The scrapyard was quiet, but Ayo's heart wasn't.
Every sound — a clinking pipe, a shifting crow, the hum of broken hovercars — felt like a trap waiting to spring.
Zina was already scanning the perimeter with her wrist-module. Her eyes, usually sharp with sarcasm, were now hard with focus.
Tobe tapped into the city's low-frequency scanner grid, hands flying across his ancient laptop's cracked keys.
"There's a broadcast ping repeating from an old military zone east of here," he said. "Encrypted. Deep-code. Like pre-Collapse tech."
Zina frowned. "You think it's for us?"
"It's not for us," Ayo said, standing. "It's for me."
The red mark on his chest was glowing faintly — pulsing in sync with the signal. Every beat whispered the same phrase in his mind:
> "Come to the ashes. Come to the truth."
---
The Ruins of Sector K
Sector K had once been a military research base before the last War of the Oracles. Now it was a wasteland of rusted steel towers, broken mech parts, and bones too bleached to identify.
The trio arrived at nightfall.
The red signal led them into a bunker half-buried in collapsed soil. The air was thick with sulfur and old blood.
Ayo stepped into the chamber — and immediately froze.
Dozens of symbols lit up along the walls. The same ones from his visions. The mark on his chest flared bright red.
And then he heard it.
A whisper.
A low, beautiful voice.
"You finally answered."
---
The Flamekeeper's Hall
The walls dissolved into flame — not burning, but alive. Ayo stood alone now, surrounded by projections of ancient flamekeepers: warriors, prophets, rebels — all marked like him.
One stepped forward — a woman with silver locs and one arm missing.
"You are the final node," she said. "The last flicker of our fire."
"What am I?" Ayo asked.
"A weapon. A healer. A key. And you're waking too late."
The flames darkened. Behind the flamekeepers, a void appeared — massive, mechanical, dripping with black tendrils.
The Machine God is coming," she whispered. "And when it does… your city will bleed neon.
---
Reality Returns
Ayo dropped to the bunker floor, gasping. Zina and Tobe caught him.
"You passed out again," Tobe said. "Bro, you've gotta stop doing that."
Ayo looked up.
"I saw them. The flamekeepers. And something else. A machine. Huge. Evil."
Zina stiffened. "You saw the Mecha-Orisha?"
He nodded.
Zina closed her eyes. "Then we're already out of time."
Tobe pointed at his laptop. "Uh, yeah. And so are we."
A convoy of Oba Syndicate bikes had just appeared on the grid — heading straight for Sector K.
---
The Red Signal Traps
As they fled the bunker, Ayo looked back. The signal stopped.
And from the shadows, a red mechanical eye blinked.
Someone — or something — had been watching him the whole time.