Damien got home later than usual.
The city outside was already shifting into its night rhythm, where aerial traffic lines dimmed into slow glowing ribbons and the sky itself looked like it had been gently washed clean.
Hover-lamps along the residential district floated in place like patient moons, casting soft light over quiet streets.
His house recognized him the moment he stepped in.
A subtle pulse of light scanned his presence.
Then the door closed behind him with a smooth, automatic sigh.
“Welcome back, Damien,” a calm synthetic voice said through the walls.
Nova.
The house’s integrated AI system.
Not overly emotional, not overly expressive.
Just precise, like a quiet assistant that never slept and never forgot.
Damien didn’t respond.
He walked straight to his room.
The moment he entered, he didn’t even bother turning on the main lights.
The room adjusted itself anyway.
Soft ambient lighting shifted upward from the floor panels, painting the space in a muted blue glow.
The furniture was minimal, modern, and clean in design.
A floating desk unit rested near the window, and a holographic projector sat dormant beside it like a sleeping eye.
Damien dropped onto his bed.
Flat on his back.
No dramatic movement.
Just a controlled fall into stillness.
His eyes stared at the ceiling.
But his mind wasn’t there.
It was still on the rooftop.
Still on Dr.
Frost.
Still on that single moment where something impossible had happened.
Pain.
He replayed it again.
The punch.
The impact.
The sensation spreading through his face like a signal his body had never broadcast before.
He raised a hand slowly and touched his cheek, as if expecting it to still hurt.
It didn’t.
But he remembered it clearly.
That was the problem.
Damien had always believed something simple about himself.
That he didn’t break.
Not easily.
Not at all, sometimes.
There was no specific moment when he learned it.
It was just something life kept confirming for him.
Like when he was nine years old.
He had fallen from a three-story building.
No memory of how it happened mattered anymore.
What mattered was the outcome.
He had stood up afterward.
No broken bones.
No bleeding.
No concussion that anyone could detect.
Just… normal.
Even the adults called it luck.
He never corrected them.
Because it was easier that way.
Now, lying in his room, that memory felt different.
Because Dr.
Frost had done something no accident, no fall, no simulation ever had.
He had made Damien bleed.
Not only that.
He had made him feel it.
Real pain.
Not pressure.
Not discomfort.
Actual pain.
Damien stared upward.
His expression remained flat, but his thoughts were no longer calm.
“If I’m not normal,” he muttered quietly, “then what am I?”
The room didn’t answer.
Nova didn’t respond unless spoken to directly.
So silence filled the space again.
Heavy, but not uncomfortable.
Just present.
After a moment, Damien sat up.
He reached toward his desk and pulled on his glasses.
They weren’t ordinary eyewear.
They were thin, almost invisible in frame, with a soft metallic edge that adapted to facial movement.
The lenses shimmered faintly when activated, projecting faint data reflections into the air.
They had a name.
AURON SPECTRA-LINK GLASSES.
Most people just called them Spectra-Lens.
Once worn, they synced instantly with global data networks, personal archives, and encrypted channels depending on authorization level.
Damien adjusted them slightly.
A soft interface bloom appeared in his vision.
Transparent menus unfolded like floating glass sheets in front of him.
He focused.
“Search: Dr. Frost.”
Nothing.
No results.
He refined the query.
“Dr. Frost scientist.”
Nothing.
“Dr. Frost medical research.”
Nothing.
“Dr. Frost recent tech recruitment.”
Nothing.
The system responded with an error tone once.
Then suggested alternative queries.
None of them mattered.
Damien leaned back slightly.
Then tried something deeper.
A darker layer of the net.
Private indexing channels.
Encrypted archives.
Restricted corporate listings.
Underground knowledge grids.
He pushed further.
Past normal access.
Past standard clearance filters.
Into the layers most people never even knew existed.
Still nothing.
Not a mention.
Not a trace.
Not even a rumor fragment.
It was like the name didn’t belong to any system in the world.
Or like it had been erased deliberately.
Damien removed the glasses slowly.
“…Nothing,” he said quietly.
He stared at the ceiling again.
A strange realization began forming in his mind.
If something didn’t exist on the net in this era…
It usually meant one of two things.
It was either completely irrelevant.
Or it was intentionally hidden.
And Dr.
Frost did not feel irrelevant.
Damien sat up again.
This time slower.
His expression changed slightly.
Not emotion.
Just decision.
“If I can’t find you,” he muttered, “then I’ll just go where you were.”
He looked toward the card Dr.
Frost had given him.
It lay on his desk now, untouched.
Like it had been waiting.
Damien picked it up.
He turned it in his fingers.
No visible markings.
No readable text.
Just that strange material that didn’t behave normally under light.
“…A side quest,” he said quietly to himself.
A faint exhale.
“If it’s a trap, I’ll figure it out when I get there.”
That was his conclusion.
Simple.
Clean.
Final.
Before he could think further, a soft chime echoed through the room.
Nova’s voice followed immediately.
“Damien. Visitor at the front door.”
He paused.
“…Who is it?”
A brief silence.
Then—
“Sarah Chen.”
Damien closed his eyes for a moment.
Of course.
He stood and left his room, walking down the hallway toward the living area.
The house adjusted lighting automatically as he moved.
Walls softly illuminated ahead of him, then dimmed behind him like a guiding breath.
When he reached the living room, Sarah was already inside.
She looked slightly more tired than earlier, hair still faintly damp from earlier practice, though now mostly dry.
She was standing near the entrance awkwardly, as if she had entered without fully deciding how she felt about it.
The moment she saw him, her expression softened.
“Hey,” she said.
“Hey,” Damien replied.
A pause.
Then Sarah stepped further inside.
“I hope I didn’t interrupt anything.”
“You didn’t.”
She nodded slowly, looking around the room briefly.
“This place is always so quiet,” she said.
“It feels like it doesn’t know how to be messy.”
“It doesn’t need to be.”
Sarah gave a small smile at that.
Then she shifted her weight slightly.
“I was just passing by,” she said, though it didn’t sound fully convincing.
“Thought I’d check on you.”
Damien glanced at her.
“You’re checking on me?”
“Yeah,” she said quickly, then added, “I mean, you were acting weird earlier.”
“I was normal.”
“That’s your normal, and that’s the problem.”
Damien didn’t respond.
Instead, he moved toward the table.
“Want help with homework?” he asked.
Sarah blinked.
“That’s… a sudden change of topic.”
“You’re already here.”
She hesitated.
Then sighed.
“Fine.”
They sat together at the floating desk unit.
Sarah pulled up her assignments through her wrist interface, projecting soft holograms into the air.
Mathematical structures, historical timelines, and advanced theory modules hovered between them like layered glass.
Damien worked through them with quiet efficiency.
He didn’t need to think too hard.
That was the issue.
Everything academic came too easily.
Sarah watched him a few times during the work, clearly used to it but still mildly impressed.
“You’re definitely not normal,” she said casually.
“Neither are you,” Damien replied without looking up.
“Yeah but I mean in a different way.”
Silence.
Then Sarah leaned back slightly.
“So…” she said slowly, “that guy earlier. Dr. Frost.”
Damien’s hand paused for a fraction of a second.
Then continued.
“What about him?”
“What did he want?”
Damien didn’t look at her.
“He just tried to recruit me.”
“For what?”
“Some tech company.”
Sarah frowned slightly.
“That’s it?”
“Yes.”
She studied him carefully.
This time, her expression shifted.
Not fully convinced.
Not fully dismissive either.
“…That’s fine I guess,” she said slowly.
“But I feel like something is up.”
Damien stayed focused on the assignment.
Sarah continued anyway.
“What stops him from coming back again?” she asked.
“These tech recruiters are overly persuasive you know. They don’t just disappear after one meeting.”
A pause.
Damien finally spoke.
“You don’t have to worry about that.”
Sarah tilted her head slightly.
“You sure?”
“You know I can take care of myself.”
That line landed in the room with quiet certainty.
Sarah looked at him for a moment.
Then sighed softly.
“I guess it’s fine if you say so then,” she said, smiling.
But there was something underneath that smile.
A small hesitation she didn’t fully express.
They continued talking for a while after that.
Nothing important.
Small things.
School updates.
Random jokes.
Normal conversation stitched together like fragments of everyday life trying to pretend everything was fine.
Eventually, Sarah stood up.
“I should go,” she said.
Damien nodded slightly.
“Alright.”
She walked toward the door.
Then paused.
Turned back slightly.
“Goodnight, Damien.”
“Goodnight.”
She left.
The door closed behind her with a soft automated lock.
Damien stood still for a moment.
The house was quiet again.
But this time, the silence felt different.
Because now there was something inside it.
A pressure.
Not external.
Internal.
Sarah’s concern lingered in his mind.
Not because of Dr.
Frost.
Not because of lies.
But because it confirmed something Damien had already begun to suspect.
Whatever Dr.
Frost was…
It wasn’t going away.
And neither was what Damien felt on that rooftop.
He slowly turned back toward his room.
His expression unchanged.
But his decision already made itself clearer in his mind.
He had to find Frost.
Not later.
Not eventually.
Soon.
Before the curiosity turned into something else entirely.