The sky over Terra Prime was never supposed to be dark.

The megacity stretched across an entire continent, its skyline pulsing with neon lights and aerial traffic that wove through towering spires of steel and glass.

But on that night, the stars vanished behind a thick storm of smoke and fire.

Inside the upper districts of the capital, hidden within the sterile white halls of a research facility, a young girl huddled in the shadows, her small body trembling.

Six-year-old Euodias pressed her hands against her ears, trying to drown out the screams. The alarms wailed, a shrill warning that no one would live to heed.

She could still hear her father's voice, urgent and commanding, as he handed her a small data drive no bigger than her palm.

No matter what happens, keep running. Do you understand, Euodias

Her mother had kissed her forehead, whispering words that she would not understand until years later.

Live. No matter the cost.

Then, the doors burst open.

The soldiers in black armor flooded in, their weapons humming with the lethal charge of plasma rounds. Euodias didn't understand everything, but she understood what happened next.

Her parents didn't run.

They fought.

She saw her father activate a security override, locking down the lab to buy her time. Saw her mother fire the first shot, a fierce light in her eyes as she struck the first soldier down.

Then blinding flashes of gunfire. The metallic scent of blood. Her parents collapsed in a lifeless heap on the pristine white floor.

And in the center of it all, standing over their bodies, was the man who would haunt her nightmares for the next decade.

General Kael Drayven.

He was tall, and imposing, his dark eyes scanning the room like a machine calculating his next move. He wiped a speck of blood from his gloves, then gave a single order:

Find the child.

Euodias did the only thing she could do.

She ran.

She ran through the ventilation shafts, her tiny frame slipping through places the soldiers couldn't follow. She ran across the rooftops of Terra Prime, the burning skyline reflecting in her tear-filled eyes.

She ran until her lungs burned, until her legs gave out until she collapsed in the slums where no Dominion soldier cared to look.

And from that moment on, Euodias was no longer a child.

She became a ghost.

A survivor.

And one day, she swore, she would return.

Not as a child running for her life.

But as the executioner delivering judgment.