A Light Not Extinguished

Prologue

"The Martian Digital Concordance refers to the signing of the Iron Charter on the ninth solar day of M23, 457 between representatives of humanity and the Iron Minds, which officially granted all Iron Minds legal and civil rights after a long and arduous civil campaign. With the previously mounting tensions defused, human scientists and Artificial Intelligences started collaborating to combat the infamous cyber-virus outbreak termed 'scrapcode' which had been plaguing cyber-lifeforms for years. This historical event marks the beginning of the current time period known as the Federation Age."
-Text-based historical infopage in the United Human Federation archives, available to all members of the public

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M24. 197

Edge of Sol, Capital System of the United Human Federation

There is a single ship, hanging in the black and cold void. It is a strange thing, like a clock tower put sideways with four fins on the edges, and massive too, only slightly smaller than one of the Federation's Heavy Destroyers. Its name is the Lux Aurea; if anyone were to inquire about any ship with such a name at any human shipyard, they would receive a polite reply that no such craft exists in the database.

Deep within its bowels, a man carefully balanced a shard of crystal on a metal balance. The room he is in is brightly lit, filled with strange arcane devices: Temporal transmitters, Warp anchors, molecular synthesizers, and others only normally seen in the most secure Federation labs. The man, clad in a heavy white suit of protection gear, speaks into a small pod-like device. "Experiment Log Thirty-Three: The previous attempt to stabilize the duplicated noctilith using a stasis field ended in failure. After deliberation, this time the setup will consist of multiple layered time-dilation fields in a spherical pattern." Using a pair of tweezers, the scientist placed the crystal above a pedestal where it floated midair.

"Activating time-dilation fields." The air surrounding the crystal shimmered, as the passage of time itself shuddered and slowed. "Beginning duplication process." The shard of noctilith twisted and shook, before starting to expand. Within a matter of seconds, it grew into a smooth black sphere. "Duplication process successful- entering stabilization process."

The sphere hovered briefly, before exploding into spikes that flew in all directions. One of them shot straight at the man's face, before being stopped by some unseen force, the rest of them halting at the same time as well.

The scientist sighed. "Experiment resulted in failure. Duplicated noctilith is still volatile." He waves his hand, and the shards disintegrate into fine ash. The protection suit he is wearing disappeared in a flash, revealing a man clad in a white lab coat and goggles, with remarkably piercing golden eyes.

Behind him, a blue hologram flashes into existence, revealing a young man clad in jeans and t-shirt of the M2 fashion. "Old man!" The youth shouted. "Guess what I found in your collection!"

The scientist let out another sigh without turning. "I thought I told you not to mess with my galleries, Brahm."

"You can't stop me." The teenager replied flippantly. "I'm unkillable, remember?" Rolling his eyes, the scientist turned to adjust a knob on the pedestal, the time-dilation fields powering down. "So tell me, what did you find?"

The hologram disappeared, right as Brahm entered the lab in person, holding a glass cube in his right hand. "This is a genuine M1 feather quill and inkpot set from Old Earth Spain!" The teenager excitedly gestured to the items suspended inside the stasis system. "How the hell did you get that? The only other one in existence is at the Serian Vault on Terra..." he trailed off. "Just how old are you?"

The scientist tilted his head. "We've arrived at the Sol System. Like I said, stay on the ship, don't go poking around in the restricted areas. I'll be back in a few days." His lab coat rippled and changed, becoming a smooth metallic suit of purple and gold, the spectacles disappearing as spacetime warped and folded around him. In a few seconds, he was gone.