Then she emerges.
Ara.
Her veil drapes across the lower half of her face, as her hair spills in iridescent blues and greens under the lights. Metallic markings sweeping across her face like war paint.
I’ve seen countless performances online, but nothing compares to being in person and seeing the way her body glides across the stage like gravity itself is rearranging for her.
Because this—this is why Orion dragged me here.
He wanted me to see something that reminded me of life instead of loss.
Ara lifts her mic, and the first note she sings is low, almost a growl, but it hits like an impact.
The crowd erupts.
I stand there, spine straight, and heart hammering.
Holy shit.
I didn’t know music could feel like this in person.
Lights explode into color, drums hit hard enough to shake metal, and Umbra surges into their first song.
And somewhere in my chest under scar tissue, under memory, under everything that tried to bury me—
Something wakes up and answers back.
I don’t know why.
I don’t care.
I’m here.
And I can’t look away.
8
Celeste
The first note hits, and the arena exhales.
The pressure rolls up through the stage, through my boots, and through my bones. The crowd surges as one living thing, a tide of bodies and breath and anticipation that crashes straight into my chest and settles there, steady and unrelenting.
This is where my lungs finally work.
The lights slice down from above, blue and indigo, cutting the world into sharp, deliberate pieces. Smoke curls around my ankles. Heat blooms against my skin. I step into it without hesitation, veil in place, face paint set, wig catching the light like oil on water that shifts every time I move.
The crowd goes feral for it.
For Ara.
ForUmbra.
I lift the mic, and the sound that comes out of me isn’t gentle. It never is. It’s textured and rough around the edges. Wrapped in melody sharp enough to cut through sixty thousand screaming throats.
Bass bleeds through concrete and steel, low enough to rattle teeth. I feel it in my sternum, syncing my pulse to something larger than myself. My body knows this rhythm better than it knows fear. Every step lands exactly where it’s meant to, every breath is measured and controlled.
Pyro erupts behind me, heat licking my back as Dusk locks into the groove, her bass slung low, and I can only imagine her feral grin behind her mask. Twilight is already gone, his shoulders loose, fingers flying, hair damp and catching the lights as if he belongs to them, as Shade drives the beat like a weapon, her sticks snapping down with surgical precision.
