Eliza had always found comfort in the stars. As a child, she would trace constellations with her finger, imagining stories woven across the night sky. They had always felt constant, eternal—until tonight. Something had changed, and she could feel it in her bones. The stars no longer felt comforting but seemed to watch her with cold, distant eyes.
She gripped the steering wheel of her car, her fingers tightening. The observatory had been quiet, but something stuck in her mind: a strange reading on the instruments, something that shouldn't exist. She had dismissed it as a mistake, but now, with the empty road stretching ahead, she couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong.
"Just equipment failure," she muttered, not believing her own words.
The data had shown something impossible—a ripple in space itself. Her coworkers had laughed it off. But Eliza knew better. She'd checked everything three times. The reading was real, and it was getting stronger.
Now, driving home at midnight, worry gnawed at her stomach. The stars above seemed to pulse strangely, as if sending a warning.
Her phone buzzed on the passenger seat. Probably her boss wanting to talk about those weird readings. She ignored it. What could she say? That the universe was having some kind of cosmic hiccup? That would be career suicide.
A sudden light flared in the distance.
Her heart jumped. Headlights? No, too bright. Too big. The light didn't come from the road but from above, washing over everything in sight. The trees cast writhing shadows that seemed almost alive.
In a heartbeat, the whole world was swallowed by blinding light.
Eliza slammed the brakes, her mind racing. The light went through everything—her car, the road, her body. It wasn't just bright; it had weight, pressure, presence.
Impact.
Metal twisted. Glass broke. The car rolled, floating as if gravity had given up. She barely felt herself flying forward, the seatbelt catching her, her body smashing into the dashboard.
Time slowed down. Each second stretched forever. She watched her hands float in front of her, drops of blood hanging in the air. The windshield exploded inward, glass fragments suspended like frozen rain.
There was a flash of terrible pain—and then, nothing.
Eliza existed in silence.
No ground beneath her. No sound. No air. Just endless blackness stretching forever in all directions. The darkness wasn't empty; it seemed alive, breathing around her. She tried to breathe, but couldn't. She tried to move, but had no body.
Fear gripped her mind. Was this death? Had she just... ended? The thought should have terrified her, but terror needed a body to feel it, and she was beyond that now. There was only awareness—just her thoughts floating in nothingness.
She tried to remember what happened—the light, the crash, the pain—but the memories slipped away like water. Even who she was began to fade, the idea of "Eliza" meaning less and less in this place beyond everything.
Then, the whispers began.
At first, they were barely there—like leaves rustling when there's no wind. But they grew louder until countless voices murmured around her, speaking words she almost recognized. The voices spoke in languages she'd never heard, yet somehow understood deeper than words.
Shadows moved in the darkness, shapes forming and vanishing before she could make sense of them. Strange patterns appeared—angles and shapes that shouldn't be possible. She tried to understand the whispers, but they escaped her grasp like smoke.
"Hello?" she tried to call, though she had no voice. "Is anyone there?"
The whispers paused, as if surprised by her. Then, they returned, more urgent than before. The shadows gathered, forming shapes that might have been people, or might have been something else entirely. They moved around her, watching, studying.
And then, a voice unlike the rest.
"You do not belong here."
The words vibrated through her very core, neither angry nor kind. Simply stating a fact. The voice was both one and many, old and new, male and female all at once. It carried the weight of ages, of countless worlds.
"Where am I?" she tried to ask. "What happened to me?"
"Questions from a being that should not exist here," the voice answered. "A curiosity. Something that doesn't fit."
"Am I dead?"
A ripple passed through the darkness—almost like laughter. "Death is for beings that end. You are between places, between realities. Caught in forces beyond your understanding."
Before she could ask more, the darkness cracked like broken glass. Lines of light split across the blackness, spreading like lightning. Light poured through the cracks, surrounding her.
A powerful force rushed through her, tearing her apart and rebuilding her instantly. It wasn't pain—it was beyond pain, beyond feeling itself. It was change at the deepest level. Images flooded her mind—stars dying, galaxies being born, endless time compressed into a single moment. She saw worlds form and die, all happening at once.
The feeling of being unmade and remade was overwhelming. It felt like her very soul was being unwoven and woven again. Knowledge filled her—things no human was meant to know, secrets of how reality worked, languages of long-dead worlds, the true names of forces that science barely understood.
"What's happening to me?" she cried out, her non-existent voice somehow echoing.
"You are being remade," the voice answered. "The old must go for the new to come."
"I don't want to be remade! I want to go home!"
"That is no longer possible. There is no going back. Accept what comes."
Reality rebuilt itself.
She gasped, air rushing into her lungs like she'd been underwater too long. The feeling shocked her—the burn of oxygen, her chest expanding, her heart pounding. She was lying on solid ground—soft, warm, unlike anything she'd felt before. Every nerve in her body sparked with new sensitivity.
Slowly, she pushed herself up, her fingers sinking into grass that glowed silver. The grass bent under her touch, releasing a smell like cinnamon and electricity. Her movements felt strange, too smooth, too perfect, as if her body responded too well to her thoughts.
Her breath caught in her throat. Above her stretched an endless golden sky, swirling with shifting patterns of light. There was no sun, no clouds, just an ever-changing canvas of color that seemed to watch her. The air hummed with energy against her skin. The horizon curved strangely, breaking all rules of normal space.
This was not Earth.
Cold fear settled over her. She stumbled to her feet, every sensation too strong—too real, too alive. The ground beneath her pulsed with energy that traveled up through her legs, making her feel weightless yet anchored.
"Hello?" she called out, her voice sounding strange—more musical, with tones that seemed to make the air vibrate. "Is anyone there?"
Only silence answered, but it was a silence full of waiting, as if the world itself was holding its breath.
Then she saw her reflection in a still pool nearby. The water had a pearl-like quality, perfectly showing her image without a single ripple.
It was not her.
The face staring back was both familiar and alien. Her skin glowed faintly, as if light lived just under the surface. Her features were different—sharper, more elegant, with angles no human face had. Her once-brown eyes now shone with a silver light, surrounded by rings of shifting color. Her dark hair, now longer and flowing past her shoulders, moved gently as if in a breeze that wasn't there.
Her breath quickened. She raised her hands, flexing her fingers—longer, more delicate, yet filled with strange strength. Patterns moved beneath her skin, like stars slowly dancing. Even her body's weight felt different, as if gravity worked differently for her now.
"What am I?" she whispered, her words making the air vibrate around her.
A name appeared in her mind, sudden yet certain.
Lyra.
The name echoed inside her, pushing "Eliza" aside gently but firmly. She didn't know where it came from, but it felt right. As though it had always been hers, waiting to be remembered rather than discovered.
"Lyra," she said the name aloud, and the sound sent ripples across the pool. The golden sky pulsed once, as if acknowledging her.
The wind stirred, carrying whispers she could almost understand. The words danced at the edge of meaning, slipping away when she tried to focus on them.
But one phrase came through clearly:
"Awaken, Assembler."
Her heart raced. She turned, looking across the endless landscape around her. No one was there, yet she felt watched, judged. The land stretched in all directions—rolling hills covered in silver grass, scattered groups of trees with see-through trunks and glowing leaves. In the distance, mountains floated above the ground, breaking all laws of physics she'd ever known.
A city shimmered on the horizon, its towers reaching toward the sky. Unlike human buildings that fought against gravity, these embraced and controlled it. The structures looked impossibly delicate, hanging in the air as if by magic. They twisted and curved in patterns that pleased the eye but challenged the mind. Lights pulsed along pathways, guiding travelers she couldn't see.
She hesitated. She had no idea where she was, who she had become, or why she was brought here. Her entire life—her work as an astronomer, her small apartment, her friends—all felt like a distant dream, fading with each breath she took in this strange place.
But something deep inside told her she couldn't stay still. That she had been chosen for something beyond her understanding. The word "Assembler" echoed in her mind, heavy with meaning and purpose.
With no other choice, she took her first step forward, knowing nothing would ever be the same again. The silver grass parted before her, creating a path toward the distant city. Each step released small flashes of light, as if the ground itself responded to her.
As she walked, Lyra felt knowledge unfolding in her mind—instinctive understanding of this place and her purpose in it. She was still herself, yet more. Still human, yet beyond. The stars she had studied for so long had claimed her as their own, reshaping her into something new.
The horizon called to her, and Lyra—who had once been Eliza—moved toward her destiny, the whispers of the cosmos guiding her every step.