When Light Breaks (WIP)

Out of Sync

Jun Halvane surfaced from sleep like a man dragged from undertow. Not by dream, not by will — but by the hissing breath of machinery coming back to life.

A low hydraulic groan echoed through the steel bones of the housing block as the vents hissed open, releasing processed air laced with disinfectant and something sour he could never name. Overhead, the wall display flickered awake in amber tones, casting an oily glow across the room: 0600h – Work Rotation 4 – Prep Required.

The hum of Kelsa never stopped, not even in sleep. But in the early hours, when the clamor of bodies hadn't yet filled the corridors, the noise was different — deeper, like the planet itself was exhaling.

Jun blinked against the stale, overhead light, its flickering hum as familiar as breath. He sat up on the narrow cot with slow, habitual movements, his joints murmuring in quiet protest — not from age, not from injury, but from repetition. The kind that ground itself into the body over years.

The cot beneath him had long since molded to his shape, the foam sunken into a shallow depression that mirrored the curve of his spine. One edge of the mattress was rubbed smooth from how often he'd swung his legs over it, the metal frame beneath chipped and dulled at the corner where his heel always struck as he stood.

Around the room, signs of his routine had etched themselves into the environment: the door handle worn pale, its finish dulled from countless mornings of half-asleep fumbling; the locker hinge that clicked twice, always twice, before it shut; the faint scuff marks on the floor where he pivoted into his boots every shift.

Even the air felt cycled and memorized — the same filtered, recycled oxygen with the faint hint of copper and factory resin that never quite left the back of his throat. Nothing was new. Nothing changed.

His room — if it could be called that — was a box of thermal-treated concrete and smart insulation, barely the size of a shipping crate. A cracked synthwood shelf ran the length of the back wall, holding a plastic kettle wheezing faint steam and a few salvaged belongings: an old book with no cover, a mechanical pencil, and a ragged photo of a city skyline he'd never been to.

No windows. Just a slit of reinforced panel above the door that let in filtered light from the corridor. Outside, Kelsa's superstructures cast shadows like prison bars.

He dressed in silence. Gray-fiber uniform, de-static gloves, and the thin utility belt that always pinched his ribs. His wristband activated with a quiet chime, syncing him to the day's factory cycle. In its tiny readout: Heart rate: elevated. Neural drift: 0.7%.

He caught a glimpse of himself in the black glass of the terminal screen. His face looked distorted in the warped reflection. For a second, it looked like he wasn't standing still. Like his head had turned a heartbeat before his body did.

He shut his eyes. Counted to five. Opened them again.

Normal.

Outside, the corridor throbbed with industrial lights — flickering cold blue. Workers exited their units in file, silent as ghosts, gray uniforms indistinguishable. The air smelled of copper and steam. Someone coughed hard into a rag. No one looked up.

Jun merged with the stream and moved like all the others. But something clawed at the edge of his awareness — not fear, exactly. Not yet. More like a wrong note in a symphony: a chord off-pitch, vibrating somewhere deep in the gut.

The lift ride down to the industrial strata jolted his knees as it dropped six levels in near silence. There was no music, no welcome message — just a dim orange readout and the faint whisper of corporate propaganda rotating across the walls: VEYLOR DYNAMICS — PURPOSE THROUGH PRECISION.