He was just beginning to worry the machine had abandoned him there, alone in the dark, when new text blinked into being:

  [SYSTEM NOTICE — CASE REVIEW COMPLETE]

  Status: Partial Induction Approved.

  License: Provisional access to Thrive System granted (Ref: LIC-TH/PRV).

  Restriction: Directed growth path unavailable. All essence rewards earned will be redistributed per Alternate Protocol (Ref: ESS-ALT/09).

  This notification is final under Oversight Queue OQ-212.

  Good luck, citizen.

  Rem exhaled, the sound escaping half laugh, half shudder. “Well… that’s something, at least.”

  He pressed his palm back to the wall. A new sequence scrolled up, crisp, impersonal:

  [SYSTEM INTERFACE — TRANSPORT MENU]

  Available Destinations:

  ? Storage Locker (Ref: LOC-ST/001)

  ? Challenge Level 1 — Passes Remaining: 1 (Ref: CH-001/DAILY)

  ? City Square (Origin Node: LOC-OR/001)

  Input required: Select one.

  At least this matched what Tomas and Saskia had described.

  He affirmed Storage Locker. Light flared, the floor shifted, and suddenly he was inside a small, rectangular brick room.

  Wooden Shelves and Racks. All of them empty.

  Had his induction worked properly, his starter gear would be here. Weapons. Armor. The little box of essentials every citizen received. Instead, silence pressed in. Hollow. Accusing.

  Rem pulled the cream card from his pocket, the one the machine had scrawled his shame across, and slid it into the upright slot at the back of the room. Gone. Buried. According to Saskia, no one else could access this space. Perfect. Let the card rot here, unseen.

  Back at the glyph wall, he brought up the menu again.

  Challenge Level 1. One attempt per day. Non-transferable. Non-accumulative.

  Part of him wanted to try. To prove something. But with what? No weapon. No gear. Nothing but his “power.”

  He summoned it.

  Nothing happened. Not quite nothing.

  The faintest flicker hovered in front of him, a pale blue square, translucent, no larger than a thumbnail.

  Rem frowned. “What am I supposed to do with this?”

  Disgust crawled in his throat. He released it, and the tile blinked out of existence, leaving only his humiliation behind.

  The menu still waited. One free challenge attempt. One chance not to feel like a mistake.

  His hand lifted, then fell.

  Not today.

  The platform lit beneath his feet and the world flickered. In the next breath he was back, wrapped in the glow beneath the arch. The energy unraveled as he stepped forward, the roar of the crowd surging in to fill the silence he had left behind.

  His father waited at the edge of the concourse, hands clasped behind his back. His father’s face loosened when he saw him — just for a second, then the lines returned. He closed the distance, eyes searching for any trace of change.

  “You’re through,” his father said. The words were sharp, evenly spaced. “No complications?”

  Rem’s mouth went dry. The card was gone, locked away in the silent dark of his private locker. No proof. No evidence. Only his word. For a heartbeat he imagined telling the truth anyway: that the Union had weighed him and found him lacking, that his “gift” was nothing but a trash-tier joke. He saw how his father’s eyes would harden, how the last threads of belief would snap.

  No. He couldn’t.

  “It worked,” Rem said. His voice came out steadier than he felt. He lifted his chin, trying to make it sound like confidence instead of desperation. “I got through. Everything went… fine.”

  His father’s face eased. Something flickered there — maybe pride, maybe just relief that Rem hadn’t made a scene. “Good. That’s good. Your mother was worried. But you see? You made it.”

  Rem forced a smile. His chest ached with the lie. He let his father guide him away from the arch, the truth left behind with the card, burning in its slot like a coal.

  They left the plaza together, slipping into the current of families and fresh initiates. The square buzzed with voices, some high with giddy excitement, others hushed and heavy. His father’s hand stayed firm on his shoulder, steering him through the crowd.

  “You went in, you came out. That’s more than some managed today.”

  Rem frowned. “What do you mean?”

  His father scanned the crowd. “There were failures. Not many, but enough. Some didn’t integrate. Some resisted too long. Others broke under the strain. The Union doesn’t advertise it, but everyone hears the stories.” He paused, voice low. “I was prepared in case you didn’t come back.”

  Rem’s stomach twisted. He wanted to say he had almost failed too, that the machine had faltered and spat him out broken. Instead, he said nothing.

  They moved through the crowded artery leading away from the square, voices of other families rising and falling around them. His father’s grip on his shoulder stayed steady, keeping him upright, presentable.

  “You don’t have to tell me,” his father said quietly. “It’s your choice, and the Union says builds are private. But I need to know one thing.” He glanced down at him. “Do I have to worry about you?”

  Royal Road is the home of this novel. Visit there to read the original and support the author.

  The question hit like a weight. Worry. Always worry. Never pride. Only the kind that came before an apology he hadn’t made yet.

  Rem swallowed, his throat tight. He had nothing to show. Nothing to offer. The truth would crush him here, on this walk home.

  “Crafter,” he said at last. The word felt clumsy in his mouth. “I can… make things. Gear, tools. Supplies people need, hopefully.”

  His father slowed, turning to look at him fully. His father’s shoulders eased; the tightness around his jaw slackened. “A crafter.” His voice thinned, as if the words had to fit through a narrow space. “That’s good, Rem. That’s useful. People will need you.”

  Heat flared in Rem’s face. He forced himself to nod. “Yeah. Useful.”

  Rem stared straight ahead, every step heavier than the last. His father nodded once, satisfied. It should have felt like relief. It didn’t. Instead, the shame pressed harder, as if the card he had locked away was burning through the pocket of his memory.

  The rest of the walk passed in a blur. His father spoke here and there about his goals in this post-union world, but Rem could only nod or murmur in return. He felt like he was walking through water, every word muffled by the weight pressing against his chest.

  It wasn’t until they stepped inside the apartment, and his father’s voice lifted to the others, that Rem blinked back into the present.

  “He’s got a support role,” his father announced, offering a conspiratorial wink. The details of his build would stay between them, for now, but Rem knew it would not be long before his mother heard.

  “That’s great!” Saskia cheered. She had showered and changed, her hair loose around her shoulders, looking more like herself again.

  “We have so much to be thankful for,” his mother's smile melted years from her furrowed brow. “Now get ready. We have mass tonight.”

  The family walked together to in silence. It was part of the ritual.

  They always arrived before mass, pausing at the base of the steel-and-glass cathedral to greet the priests who waited there.

  Among them was Father Ignatius Rossum—ancient now, yet still warm, greeting each parishioner as if rediscovering lost kin.

  When the others moved inside, Rem lingered on the steps.

  “Walk with me?” The old doctor always began that way.

  Rem nodded and fell in beside him. They followed the path that curved toward , the cobbles slick with last night’s rain. The basilica bells murmured behind them, their sound folding into the hush of the city.

  “I’m sorry, Rembrandt.” The doctor’s voice came low, each word heavy with its own fatigue. Beneath the white brows, his eyes were bright and restless; the rest of him looked fragile, held together by habit alone. “I heard what happened. You were supposed to conquer a fear, not risk your life. Always the extremes with you.”

  Rem looked down at his hands. “It would have worked,” he said, a thin laugh breaking through. “But then aliens arrived. Who could have expected that?”

  The doctor exhaled through his nose, half sigh, half chuckle. “Timing’s never been our strong suit.”

  They reached a bench overlooking the square. The wind carried the scent of rain and crushed flowers. Neither spoke for a long while. The silence between them wasn’t awkward—it was careful, like something fragile they didn’t want to break.

  “Nevertheless, I’m proud of you,” the doctor said. “You’ve come a long way.”

  His eyes were the only part of him untouched by age—still quick, bright, alive with that restless intelligence. “Still keeping your journal?”

  “Some.” Rem’s fingers tightened around the worn leather cover. “Mostly I leave it by the bed. To catch the dreams before they fade.”

  “May I?”

  The doctor extended a hand, steady but expectant.

  Rem hesitated. Then, after a breath, passed it over.

  Pages whispered as the doctor turned them, reading a few lines before flipping back and forth, the way he always did when searching for patterns.

  “Hmm. More consistent,” he murmured. “Fewer… variations.”

  The word hung between them.

  That was they had agreed to call

  He turned another page, studying a cluster of sketches. “These are remarkable. Yours?”

  Rem nodded.

  The doctor looked up, eyes bright with quiet fascination. “You remember drawing them?”

  Rem nodded again, slower this time. He did remember. He thought he did.

  “Voices?” The doctor closed the journal and set it gently back in Rem’s hands.

  “None,” Rem said—a lie, clean and quiet. It would’ve been too convenient for a sharp crack to the skull to fix everything.

  The doctor nodded, then let out a long sigh that seemed to fill him before leaving him smaller than before. “I wish I could keep working with you, my boy. But this Union business has the Church in a proper frenzy.”

  He sat a little straighter, summoning the old firmness in his voice. “They’re calling me to the Vatican.”

  The thought came sharp, unexpected. For all the help the “integration therapy” had given him—and it had helped—he wouldn’t miss the reminder that something inside him was broken.

  “That’s great,” he managed, forcing a smile. “I mean—congratulations on the promotion.”

  They spoke a while longer, the doctor reminding him—again—to keep writing. Then he walked Rem back to the cathedral steps, where the family waited in quiet expectation.

  “Let’s celebrate!” Tomas’ voice boomed, filling the apartment. When Rem mentioned that would be his last session he could feel his brother’s sigh of relief. Nobody enjoyed their little ritual, a pretense to keep his issues a secret, least of all his brother.

  And so they did, gathered around the table as their mother set down stacks of golden pannenkoeken, wide and thin, their edges crisped, the centers soft and steaming. Plates of toppings sat waiting—syrup, powdered sugar, curls of cheese, slices of apple, strips of bacon. Rem’s favorite. The smell of fried batter and warm fruit wrapped the room in comfort.

  For a while, he even managed to enjoy it. He filled his plate, listened to Saskia’s chatter, let himself laugh when Tomas mimicked the wobble of someone facing their first slime. For a time, it almost felt like the old days, before the arch, before the Union, before the weight of shame pressed into his chest.

  But when the food was nearly gone, Tomas leaned forward, eyes sharp with curiosity.

  “So tomorrow’s your first challenge,” he said. “Any idea how your class works? Did you get any weapons? What’s your plan?”

  Tomorrow. Might be my first challenge. With no weapons. With a trash-tier skill.

  Rem cleared his throat, forcing out the words he had been shaping in his mind since leaving the arch. “Got a workbench in my storage, but no weapons. I guess I should get something to get me through the first challenge, at least until I figure out how my skills work.”

  The table went quiet. The silence stretched long enough for panic to stab his gut. Was it unheard of not to get a starter weapon? He cursed himself for not asking earlier.

  Saskia saved him. She tapped a finger against her lip, then raised it as if she had cracked the mystery. “Never heard of that. Must be a rare support class with no starter gear.” She leaned forward, voice steady. “We’ll figure it out. You’ll need a big impact weapon, something like a club. Better than a spear for sure.”

  Rem nodded quickly, relief spilling through him, but the weight of his lies only grew heavier.

  After dinner Saskia tried to corner him, but he waved her off with a muttered excuse about exhaustion.

  Later that night, alone in his room with the lights dimmed to near darkness, he reached inward. His power answered. Not much, just a flicker, a pathetic square of nothing, the space where two things could be pressed together and become something else.

  A miserable laugh escaped him. He rolled over, burying his face in the pillow, and let the little light wink out.

  You can feel sorry for yourself tonight, he thought. But tomorrow you get over it. Tomorrow you fight.

  He drew a slow breath, tasting the faint trace of essence still clinging to him from the arch. The old question, is this a dream, pressed in one last time.

  He knew now. The system had measured him and come up short. If this were a dream, he’d be the hero—the kind his father could stand beside, the kind his sister would brag about, the kind his brother would acknowledge for real. Instead he was the one they’d have to shield, the extra weight that slowed the family down. The shame of it sat too solid to be imagined.

  Tomorrow was his first challenge. No class, no skills - trash power, and already behind.

  d