*CHAPTER 1 - AWAKENING* The spaceship had crash-landed. It was not completely destroyed, but it was broken — twisted metal, shattered glass, smoke rising from its wounded hull. Inside, silence hung heavy like dust. Slowly, a boy opened his eyes. His vision was blurred. His head throbbed. It felt as if his memories had been scattered, like pieces of paper thrown into the wind. He tried to move, but his body felt heavy, his limbs numb. Then he heard it. A low, garbled noise from the corner. Buried under fallen debris and torn wires, a humanoid robot lay covered in ruins. Its eyes flickered — red, then blue, then red again — beeping repeatedly while uttering nonsense, its voice box glitching. "Bzzt... Ob... Obed... sys... tem... bzzzt..." The boy turned his head slowly, dizzy, a slight headache pounding behind his eyes. Suddenly, the robot jolted. With a surge of power, it threw off everything that was on top of it — metal plates, cables, broken storage crates — like a man refreshed after a long, deep sleep. It stood up, dust falling from its iron shoulders, its chest light pulsing. The boy stared at it. The robot stared back. For a moment, neither moved. Then the robot tilted its head, its sensors scanning. In its own internal view, data streamed rapidly — heart rate, brain activity, memory fragmentation, mild concussion. It displayed what the boy was going through. Without warning, it flashed a bright green light from its eyes. The light scanned the boy from head to toe. In an instant, warmth flooded his body. The dizziness vanished. The headache cleared. His thoughts snapped back into place, sharp and clear. His muscles tightened, his strength returned to its peak. He gasped and sat up straight, breathing hard, fully conscious. He stood up. The humanoid iron robot stood there, looking at him quietly, its large glowing eyes blinking. The boy looked at his own hands, then at the robot. "Did you do that?" he asked. Although he already knew what this robot was capable of, he still asked. It was a habit — a way of talking to the only family he had ever known. The robot nodded. The movement was small, almost cute. The boy smiled faintly and patted its cold, metallic hand. "Thank you, Greg." Greg made a soft beeping sound, pleased. Obed then tried to understand what had happened. He looked around. The interior of the ship was a mess. The learning pods were shattered. The control panels that once projected light like films — the films where he had learned about Earth, about oceans, about history — were all dark. Cables hung from the ceiling like vines. The cryo-beds of the other crew members were empty and cold. They had been empty for a long time. He was trying to gather his thoughts, trying to remember the last moment before impact, when a loud noise cracked through the hull. _CRACK!_ One part of the spaceship's side split open. The metal groaned and peeled away, and a sharp beam of sunlight pierced through the darkness, cutting straight across the dusty floor. The light was so bright, so warm, that Obed froze. It was real sunlight. Not the artificial white light of the ship. Real. "We... we landed," he whispered. Living in this spaceship his whole life, he had learned everything from the robots. Greg and the others would project lights that formed moving pictures — films of old Earth. He had seen forests in those films. He had seen oceans. He had seen skies. But he had never seen them for real. Everything he knew was from a story told by light. Now, it was real. He was really happy — a wild, innocent joy rising in his chest — and he rushed toward the crack, toward the light, desperate to see what the outside world looked like. And what he saw was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen in his life. He stood there, dazed and amazed, unable to move. He had landed by a beach. Before him stretched an endless expanse of water, blue and glittering under the sun, moving and breathing, waves crashing softly against white sand. The sound was unlike anything he had ever heard — not the hum of engines, but the endless sigh of the sea. The wind carried salt and freshness into his lungs. "Wow..." he breathed. He stepped out of the wreckage, his bare feet sinking into warm sand. It was soft. It was real. He walked a few steps, then turned around and looked the opposite way. There, behind him, were trees. Not the small, artificial plants from the ship's lab. These were giant, ancient trees with thick, high wood, their leaves dense and green, forming a forest that stretched far into the distance. Birds flew above them. The air smelled like earth and life. This was the first time he was seeing this for real. Not as a projection. For real. His heart was beating fast. His eyes were wide with wonder. For eight years, his world had been metal walls and blinking lights. Now his world was infinite. "Greg!" he called, his voice filled with excitement like any child. He turned back to the ship. "Greg, come! Look!" Greg did not hesitate. The iron robot walked out of the broken hull, its heavy feet thudding on the sand, its eyes scanning the new environment. It stopped beside Obed, looking out at the sea, then at the forest, analyzing. Obed laughed — a pure, free laugh — and started walking around, touching everything. He touched the sand, letting it run through his fingers. He touched the trunk of a fallen tree near the beach, feeling its rough bark. He knelt and touched a small wildflower. He breathed in the fresh air deeply, peacefully, as if he had been holding his breath his whole life. Greg followed him closely, like a guardian, like a father. The two of them — a boy born in the stars and an old iron robot — walked along the edge of the beach, leaving footprints where no human footprints had ever been. Obed stopped and looked up at the sky. It was vast and blue, with clouds drifting slowly. For the first time, he was not inside a ship. He was home. But it was a home he did not know.

Awakening