"Doctor Pigeon."

For months now, that nickname had been following Noah Ainsworth like a bad smell.

And yet, he had everything it took to succeed.

Graduated with honors from Cambridge, researcher in pharmacology and chemistry, author of several peer-acclaimed publications before even turning thirty Noah belonged to that handful of scientists labeled as prodigies with as much admiration as envy.

But genius came with a price.

The further his research progressed, the slower ordinary conversations seemed to him. The more complex his theories became, the simpler other researchers appeared.

The gap had kept widening until it became a chasm.

Today, he was eating alone, as usual.

He adjusted his glasses and took another bite without looking up.

The hubbub of the university cafeteria rolled around him like a distant tide. Cutlery clinked. Chairs scraped the floor. The smells of burnt coffee and reheated meals mingled in the air.

A few tables away, two researchers were chatting, unaware that their conversation was reaching him perfectly.

The curse of open spaces and prying ears.

"Ah, Palmer. There you are."

Palmer set down his tray with the heaviness of a man returning from a lost war. His cheeks still bore the bite of the cold, a dry redness beneath the skin.

"Hey, Keppler."

"So? That North Pole expedition? The geological impacts of the Radiation?"

Palmer slumped into his chair.

"Don't even mention it. Three months freezing my balls off to come back empty-handed."

Noah kept eating without looking up.

"Still no results?"

"Nothing. Not a single major discovery. Not even a damn publishable paper."

A bitter laugh.

"Yet the university spent a fortune on this expedition."

"And that's not even counting the Ascendants escorting us. Without them, the mutants would have turned us into food."

Keppler's fork remained suspended.

"Mutants?"

"Without the escort Ascendants, we'd still be there. Or inside."

The word caught Noah's attention despite himself.

Mutants.

For eleven years now, that term had become part of everyday vocabulary.

Like storm, disease, war, or death.

Keppler swallowed hard. For a second, his gaze settled on the bay window. Outside, the London sun struck the clean facades of the campus. Too clean. As if the city had never learned to hide its scars.

"All that budget for nothing." Palmer massaged his temples. "The dean is going to chew me out."

Keppler gave a thin smile. His gaze slid toward Noah an unremarkable man of average height and build, short dark hair already streaked with gray, green eyes hidden behind his lenses, silently focusing on his plate.

"Your lack of results will go almost unnoticed. Our colleague, Doctor Pigeon, has already blown the meter off the charts."

This time, Noah slightly raised his eyes.

Palmer frowned.

"Doctor Ainsworth?"

"Himself."

"Doctor Pigeon? Ainsworth? I thought he was competent."

"He is."

"Then why the nickname? Did he inhale too many solvents?"

A mocking smile stretched his companion's lips.

"Get this. his girlfriend stole his thesis."

The silence lasted a second, followed by a burst of laughter.

"Seriously?"

"She published the work under her own name and got recruited by a private pharmaceutical company."

The laughter doubled.

"Fuck..."

"Exactly."

"I take back what I said. Doctor Pigeon suits him perfectly."

Noah stabbed a piece of meat with a bit more force than necessary.

The metal screeched against the porcelain.

The two men didn't notice a thing.

"Honestly, what was he thinking?"

"That she was in love with him, probably."

"What a genius."

"Yeah. For science. Not for women."

A muscle twitched in Noah's jaw.

'So here I am, judged by a geologist who collects rocks in hostile environments and calls it a career. I've fallen pretty low.'

'Keep going.'

'Get it off your chest.'

'I'm almost done with my meal.'

The two researchers joyfully continued his public execution.

"According to some rumors, the administration is even considering firing him."

"Seriously?"

"They want to make an example out of him."

"That must be humiliating."

'Not as much as this conversation.'

Noah exhaled slowly.

The anger dissipated almost immediately.

What was the point?

They weren't entirely wrong.

The name Grace passed through his mind like a dirty blade.

'That bitch really played me for a fool, and I mistook desire for trust.'

Grace had manipulated him, used him, and stolen several years of his work, but he hadn't seen any of it coming.

The worst part wasn't even the betrayal. The worst was being stupid enough to allow it.

'If only I had listened to my brain more than my crotch.'

A bitter smile crossed his face, then disappeared.

Despite everything, he refused to crumble.

Theories could be stolen, not intelligence, nor experience, nor ideas.

Grace had taken a paper from him, but not his genius.

One day, he would publish something important enough to erase even that name. One day, he would win the Nobel Prize.

Even if, in the current world, that trophy had lost much of its value.

Since the Great Radiation, the rules had changed.

For everyone.

The catastrophe had struck eleven years earlier without warning, explanation, or apparent logic.

An unknown energy had invaded the planet.

The first signs had been subtle.

Plants growing too fast. Animals becoming abnormally aggressive. Impossible biological anomalies then the phenomenon had abruptly accelerated.

Forests, oceans, and even humans had mutated.

The energy eventually received a name.

The Astra.

An invisible substance capable of permeating living matter down to the cellular level.

Ascendants themselves remained a partial mystery to science. All researchers knew for certain was that each Ascension was accompanied by the formation of unknown structures under the cerebral cortex: the Nodes.

No one truly understood its origin or its laws.

"Do you think he'll get fired?"

Palmer's question brought him back to the conversation.

Keppler shrugged.

"Impossible to say."

"It would be a waste."

"Maybe."

Then his tone grew lighter.

"But at least it reminds us that even geniuses can be stupid."

A new laugh.

Noah finished his glass of water. The liquid was lukewarm and unpleasant.

He pushed his tray away. The meal was over. The conversation too. At least for him.

The familiar corridors of the research department scrolled past him.

His mind already occupied by a thousand hypotheses.

'I'll eventually understand the origin of the Great Radiation.'

'It's only a matter of time.'

Bzzz.

The vibration against his thigh abruptly interrupted his thoughts.

Noah took out his phone.

A message from his father.

[Noah join me at the hospital. Don't worry. Nothing serious. But come quickly.]

He reread the text a second time, then a third.

His stomach tightened.

'What kind of message is that?'

'You're at the hospital.'

'You're telling me not to worry.'

'And you're asking me to come quickly.'

'You can't get more alarming than that.'

His thumbs hovered over the screen for a moment. Then he typed.

[What's going on? Are you okay?]

The reply came almost instantly.

[I'm fine. Hurry up and come.]

Noah stared at the two lines.

I'm fine.

Hurry up and come.

If everything was fine, why the urgency? Why the hospital?

Zen Ainsworth wasn't a particularly demonstrative man.

But he had always been there.

No matter the difficulties the mistakes and the failures. Even after the Grace affair the rumors and the humiliation.

His father had simply placed a hand on his shoulder.

"One mistake doesn't erase a lifetime of work."

Then he had changed the subject as if nothing else needed to be said.

Noah took a deep breath. The worry increased.

Without wasting any more time, Noah headed to the locker room, got rid of his lab coat, and set off.

A few minutes later, he was getting on a train, then into a taxi.

The city scrolled past behind the window.

London seemed normal at first glance. A blue sky, buildings, cars, pedestrians then the details appeared.

The checkpoints, the barricades, the armored vehicles, the security signs.

The scars left by eleven years of coexistence with the inexplicable.

A glowing sign scrolled past the window.

[ATTENTION]

[HOLE CLEARANCE IN PROGRESS]

[MANDATORY DETOUR]

Noah observed the warning.

'Mark would say again that it looks like a video game dungeon.'

His brother spent way too much time in front of screens. Yet, on this specific point, Noah couldn't entirely disagree with him.

The Holes defied all scientific logic.

Spatial fractures that opened in the ground. Pockets of altered reality. Places where the known laws of physics sometimes seemed to lose their minds and from where the monsters emerged.

The driver suddenly honked.

A long, aggressive blast.

Traffic had just come to a complete stop.

"Fucking move!"

The driver stuck his head out the window.

"What are you waiting for?"

A head appeared in the vehicle ahead.

"Can't you see it's blocked?"

"Then move!"

"Fuck off!"

Noah briefly closed his eyes.

The driver kept grumbling.

"Same thing every day."

Then he looked ahead again.

"I'm gonna end up getting out of this car to smash his face in."

An insult flew from the vehicle in front of them, followed by another.

The intellectual level of the exchange quickly dropped to the basement.

Noah rubbed the bridge of his nose.

"Sir."

The driver turned around.

"What?"

Noah showed him his phone. An article had just popped up on the news networks.

The HMA (Hole Management Agency).

Terrorist attack.

Intervention in progress.

Less than a kilometer away.

"I think the problem is coming from there."

The driver looked at the screen, then at the columns of smoke rising on the horizon.

His anger faded immediately.

"Ah..."

"We're probably all stuck for the same reason."

The driver let out a sigh.

"Ascendants fucking shit up again..."

"The HMA will probably handle the situation."

BANG!

The noise exploded so loudly that the windows vibrated.

A black mass crossed the sky and crashed onto the roof of the car in front of them.

The bodywork crumpled like aluminum foil. The car alarms immediately started wailing.

The driver went pale.

"Holy shit..."

"What the hell was that?"