't a hallucination. His apartment had no power, no signal, and yet the text hovered right in front of him—crystal clear and unmoving.
He swallowed.
"…Yes," he whispered.
[Integration commencing...][WARNING: Process is irreversible.]
Pain
The first thing he felt was heat—like a furnace igniting inside his bones.
His spine arched as muscle tore, joints cracked, and his body betrayed him. He hit the floor hard, gasping. His fingers spasmed violently. His right arm convulsed—bones snapping, twisting, reshaping.
Something metallic pushed up from under his skin.
He screamed.
He didn't care who heard.
His right eye burned. Not just pain—reconstruction. His vision exploded in white, then black, then blue. The world flickered through new filters, overlaid with reticles and data.
His ribs groaned as something pressed against them from the inside—reinforcing, anchoring, integrating.
And then, finally, stillness.
He lay there, chest rising and falling.
Not dead.
But not fully human either.
[Integration Complete][Status: CYBORG][Subdermal Skeleton: Reinforced Titanium Composite][Right Arm: Full-Conversion Mechanical Unit][Right Eye: Cybernetic Interface Online][Vital Organs: Retained (Human)][Power Core: Stable]
James coughed and rolled onto his side.
His body felt heavier. Stronger. The floor beneath him cracked slightly as he pushed himself up. The fingers on his right hand—now sleek black metal—moved with eerie precision. Smooth. Seamless.
He stumbled into the bathroom and caught sight of himself in the mirror.
The person staring back was both familiar and foreign.
His right eye glowed faintly blue, mechanical components embedded around the socket like armor. The skin of his right arm had been replaced entirely with segmented plating. Black steel. Gleaming. Beautiful, in a terrifying way.
He leaned closer, eyes trembling.
Not from fear.
From realization.
"This isn't a suit," he whispered. "This is me now."
The City Burns
He opened the window.
New Chicago was in chaos.
Smoke curled from broken buildings. Creatures—tall, sinewy, some insectoid—crawled across rooftops and tore through the streets. Gunfire echoed. Military drones buzzed overhead, already outnumbered.
[Scanning…][Unknown lifeforms detected. Bio-data incompatible.][Threat level: Variable]
James didn't panic.
But something inside his chest tightened.
Not fear—tension. Instinct. He wasn't stupid. This wasn't just a disaster. It was a shift. A reset. The kind of moment you either seized or were swallowed by.
He looked down at his new hand.
A smooth metal casing slid open over the palm, revealing a micro-barrel hidden within.
[Nano-Railgun Online][Power output: 23%]
His reflection in the window shimmered.
His heart was still human.
But the rest of him?
He didn't know yet.
The Girl
A scream.
He turned sharply—his right eye tracking motion before he consciously registered it.
Down below, a girl—maybe sixteen—was sprinting across the alley, tripping over debris. Behind her, a quadrupedal creature scrambled on clawed limbs, jaws lined with twitching teeth.
[Target locked][Distance: 47 meters]
James hesitated.
She was going to die.
It wasn't his responsibility.
But…
She looked back for a split second. Eyes wide, terrified, alone.
He lifted his hand.
The railgun whined softly, a rising hum of energy.
He fired.
The bolt of light punched clean through the creature's skull. It collapsed mid-lunge, skidding lifelessly across the pavement.
The girl stumbled backward, gasping, searching the rooftops.
James closed the window.
[Target Neutralized][Class XP +3%][Tactical Data Absorbed: Neural Mapping | Bone Density | Movement Algorithm]
He stood in silence.
Not heroic. Not emotional.
Just… thoughtful.
Helping her had benefited him. That was enough.
But still, as he sat back down on the floor, staring at the glow of his cybernetic eye in the darkened glass, a strange flicker of something stirred.
A question.
What happens now?
Closing Logs
[Core Status: Stable][Combat System: Active][Class Objective: Undefined][Warning: Evolution stagnates without long-term goals.]
James exhaled.
"…You want me to evolve."
The system said nothing.
But he already knew the answer.
He'd spent his whole life resisting the world's systems—governments, jobs, schools, families. Every one of them wanted to define him.
Now, he had a system of his own.
And it would only grow if he gave it purpose.
He smiled, barely.
"Then I guess we'll find one."
Outside, the sky rippled again.
And James, for the first time in his life, stood up to meet it.