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Once, the GlassReef was a gleaming waterfront of chrome towers and shining plazas, built by corporations who promised a future of endless wealth and effortless living. They called it a city of tomorrow — crystalline facades reflecting the ocean, a hub meant to lure investors and dreamers alike. But the seas kept rising, and the corporations fled before the water could swallow their profits. What remains today is a half-drowned skeleton of that vision, where glass high-rises jut like coral teeth from the surf, their lower levels lost to brackish tides.
Now, the GlassReef is alive again — but not with the future its architects imagined. The drowned streets have become a floating bazaar, built of pontoons, rafts, and broken bridges lashed together. Gangs, scavengers, and desperate families cling to the shifting platforms, trading cybernetic scraps, jury-rigged tech, and oxygen canisters. The upper towers are battlegrounds claimed by salvage lords and syndicates, while the lower floors are the realm of divers, who risk their lives in the black water for whatever treasures the corporations left behind. more ↓
Aqualonix
Aqualonix is a Luddite Broker who Knows Everything
You’ve made it this far without having any cybernetic implants—an extreme outlier in a world where they’re as common as eyeglasses. You should decide the reason why you don’t have any—religious objection, allergic to synthetic materials, poverty, or simply lucky (or talented) enough to never have needed them. You might be open and obvious about this, or try to keep it a secret (perhaps using scars or tattoos to make it look like you aren’t a luddite).
You’re a know-it-all. You’ve always been curious, likely to be found with your nose in a book and several wiki articles pulled up on your computer. In your school days, you were probably a good student and skilled researcher. In the present, your primary hobby is gathering knowledge. You know what questions to ask and where to look for the answers.
Your mental cybernetics have improved your memory and given you nigh-unlimited access to information. You’re a mental powerhouse—and eager to keep learning.
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Corvexa
Corvexa is a Corpo Broker who Explores Cyberspace
You have (or had) a successful career working for a megacorporation, climbing your way up through the ranks. You’ve kissed ass and backstabbed as much as you needed to in order to survive the capitalist rat race. You’re smart, manipulative, and observant. Maybe you’re still employed there, with a “safe” promotion that’s giving you some time to take a breather before your next goal. Maybe you were fired for cause, or cut loose to improve the corporation’s end-of-quarter profit. You might be a loyalist looking to get back in, or vengeful and ready to see what other opportunities avail you.
You’ve always been fascinated by cyberspace, its architecture, and the wealth of data it contains. You may have started out as a hacker, programmer, or data administrator, but viewing the internet on a screen was never enough for you. You’re driven by the urge to transcend your body, to enter a complete simulation of that nonsensical nonspace. You’re a netrunner, hooked on the thrill of jacking into the matrix, where you interact with physical manifestations of AI, software, and viruses.
You might enter the matrix for legitimate reasons, such as for your job or education-or maybe you make a point of going where you’re not welcome, stealing and selling proprietary data. With access to a computer or terminal, you plug yourself in and you’re off to the races.
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Brinix
Brinix is a Skeptical Broker who Hacks The Network
You possess a questioning attitude regarding claims that are often taken for granted by others. You’re not necessarily a “doubting Thomas” (a skeptic who refuses to believe anything without direct personal experience), but you’ve often benefited from questioning the statements, opinions, and received knowledge presented to you by others.
AI and the countless networks integrated into every part of life are as ubiquitous as air and, to most people, about as noticeable. Not you. From the moment you first realized that networks ran on an underlying “Ur” tongue, a code of mathematics and logical symbols, you were hooked. It wasn’t your goal to learn everything you could about hacking computers so much as there was nothing else for you. As a thrown stone follows its trajectory, you learned to hack the network.
As long as you have access to a computer, hand terminal, or other connection, you accomplish your goals by working the code. You might have a few extra pockets for high-energy snacks and spare storage devices, as well.
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Nautex
Nautex is a Jovial Broker who Weaponizes Chrome
You’re cheerful, friendly, and outgoing. You put others at ease with a big smile and a joke, possibly one at your own expense, though lightly ribbing your companions who can take it is also one of your favorite pastimes. Sometimes people say you never take anything seriously. That’s not true, of course, but you have learned that to dwell on the bad too long quickly robs the world of joy. You’ve always got a new joke in your back pocket because you collect them like some people collect bottles of wine.
Some of your organic parts have been replaced with artificial components. Like most people in the city, you are a cyborg, but your augmentations are extensive, and your chrome parts are specialized for melee combat. You almost certainly have metal plating and technical components visible on your skin. As you advance, you can add to, modify, or discover new functions for your machine parts.
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Cryonix
Cryonix is a Resilient Solo who Is A Walking Tank
You can take a lot of punishment, both physically and mentally, and still come back for more. It takes a lot to put you down. Neither physical nor mental shocks or damage have a lasting effect. You’re tough to faze. Unflappable. Unstoppable.
Some of your organic parts have been replaced with artificial components. Like most people in the city, you are a cyborg, but your augmentations are extensive, and your chrome parts are meant for defense and protecting others. You almost certainly have metal plating and technical components visible on your skin. As you advance, you can add to, modify, or discover new functions for your machine parts.
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Surflux
Surflux is a Intuitive Solo who Packs Chromed Heat
You are often tickled by a sense of knowing what someone will say, how they will react, or how events might unfold. Maybe you have a mutant sense, maybe you can see just a few moments ahead through time, or maybe you’re just good at reading people and extrapolating a situation. Whatever the case, many who look into your eyes immediately glance away, as if afraid of what you might see in their expression.
Some of your organic parts have been replaced with artificial components. Like most people in the city, you are a cyborg, but your augmentations are extensive, and they assist you with ranged combat. You almost certainly have metal plating and technical components visible on your skin. As you advance, you can add to, modify, or discover new functions for your machine parts.
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Abyssara
Abyssara is a Furious Solo who Weaponizes Chrome
You always feel like you’re a hair’s breadth away from giving in to an unthinking rage. You may have a mild case of SHITS, or suffer an illness or injury that makes you prone to violent outbursts. You might do your best to hide it or control it, or perhaps you have given up trying to tame it and you let it run wild. Either way, it seems to cause you-and those around you-grief more often than not.
Some of your organic parts have been replaced with artificial components. Like most people in the city, you are a cyborg, but your augmentations are extensive, and your chrome parts are specialized for melee combat. You almost certainly have metal plating and technical components visible on your skin. As you advance, you can add to, modify, or discover new functions for your machine parts.
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Sonatra
Sonatra is a Corpo Solo who Embeds Stealthtech
You have (or had) a successful career working for a megacorporation, climbing your way up through the ranks. You’ve kissed ass and backstabbed as much as you needed to in order to survive the capitalist rat race. You’re smart, manipulative, and observant. Maybe you’re still employed there, with a “safe” promotion that’s giving you some time to take a breather before your next goal. Maybe you were fired for cause, or cut loose to improve the corporation’s end-of-quarter profit. You might be a loyalist looking to get back in, or vengeful and ready to see what other opportunities avail you.
Some of your organic parts have been replaced with artificial components. Like most people in the city, you are a cyborg, but your augmentations are extensive, and your chrome parts are meant for stealth and infiltration. You almost certainly have synthetic materials and technical components visible on your skin. As you advance, you can add to, modify, or discover new functions for your machine parts.
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Veyline
Veyline is a Guarded Tech who Has A Custom Drone
You conceal your true nature behind a mask and are loath to let anyone see who you really are. Protecting yourself, physically and emotionally, is what you care about most, and you prefer to keep everyone else at a safe distance. You may be suspicious of everyone you meet, expecting the worst from people so you won’t be surprised when they prove you right. Or you might just be a bit reserved, careful about letting people through your gruff exterior to the person you really are.
No one can be as reserved as you are and make many friends. Most likely, you have an abrasive personality and tend to be pessimistic in your outlook. You probably nurse an old hurt and find that the only way you can cope is to keep it and your personality locked down.
You’re a genius with drones-building them, controlling them, and repairing them. You’ve created a unique drone with a limited artificial intelligence; it follows your commands like it’s an extension of your thoughts. As you advance, you learn and discover new ways to update your drone and give it additional abilities, and how to control multiple drones at once. You may think of your drone as a tool, pet, or sidekick; it sees you as a best friend or beloved parent.
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Marivox
Marivox is a Addicted Tech who Has Eyes Everywhere
You are addicted to a drug, probably something illegal, expensive, or both. You are usually in control enough to be a functional adult, holding down a job and maintaining some personal relationships, but the hunger is always there, threatening to fuck up your life. You have a unique insight about crime, or at least how to interface with the criminal world so you can get your next score. You know you have your addiction under control-your drug of choice helps you cope with your illness, or the crapsack world you live in. Or you’re looking for help. Or you need to hit rock bottom before you realize how serious your problem is. Or maybe you’re too stubborn to realize this’ll kill you sooner rather than later. People who know about your addiction might pity you, want to save you, or dismiss you as a junkie.
Let’s be honest: you live in a surveillance state. Security cameras on every corner, smartphones that track the user’s activity, cybernetics that track the wearer’s movements. It’s nearly impossible to avoid being tracked, but you’ve made the most of it. You hack into these surveillance networks and use your unauthorized access to monitor your environment.
It’s up to you what you do with this access. You may serve as a lookout for criminal associates, work dispatch for local vigilantes, or just keep an eye on the neighborhood. You likely have multiple phones and computers, alternating between them to obfuscate your activities.
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Glaciera
Glaciera is a Luddite Tech who Knows Everything
You’ve made it this far without having any cybernetic implants-an extreme outlier in a world where they’re as common as eyeglasses. You should decide the reason why you don’t have any-religious objection, allergic to synthetic materials, poverty, or simply lucky (or talented) enough to never have needed them. You might be open and obvious about this, or try to keep it a secret (perhaps using scars or tattoos to make it look like you aren’t a luddite).
You’re a know-it-all. You’ve always been curious, likely to be found with your nose in a book and several wiki articles pulled up on your computer. In your school days, you were probably a good student and skilled researcher. In the present, your primary hobby is gathering knowledge. You know what questions to ask and where to look for the answers.
Your mental cybernetics have improved your memory and given you nigh-unlimited access to information. You’re a mental powerhouse-and eager to keep learning.
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Corthera
Corthera is a Engram Tech who Explores Cyberspace
‘But I thought I was human this whole time!’
A common refrain within this uncommon demographic. You’ve got some chrome-who doesn’t?-but you thought you were human at the core. As it turns out, you’re not a mammalian body with machine augmentations. You’re a machine intelligence housed in a body constructed from biological components. You’re an engram-an AI personality based on someone else’s consciousness.
Short of an x-ray, invasive medical procedure, or catastrophic injury, you seem normal enough. You may have recently found out you’re an engram, harbor suspicions that something isn’t quite right, or begin the adventure oblivious to your own android nature.
You’ve always been fascinated by cyberspace, its architecture, and the wealth of data it contains. You may have started out as a hacker, programmer, or data administrator, but viewing the internet on a screen was never enough for you. You’re driven by the urge to transcend your body, to enter a complete simulation of that nonsensical nonspace. You’re a netrunner, hooked on the thrill of jacking into the matrix, where you interact with physical manifestations of AI, software, and viruses.
You might enter the matrix for legitimate reasons, such as for your job or education-or maybe you make a point of going where you’re not welcome, stealing and selling proprietary data. With access to a computer or terminal, you plug yourself in and you’re off to the races.
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Neptivex
Neptivex is a Stealthy Hotshot who Embeds Stealthtech
You’re sneaky, slippery, and fast. These talents help you hide, move quietly, and pull off tricks that require sleight of hand. Most likely, you’re wiry and small. However, you’re not much of a sprinter-you’re more dexterous than fleet of foot.
Some of your organic parts have been replaced with artificial components. Like most people in the city, you are a cyborg, but your augmentations are extensive, and your chrome parts are meant for stealth and infiltration. You almost certainly have synthetic materials and technical components visible on your skin. As you advance, you can add to, modify, or discover new functions for your machine parts.
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Velara
Velara is a Virtuous Hotshot who Explores Cyberspace
Doing the right thing is a way of life. You live by a code, and that code is something you attend to every day. Whenever you slip, you reproach yourself for your weakness and then get right back on track. Your code probably includes moderation, respect for others, cleanliness, and other characteristics that most people would agree are virtues, while you eschew their opposites: sloth, greed, gluttony, and so on.
You’ve always been fascinated by cyberspace, its architecture, and the wealth of data it contains. You may have started out as a hacker, programmer, or data administrator, but viewing the internet on a screen was never enough for you. You’re driven by the urge to transcend your body, to enter a complete simulation of that nonsensical nonspace. You’re a netrunner, hooked on the thrill of jacking into the matrix, where you interact with physical manifestations of AI, software, and viruses.
You might enter the matrix for legitimate reasons, such as for your job or education-or maybe you make a point of going where you’re not welcome, stealing and selling proprietary data. With access to a computer or terminal, you plug yourself in and you’re off to the races.
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Deltis
Deltis is a Addicted Hotshot who Hacks The Network
You are addicted to a drug, probably something illegal, expensive, or both. You are usually in control enough to be a functional adult, holding down a job and maintaining some personal relationships, but the hunger is always there, threatening to fuck up your life. You have a unique insight about crime, or at least how to interface with the criminal world so you can get your next score. You know you have your addiction under control-your drug of choice helps you cope with your illness, or the crapsack world you live in. Or you’re looking for help. Or you need to hit rock bottom before you realize how serious your problem is. Or maybe you’re too stubborn to realize this’ll kill you sooner rather than later. People who know about your addiction might pity you, want to save you, or dismiss you as a junkie.
AI and the countless networks integrated into every part of life are as ubiquitous as air and, to most people, about as noticeable. Not you. From the moment you first realized that networks ran on an underlying “Ur” tongue, a code of mathematics and logical symbols, you were hooked. It wasn’t your goal to learn everything you could about hacking computers so much as there was nothing else for you. As a thrown stone follows its trajectory, you learned to hack the network.
As long as you have access to a computer, hand terminal, or other connection, you accomplish your goals by working the code. You might have a few extra pockets for high-energy snacks and spare storage devices, as well.
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Tydralux
Tydralux is a Engram Hotshot who Packs Chromed Heat
‘But I thought I was human this whole time!’
A common refrain within this uncommon demographic. You’ve got some chrome-who doesn’t?-but you thought you were human at the core. As it turns out, you’re not a mammalian body with machine augmentations. You’re a machine intelligence housed in a body constructed from biological components. You’re an engram-an AI personality based on someone else’s consciousness.
Short of an x-ray, invasive medical procedure, or catastrophic injury, you seem normal enough. You may have recently found out you’re an engram, harbor suspicions that something isn’t quite right, or begin the adventure oblivious to your own android nature.
Some of your organic parts have been replaced with artificial components. Like most people in the city, you are a cyborg, but your augmentations are extensive, and they assist you with ranged combat. You almost certainly have metal plating and technical components visible on your skin. As you advance, you can add to, modify, or discover new functions for your machine parts.
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Character Introductions
They met where the city floats on its own bones. Nautex, all chrome grin and easy jokes, had just invited Aqualonix to tag along for “something fun and maybe profitable” at the Driftmarket. Aqualonix didn’t know why the cyborg bruiser wanted an unchromed know-it-all, but the invitation felt like a lifeline they didn’t want to drop. Corvexa was already there because they’d been chosen-someone with corporate clearance, enough office politics to charm Salvage Lords, and a travel case full of strange souvenirs that made even black-market vendors blink. Brinix arrived last, eyes narrowed and recorder humming, because the trio at a noodle raft were declaring alien shards could sing futures, and Brinix didn’t buy stories without proof.
The proof tried to sell itself when a vendor raised a velvet-lined box: a black sliver humming like a swallowed storm. Two gangs moved at once. The market convulsed-stalls toppled, algae oil flared, and the water filled with curses in three languages Brinix’s translator stitched into sense. Nautex grabbed Aqualonix and bull-rushed a path to a skiff; Corvexa flashed a corp badge from a company that no longer existed and bought them three seconds of confusion. In that breathless pivot, Aqualonix vaulted aboard and, thinking everyone was with them, shoved off-only to look back and see Brinix still on the sinking pontoon. Nautex wheeled, chrome sparking, and hauled Brinix across a tearing cable. Brinix survived, but the look they shot Aqualonix promised the question would come later: did you mean to leave me?
They holed up in the Coral Spire, where the walls pulsed like gills and the coral’s glow turned everyone’s shadows into stained glass. Augments twitched-Nautex’s forearm seized in a half-salute, and when Corvexa tried to dive the Ghost Grid from a refugee’s router, Nautex’s proximity made her interface howl, burning effort for every packet. “Stand over there,” she hissed. “Farther.” Brinix, inducted into a secret society that whispered the network had an Ur tongue and that shards weren’t miracles but traps, watched the coral draw patterns that hurt to look at. Refugees told them three things: a salvage lord wanted a sample from the Spire’s drowned levels, a diver’s corpse had washed up clutching a shiverglass coin stamped with an extinct corporate crest, and down at the Ghostline, the shard was whispering again.
By dawn, they had a plan and a reason to keep traveling together. Corvexa’s ex-employer’s seal on that dead diver’s coin matched a keepsake in her collection, tying the murder of Nautex’s neighbors to a supply chain no one was supposed to remember. The salvage contract on Spire coral would pay their way, and the Ghostline promised the only thing Brinix would accept: firsthand data. Nautex vowed to impress Corvexa by not only keeping her safe underwater but making her laugh there; Aqualonix promised to count heads before any future shove-offs, even as Brinix measured the weight of that apology. The GlassReef rolled under them-chrome towers like teeth, water like ink, and somewhere beneath it all, a shard waiting to decide which of them it would speak to first.
Remember that one time
The four of them had slipped into the Coral Spire under a wash of neon and salt spray, climbing up where biotech coral gnawed at the tower’s bones. Augments buzzed and glitched the moment they stepped inside-Nautex’s chrome hand twitched like it had a mind of its own, while Corvexa’s AR readouts melted into impossible fractals. Aqualonix, smug as ever in their unchromed body, was the only one walking straight. “Told you all,” they said, voice echoing in the pulsing blue halls, “metal rots, flesh adapts.” Brinix was already running code through a portable rig, muttering about signals buried in the coral’s hum.
They’d come looking for a missing contact, a black-market scavver who hadn’t returned from a dive three days ago. The trail of broken equipment led them deeper, into chambers where the coral formed lattice bridges and bulbous nodules that glowed from within like lanterns. Nautex, trying to impress Corvexa, stomped ahead and slammed open a coral door with a flourish. The whole wall responded, shivering like flesh, and a ripple of bioluminescence ran down the corridor. “Smooth,” Corvexa said flatly, brushing coral spores from her jacket.
Then the Spire woke up. Patterns in the walls pulsed with new rhythm, like a heartbeat amplified through glass. Brinix’s rig spat static as alien glyphs scrolled across the feed. Aqualonix told a story to calm the group-a half-myth about divers who trusted the tides and returned richer-but their voice faltered as the walls began breathing. Corvexa’s implants screamed errors; her HUD flooded with memories that weren’t hers, fragments of faces gasping underwater. Nautex grabbed her shoulder, trying to steady her, but even his chrome eyes flickered with false reflections.
That’s when they found him: the scavver, fused halfway into the coral, alive but barely, whispering in an alien tongue Brinix’s software struggled to parse. His words came out jagged, full of static and promise: “The shard… beneath… wake it… free…” And then the coral pulsed so violently the floor cracked beneath their feet, the Spire itself convulsing like something inside was trying to claw its way out.
Character Introductions
The Driftmarket’s neon smeared the tide when the gang war broke like flare-shots skipping off rusted barges, a drone-turret whirring up from under a noodle raft. Surflux was backstage at his uncle’s floating theater when his gut went electric; he slid through curtains and, with a flick of chrome and a whispered command, scrambled the turret long enough for refugees to scatter. Abyssara hit the scene like a thrown anchor, monowire whispering out of her wrist as she carved a path through the charging footsoldiers, anger running ahead of her like a siren. Sonatra stepped out of an alley of holo-ads, eyes cold, feeding a rumor through the Ghost Grid that the Salvage Lords were already cashing out-misdirection that made half the shooters look the wrong way. And Cryonix, all armored jaw and steady stance, just waded in and took the fire, a walking breakwater around the civilians, deciding in that instant that these three needed a tank who would not fall.
They rallied in the theater’s prop room while rain ticked on the patched tin roof. Sonatra laid a corporate chip on a crate and said a buyer wanted a live sample from deep inside the Coral Spire-before a rival syndicate harvested it-and whispered that the sample was waking the networks down below, humming to the Ghostline. Abyssara needed the Driftmarket to forget her face-she’d let her fury off the leash, and the fallout now wore colors and carried machetes. Surflux felt the tug of something future-shaped threading through the offer; he didn’t know why, only that if he didn’t go, the worst version of himself would catch up. Cryonix looked at the three of them, at the slick of sea on their boots and the way they needed someone who could stand in the doorway, and said yes because there was no one else here built to take the hit.
On the way to gear up, old ties surfaced like wrecks in low tide. Cryonix and Surflux traded a glance that meant: same block, same flooded schoolyard; the tank knew the shooter’s tells, and he’d been there when a swarm of corporate patrol bots put metal and terror into Surflux’s future. Abyssara studied Cryonix’s profile-the cheekbone, the stubborn line of the mouth-and said she’d seen that face in gang shrine photos; maybe kin, maybe rumor, but it took the edge off her storm. A vendor recognized Cryonix by the mentor’s book-asked about a footnote that read like a koan-and the tank’s answer was only a patient shrug. Sonatra, ex-military deserter turned boardroom blade, watched Abyssara kick over a bucket without noticing and pinched the bridge of her nose; clumsy, loud, infuriating-and useful, if pointed correctly.
They set out at high slack, skiffs threading the drowned lobbies toward the Spire’s phosphorescent glow. AR ghosts stuttered on the water as the Ghostline muttered through the vents below, a chorus of data-voices like rain on glass. The Coral Spire pulsed, and their augments ticked-optics fuzzing, ports prickling-as if the building tasted them. Abyssara’s sensor scan painted levels and names across her vision; Surflux marked cameras to blind on approach; Sonatra’s spyware sketched a route and a dozen exits; Cryonix rolled his shoulders and took the lead, not here to solve puzzles so much as to hold the line while the others did. Somewhere in the black glass under the market, a shard whispered the first note of a message, and together they moved toward it, a new shape swimming in the old city’s bones.
Remember that one time
We were halfway through the job when the Driftmarket went loud-sirens from a rusted barge, shouting, shots, neon flickering on the slick black water. Sonatra steered us through a tangle of pontoons with that boardroom poise, chin up, eyes flat, promising the Salvage Lord’s taxman nothing but trouble if he kept pushing. Surflux clocked the pickpocket before any of us felt the tug-“curtain call,” he muttered, flashing his datajack like a badge-and whispered something sharp that sent the kid retreating as if pulled by a wire. Cryonix, all chrome and patience, popped a blackout bubble over a noodle stall so our fixer could pay out without half the market seeing. Abyssara grinned at the chaos, gang tattoos ghosting through her memory; she claimed three of the gunmen used to run with her isolato crew and that if they recognized her, they’d either hug her or shoot her twice. Either way, we had what we needed: a rumor with teeth-the Coral Spire had woken, and a rival crew was already climbing.
The Spire breathed over us like a sleeping leviathan, its coral veins pulsing blue-green, turning our optics into smear and static. Augments twitched. AR peeled into fractal snow. Cryonix’s shoulder plates scraped living latticework that flinched away like a tide. A refugee elder in a scaffolding shrine quoted lines from Cryonix’s mentor’s old martial arts book as if they were liturgy-“the elbow remembers the wave,” he intoned-and asked if the Tank would let the coral teach him humility. Surflux blinked, steadied, and whispered a soft reset that blinded a camera pod grown out of coral polyps; he doesn’t hate machines, not after what they did to him, but he makes them blink first. Abyssara’s monowire sighed out of her wrist, a silver promise; she moved too fast, anger outrunning sense, leaving Sonatra cursing under her breath at the clatter on steel catwalks.
Deeper, the hum turned to a heartbeat. The Spire’s lights strobed, and the Ghost Grid flooded the air with static prayers; a shard’s voice bled through, picking Surflux like a needle picks a vein, pushing a vision of drowned hallways and a door that only opened to a song. Sonatra flicked loose a palm-sized spy, sent it singing through ventwork; it mapped us a safe path and then detonated in a gout of sparks that sent our rival’s drone tumbling. Cryonix rerouted a dead lift with hands meant to break things but trained to fix-his old tech chops surfacing, the way we knew they would. Abyssara took the first bruiser who rounded the stairwell and dazed him with a bone-deep smack, then grinned that look that means she’s about to make our lives interesting; the building answered, hatches grinding shut, alarms wailing like whales. “You’re loud,” Sonatra hissed, which is how she says she’s scared.
We found the chamber, coral swallowing a corporate safe like a pearl, bioluminescence trailing off it in prayer beads. Refugee priests hovered, eyes wide; Sonatra cut them down with a glance colder than the waterline, promising nothing and meaning it. Abyssara bristled, and in her jawline Cryonix saw the same shard of the slum they both crawled out of-maybe blood, maybe just history. The Tank touched the lock, then thumbed a sliver of remembering-recalling, perfectly, the keypad dance our fixer did back at the noodle stall under the blackout blur. The safe sighed open to a vial of humming black glass and a wind that smelled like far oceans; the Spire’s heartbeat quickened to a run. Water began to press up through the floor grates, and every light in the tower turned to look at us-just the middle, we told each other, just the messy middle-then Surflux said, very calmly, “If we don’t move in six seconds, we’ll be staying,” and the coral answered with a crack like thunder.
Character Introductions
The Driftmarket was boiling that night-neon steam, fried algae, and a gang tax collector counting percentages with a broken thumb. Veyline kept her hood up and her small-dog drone tucked close, the Adept’s mark on her knuckles hidden under tape; she’d made enemies who knew that sigil by heart. She’d recruited Glaciera for a quick job before realizing the woman didn’t carry so much as a comm-implant, just a battered phone and a mind full of inconvenient facts. Marivox drifted in their wake like a rumor with a heartbeat, convinced Veyline’s mark meant cheap Pixel from the right cartel cousin. Corthera appeared because they couldn’t help it-overheard the “Spire” whispered between stalls and gently informed the pair that their route cut right through a Salvage Lord checkpoint they hadn’t noticed.
It started with a “shard” vendor who had the patter down too clean. Veyline’s eyes narrowed, her knack for slipping past pretty lies prying at the man’s smile; she called the bluff before any credits changed hands. Then the market erupted: a turf flare-up, pressure detonations popping ropes and bridge-lashings, rafts slewing sideways. Marivox’s stolen camera grid painted a path in their ear-“left, then low”-but standing near Corthera turned the feed to snow and migraine; something in the engram’s presence chewed her bandwidth, so she rang directions from a step behind. Veyline’s drone zipped ahead and severed a cable with a focused spark, dropping a swaying footbridge between them and the gunfire. They ran as a unit because there was no other way to run. Somewhere in the crush, while Veyline “practiced” a blinding flash to break pursuit, Marivox took the hard edge of it-eyes watering, a new ache under the brow-still deciding whether it was malice, accident, or just life in the Reef. Later, over breath and silence, Veyline slid Corthera a credstick; she wanted the Adept’s mark ghosted from corporate archives, and the job was paid for but not done.
The Spire was wrong even before the coral sang. Refugee candles guttered in upper windows as the tower pulsed, its biotech ribs flexing, AR overlays stuttering into fractal seasickness. Chrome misbehaved: datajacks coughed, optics ghosted, drones twitched. Glaciera-unchromed, unbothered-moved through it like a swimmer through a rip tide she’d studied on a map. When the coral’s glow surged and the stairwell buckled into a living throat, she flung her hands and smeared the light around Veyline into a jittering blot, Distortion turning her into a flicker the Spire couldn’t quite catch. A tendril lashed where Veyline had just been; it cracked glass instead of bone. They got the sample, got out, and something tight behind Veyline’s guard loosened. She said only “you saved me,” but the words put a new thread between them that would hold in storms.
Afterward, the Ghost Grid hissed to anyone listening, and Corthera listened best. In the wash of corrupted data, a whisper used a name they hadn’t told anyone in this life; old code called old code, and they looked seaward to the drowned hub the divers called the Ghostline. Glaciera, who was pretty sure a family resemblance ran through Veyline’s eyes or the way she held silence, stayed because leaving would feel like dropping a lead on the floor. Marivox kept half a pace from Corthera so the world would stay in focus, but their eyes were already on the rafts that route to the next score-and maybe a cleaner fix. Veyline stayed because enemies hunt loners first, because the job she’d paid for wasn’t finished, and because someone had just proven they could stand between her and the tide. Together, with a sample that hummed in its jar and debts that hummed louder, they set their course toward the black glass below, and the GlassReef held its breath.
Remember that one time
We were halfway up the Coral Spire when the hum changed pitch and every implant in the place twitched like it had a bad dream. Refugee shrines flickered below us, neon prayer ribbons and wet laundry slapping against coral ribs the size of car frames. Our buyer from the Driftmarket wanted a live sample before the Razor Coral crew could harvest it; Veyline’s drone-Kite-skated the air beside us, shining a dog-sized cone of light that made the bioluminescence retreat. The Adept’s mark on Vey’s neck pulsed in time with the Spire’s heartbeat, and she muttered that it always did that when systems woke. Marivox kept her distance-every time she drifted too close to Veyline, her stolen CCTV feeds stuttered and her HUD broke into fractals, like the Spire charged her focus a tax just for existing.
Inside, the walls weren’t walls anymore, just living lattices threading through glass skeletons. Corthera’s hands hovered over a coral-fed terminal while they used their machine interface to feel what was still metal under it all; “it’s grafted the security routines,” they said, “half plant, half firmware.” Glaciera, who swears she and Veyline share the same stubborn jawline and maybe more, smeared our outlines with her distortion trick, turning us into stuttering shadows slipping past worshipper nests and cargo hammocks. Veyline popped a door lock with a quick hacker poke and Kite’s camera fed us a jittering corridor ahead-stairs drowned to black on the left, a lab to the right wearing coral like riot gear. Marivox whispered headcounts from hacked elevator cams and stall drones outside, seeing the Razor Coral enforcers marching up a rope lattice three flights below, all chrome teeth and harpoon winches branded by the Salvage Lords.
The lab was a fever dream of barnacled servers and a shard of black glass cinched in coral like a heart stone. The shard sang-data-ghost syllables that made Corthera wince, then lean in-so they jacked in through a wet cable sheath, spoke back in code, and we all felt the Spire shiver. It woke. The floor heaved with a pulse that threw rust and salt and holy beads into the air, and the enforcers hit the doorway mid-quake. Veyline’s optical hack flashed a sniper’s chrome eyes to snow, Kite buzzed a distractor pattern that made a second gunner flinch, and Glaciera called out the winch’s weak point from a sensor scan like she was reading a manual only she could see. Marivox slung a pressure charge low; it popped their feet sideways, slid their gear into the flood, and bought us a breath while Veyline scrambled the door actuator to stutter-closed. Corthera tore free with a choked laugh, eyes too bright. “It recognized me,” they said, voice wrong around the edges.
We didn’t have time to argue about gods or code. Water surged up the stairwell, carrying a ripple of lab-grown eels with too many mouths, and the coral started growing in real time, knitting over vents, eating the lab by millimeters. We grabbed the sample-Glaciera wrapped it in oilcloth like a relic-and sprinted for the maintenance gondola, that antique cradle hung on cables older than our debts. Marivox’s hands shook and she cursed whatever she’s trying not to need, but her eyes-on-everything caught a clean path through a tangle of prayer flags and solar cords. Below us the Razor Coral boys yelled oaths to their Salvage Lord; above us, the shard’s voice bled into the local Ghost Grid, lighting every cheap screen in the Driftmarket with a single word: MESSENGER. Corthera didn’t answer it. Not then. We kicked the gondola loose and rode the Spire’s heartbeat up, the whole place trying to swallow us, deciding whether we were food, thieves, or the message it wanted delivered.
Character Introductions
The night the Driftmarket tore itself open, Velara drew a line. A Salvage Lord’s bully slapped a teen diver for refusing a “tax” on a bag of oxygen canisters, and the whole floating bazaar pretended not to see. Velara didn’t. She stepped in, words like a blade, taking the hit meant for the kid and then locking stares with the enforcer’s mask until the gang went for their guns. Tydralux, half-synth guts and steady aim, waded in first with a cold warning shot that hissed steam off black water. When the shanties erupted into chaos and holo-ads flickered like lightning, a shadow skated along the cablework: Neptivex, bare-armed and fast in the sway of the rafts, tripped a stanchion, cut a line, and dropped two thugs into the drink. Between the three of them, the market’s panic found a way out that didn’t require bodies.
After, they caught their breath under a glitching sign for algae noodles, neon smearing across the tide. Velara’s virtue hadn’t bought her friends in the market, but it earned her these two: Tydralux with the machine-stillness of someone built to carry secrets, and Neptivex with a smile that suggested locks were just shyer doors. Talk drifted where talk always does in the GlassReef: the Ghostline, and the black shard that hums below. Velara said she wanted to keep divers safe from the gangs that bled them; Tydralux admitted he was hunting whoever made him, and the shard’s alien computations smelled like a trail; Neptivex-who’d been eavesdropping from the first word-slid into the light. He’d lost his greatest discovery to an arch-rival named Kade Null, and rumor said Null was fencing “post-scarcity trash” cut with coral signatures. Neptivex wanted in before Null burned the last proof. Tydralux, who’d worked a job with Neptivex that cratered hard, gave him a glassy, skeptical look that said: I’ve heard your hero story before.
Deltis arrived like a glitch between frames, drawn by the scent of ozone and the chance of a cheap score-chemical or otherwise. He figured Neptivex knew a back-channel dealer and decided to stick, but he had another hook in him: a quiet organization had once paid his way through the code academies, and now they were pinging his implants with polite demands for “Ghostline telemetry.” He promised the group he could make the shard talk. He didn’t mention how Tydralux’s face haunted him-angles that never resolved, a familiarity only an addict or an artist could fixate on-though Velara noticed him sketching it in steam on the noodle stall glass. When she patted her pocket for a keepsake holo-charm and found it gone, her eyes cut to Deltis. He raised both hands, swore he hadn’t lifted it. The accusation hung between them like fog.
The plan stitched itself together from rumor and need. Kade Null’s broker was pushing a “coral key” in a flooded lobby near the Coral Spire-biotech priests among the refugee squatters whispered that the Spire’s glow had started pulsing in time with the Ghost Grid’s static. To reach the Ghostline and beat the gangs, they’d first slip the Spire, where augments seize and AR peels back into fractal sickness. Neptivex would go light and quiet, trusting their unarmored edge. Velara would mind the data currents and keep the group grounded in purpose. Deltis would ride the code ripples and try not to chase the next dose instead. Tydralux would be the gun that held the path steady, searching every alien hum for a signature that matched his maker. In a city built to drown, four strangers chose to float together-not because it was safe, but because the GlassReef only offers two promises: the tide will rise, and no one survives it alone.
Remember that one time
We were shin-deep in the black brine of the Coral Spire’s drowned lobby, watching its bioluminescent veins pulse like a heartbeat under the glass. Our brief was simple, the kind that always turns complicated: slip in, take a living sample before the Salvage Lords, and slip out quieter than the tide. Velara glared at Neptivex beneath her visor-still convinced he’d pocketed her missing deck trinket-and Deltis had drawn Tydralux’s face in algae on a cracked pane without seeming to realize it. Above us, refugees hammered a hymn into the scaffolds and the hum of the coral turned the whole tower into a throat singing a note you felt more than heard.
The Spire hated our chrome. AR overlays bent into fractal spirals; Tydralux’s targeting reticle bloomed into a spray of confetti right as a coral-stitched maintenance drone hauled itself from a flooded stairwell. It snapped out a spine like a harpoon. Tydralux, smooth as always even with the world glitching, threw up a forearm to block and the spine slid off chrome instead of meat. Deltis cooked the drone’s belly with a handheld overheat-smoke and dying LEDs-and Velara took point, armor dragging ripples while she scanned for a path that wouldn’t churn our implants into soup. The corridor we chose was a throat of slick glass and nerve-cable; the deeper we went, the more the coral’s hum shifted into something like whispered code.
That was when Velara jacked in to soothe a lock grown from bone-blue coral, and it answered back. Her pupils dilated and she froze, breath catching, scenes blooming in her visor-kidnap vans, sterile lights, a child’s name asked by voices that never cared. The Spire wanted to adopt her, to overwrite “virtue” with “adaptation.” Neptivex moved differently then, that quiet confidence he gets when the room goes bad. He threw a sensor scan, read the frequency hiding under the hum, and used an effort-boost like a prayer, rewiring a stolen maintenance panel into a tone generator that punched a hole in the coral’s song. One bare-knuckle strike to the resonator-no need for weapons-and the feedback snapped. Velara collapsed into his arms, panting, and when she looked up, the suspicion in her eyes had thawed. “I was wrong about you,” she said, soft enough that only his audio picked it up. After that, she kept close to Neptivex’s shoulder.
We got the sample-a sliver of living lattice sealed in a poly-jar that twitched like a heartbeat in a fist-and the Spire woke angry. Refugees chanted, coral lights flared, and the whole tower shivered as if something bigger was rolling in its sleep. We sprinted for the rafts while Salvage Lord skiffs cut their engines and drifted in to box us, neon from the Driftmarket stuttering across the water like broken code. In that strobe, Deltis went still, eyes unfocused, and the Ghost Grid rode his voice in a chorus: “Messenger… below the line… black glass waits.” We didn’t have time to argue theology or shards; we just trusted our feet, trusted each other a little more than before-especially Velara with Neptivex-and ran for the market lights, laughing like idiots who’d lived through the middle of something that was about to get worse.