The flicker of neon lights outside barely illuminated the corners of Kaius's cramped room, leaving it steeped in shadows. He sat on the edge of his bed, elbows resting on his knees, hands clutching the sides of his head as if trying to hold his crumbling world together. His hair was a disheveled mess, tangled from hours of restless pacing and sleepless nights. The reflection in the cracked mirror across from him showed a boy who seemed far older than his 18 years—dark circles under his eyes, red from exhaustion, and a face that hadn't known hope in far too long.
"What am I even doing?" The thought hit him like a dull ache—one he was all too familiar with.
His gaze swept across the room, taking in the chaos that mirrored the state of his mind. His desk was a disaster of crumpled papers, half-empty coffee mugs, and scattered notebooks. The floor wasn't much better—clothes, wires from failed tech projects, and a couple of dismantled holo-devices lay strewn about. The flickering lightbulb overhead buzzed faintly, casting the room in a weak, uneven glow that seemed to mock his very existence.
"I'm falling apart."
He stood, dragging his feet toward the window. The cold pane of glass felt refreshing against his hand as he pressed his palm against it, but the view outside was anything but comforting. Neon Edge—a city of light and life, or at least that's what the holoscreens claimed. In reality, it was a city split in two. The Sky District, far above, was where the wealthy and powerful thrived, their bodies polished with the latest cybernetic enhancements, their lives untouched by the darkness below.
Down here, where Kaius lived, it was a different story. The streets beneath his window were filled with thugs and addicts, people who had given up on life, wandering the alleyways in search of their next fix. He watched a small group stumble by, their eyes glowing with cheap neural upgrades, their bodies twitching from the aftereffects of digital narcotics. Their faces were pale, their movements robotic—chasing fleeting moments of pleasure in a world that had long forgotten them.
"I felt so despaired while looking at Edge City—it made my hopes crumble once more," he thought, his chest tightening with every word.
Neon Edge wasn't the future. It was a prison—a glittering cage that kept the poor and the broken trapped in the shadows. The city's neon lights and towering holograms promised a better life, but they were lies, just like everything else in this godforsaken place.
"It wasn't supposed to be like this."
Kaius's mind drifted back to his earliest memories, flashes of a time when things were different—before his mother's death, before his father's health began to fail, before his own dreams had started to slip through his fingers like sand. He remembered the stories his mother used to tell him, back when he was just a boy. She had always been so full of hope, so sure that the future held something better for them.
"You'll see it one day, Kaius," she would say, her voice soft and full of warmth. "The world's changing, and people like us—people with dreams—will be the ones who shape it. Just keep dreaming, baby."
But she was gone. Overload had taken her, her body crumbling under the weight of too many cybernetic implants during childbirth. Her death had left a hole in their family—a hole that his father, Gareth, had never truly recovered from.
Kaius could hear his father coughing again from the other room. That sharp, raspy cough that seemed to grow worse by the day. It was a constant reminder of how little time they had left. His father was working himself to death just to keep a roof over their heads, and even then, it wasn't enough. They couldn't afford the upgrades Gareth needed to survive, couldn't even afford basic transportation.
Every day was a struggle, and every dream Kaius had written down seemed more and more like a cruel joke.
"What's the point of dreaming if it all just shatters before your eyes?"
The words hung heavy in the room, like a weight pressing down on his chest. He ran his hands through his tangled hair, pacing the length of the small apartment. His notebooks—filled with sketches of inventions, ideas for a better future—were scattered across the floor, but none of them had come to fruition. Stocks had been a failure, a scam that had cost him what little savings they had left. His ideas for tech upgrades were half-baked at best, and now he was left chasing a pipe dream: the DMT pill.
A pill that could control dreams. It was madness, but it was all he had left.
He collapsed onto the bed, the springs creaking beneath him. The city outside buzzed with life—hovercars whizzed by in the distance, and the distant hum of industrial machines echoed through the streets. But in here, in this tiny, suffocating room, the silence was deafening.
Another cough from his father. It sounded worse this time—deeper, more strained.
"I don't have time for this. I don't have time to keep failing."
Kaius stared at the ceiling, his thoughts swirling in a storm of frustration and helplessness. He had to make this work. He had to find a way out—for himself and for his father. But no matter how hard he tried, every step forward felt like three steps back.
He sat up abruptly, grabbing one of the notebooks from the desk. His hand shook as he flipped through the pages, scanning the sketches of neural interfaces and body mods. None of it mattered.
None of it would get them out of this hellhole. But then, toward the back of the book, he found it: a sketch of the DMT pill, hastily drawn, the words "control the mind, control the dream" scrawled next to it.
He stared at it for a long moment, his eyes tracing the lines of the drawing. It seemed impossible, even now. But something in him stirred—a flicker of hope that hadn't been there before.
Maybe… just maybe…
He placed the notebook back on the desk, his fingers lingering on the cover. His mind was still racing, but for the first time in what felt like forever, the storm of thoughts didn't feel overwhelming. There was a spark. A faint, fragile spark of something more.
Then, from the other room, his father's cough shattered the moment, pulling him back to reality. The sound was raw, almost painful to hear. Kaius clenched his jaw, a surge of determination flooding his chest.
I have to do this.
No more half-baked ideas. No more failed dreams. He had to make this pill work. For his father. For himself.