Starheart Nova's Arc

Chapter 1 of 3

Nova counted the cash twice and still came up short. The job was supposed to fix everything—pay the garage rent, keep her crew fed, buy her one quiet month. Instead she crouched in the quarry at midnight, holding a stolen case that didn't belong to her, and she knew someone had sold her out. The Iron Serpent crew was her family. In that rundown garage, with its patched metal walls and worn tools, they fixed bikes and planned jobs and watched each other's backs. Nova had promised them this score. She kept a small handmade charm clipped to her jacket, a lumpy superhero toy with a star on its chest. She'd made it as a kid, back when she still believed people got saved. She rubbed its worn paint now and waited for her ride. The ride never came. Headlights flooded the quarry instead. Police lights. Nova pressed flat against cold stone and watched a man step out alone. Thomas Kirkland. The cop who drank with her crew. The decorated Navy man everyone trusted, who'd shaken Nova's hand a week ago and called her a survivor. "Nova," he called. "Hand me the case. Walk away clean." She climbed up to the ledge where he stood. "You set us up." Kirkland shrugged. He didn't even pretend. "Business. You should've stayed small." "The crew trusted you." Her voice cracked. "I trusted you." "That was your mistake." He drew his gun. "The case. Now." Nova's hands shook. Not from fear. Something was wrong inside her chest, a heat building behind her ribs, pushing outward. She'd felt warm before, when she was angry. Never like this. Never like a furnace waking up. "Where's my crew?" she asked. "Gone. Rolled up an hour ago." He smiled. "You're the last piece." The heat surged. Light leaked between her fingers, white and gold, crawling up her arms. Nova stared at her own hands in horror. The quarry stones glowed in the new light. Kirkland stepped back, gun shaking now. "What is that?" he said. "What are you?" She didn't know. The fire wasn't on her—it was her, breathing when she breathed, pulling at something she couldn't name. In her jacket, the charm grew hot against her chest. She felt a ring of power snap open deep inside, ancient and enormous, like a door she never knew was locked. "Stop," she whispered to it. It didn't stop. The light exploded outward. Kirkland dove behind his car. Stone cracked. The stolen case burst open in her grip, empty, worthless, a lie. Nova screamed and the fire answered, carving a scar across the quarry floor. When it faded, she stood alone. Her crew was gone. Her money was gone. Kirkland's car raced away up the quarry road. Nova looked at her trembling hands, still warm, still glowing faint. Something had woken in her tonight. She had no idea how to put it back to sleep—or how to keep it from burning everyone she had left.