Chapter 1: The Abrupt Descent into Chaos

The first tremor slithered through Neo-Detroit's underbelly like a serpent testing its coils. By the third convulsion, the city had become a bucking steel stallion, neon arteries flickering as concrete ribs snapped above the underground market. I'd been admiring a bootleg cybernetic parakeet when the world decided to redecorate—crumbling facades for wallpaper, panic for background music."Classy," I muttered, dodging a plummeting hologram billboard. The air tasted of shattered dreams and powdered concrete, each breath scraping my lungs raw. Shadows stretched claws across collapsing alleyways as I became an unwilling contestant in Extreme Parkour: Apocalypse Edition.That's when I saw her—a flash of silver hair beneath falling debris. Luna.She moved like a glitch in the chaos algorithm, boots slipping on fractured asphalt as the crowd stampeded. No one stopped. No one ever stops here. My feet moved before my brain could calculate survival odds, because apparently chivalry isn't dead—just terminally stupid."Grab on!" I barked, yanking her wrist as a delivery drone exploded against the alley wall. Our eyes met in the ash-blurred twilight. Hers held the sharp glint of broken circuitry; mine probably screamed "Why the hell did I skip breakfast?"We became a four-legged creature of desperation, dodging the city's death throes. The ground split open with a sound like God clearing his throat, vomiting plumes of sulfur-scented steam. Luna's grip on my arm tightened—warm, human, terrifyingly real amidst the synthetic carnage.The scavengers emerged on the seventh aftershock."Look what slithered out of the drainpipe," I growled as they circled—seven pairs of optics gleaming through the dust. Their leader swung a rebar club rusted the color of old blood. Neo-Detroit's finest: part feral algorithms, part bad life choices.Luna pressed against my back, her breath hot on my neck. "Got a plan?""Working on it," I lied.The first lunge came from the left—a wiry ghoul with grafted titanium knuckles. I ducked, driving my elbow into his solar plexus. The satisfying oof told me he'd forgotten to upgrade his diaphragm. Luna's combat boot met another's groin with a crunch that made my eyes water."Not bad, sweetheart," I wheezed, parrying a switchblade with my forearm guard."You're bleeding," she noted, driving her knee into an attacker's jaw."Charming."We were down to three scavengers when the concrete exploded.Max's entrance could've been choreographed by Michael Bay—eight feet of augmented muscle plowing through walls like they were rice paper. His laughter boomed over the collapsing cityscape as he hurled a dumpster at our remaining assailants."You're late," I coughed, wiping grit from my eyes."Fashionably," he rumbled, crushing a scavenger's weapon with his bare hand. "Brought snacks." He tossed me a protein bar oozing questionable green filling.The aftershocks deepened. Across the warzone, a sterile white monolith pierced the smoke—Government Bunker #47. Its floodlights carved judgment beams through the haze, guards in hazmat suits playing gatekeepers to Armageddon."VIP tickets to hell?" I nodded at the security checkpoints.Luna's fingers found mine again. "Better than front-row seats out here."We wove through the desperate hordes, past families clutching counterfeit oxygen masks, augmented mercenaries trading bullets for entry. The air buzzed with the static charge of emergency force fields.Then I saw him—Dr. Elias Smith, silhouette framed in the bunker's airlock. The rumors painted him as Frankenstein with a taxpayer-funded lab, but no whisper captured that smile. It wasn't a human expression. It was the grin of a chessmaster watching pawns stumble into position."You recognize him?" Luna's whisper carried an edge I couldn't place."Let's hope he doesn't recognize us," I muttered, eyeing the biometric scanners.Max cracked his augmented knuckles. "If they ask about my augments…""Play nice."The queue inched forward. Guards confiscated weapons, data chips, dignity. My lower back itched where the black market neural link hid beneath synth-skin. Luna's posture had gone predator-still.Then the alarms screamed.Three things happened simultaneously: the ground split like overripe fruit, Luna's hand tore from mine, and Dr. Smith's voice cut through the bedlam via bunker loudspeakers—"Subject 0110 located. Initiate containment protocol."Luna was running.We were running.And the bunker doors began sealing with the finality of a coffin lid.