Zora's Aurora 2 - Silver Veil
Copyright© 2025 by Art Samms
Chapter 8
The LunaDome was alive yet again—flooded with pulsing light and the roar of thousands of fans. It was the third and final show of the Luna tour, and the energy in the air could have powered a small city. Holographic auroras streamed above the audience, dancing like ribbons of fire and ice, casting the crowd in cascades of blue, silver, and violet.
From center stage, Zora gripped the mic stand, the pulse of the bass reverberating through her chest. Sophie was a blur beside her, fingers flying over her guitar, her hair catching the glint of the dome lights. Natalia’s drums thundered behind them—steady, commanding, alive—and Brian’s harmonies wove through it all like silver thread.
To the crowd, it was magic. To Zora and Sophie, it was tension wound to a breaking point.
They’d spent the past two days tracing data trails and chemical shipments, but Lena’s Luna base remained a ghost. Every lead ended in a blank wall or a fake registry. The authorities still dismissed their warnings. And now, with thousands of people packed under one sealed dome, their worst fear loomed: this concert might be Lena’s field test.
Sophie had tried to focus on the set, but her eyes kept darting toward the upper catwalks, the maintenance vents that lined the circular ceiling. Zora, too, felt the prickle of unease crawling across her skin. It wasn’t stage nerves—it was instinct.
Halfway through “Eclipse Rising”, a tune they’d composed exclusively for this tour, she saw it.
A shadow moved at the upper level—small, deliberate, most definitely not security. A figure in sleek black, half-concealed by scaffolding, just above one of the vent hubs.
Zora’s heart froze. Lena.
She caught Sophie’s eye mid-verse. A subtle signal—two fingers toward the vents. Sophie’s gaze followed, then sharpened. There was no mistaking the faint shimmer of gas beginning to seep into the filtered airflow, visible only against the lasers slicing through the haze.
Zora didn’t hesitate.
“Keep playing!” she barked into her mic, startling the others.
Then, in one fluid motion, she reached to her belt pouch and yanked out her most notorious accessory—the compact air horn she’d been carrying since before the attack on Leo. Without warning, she let it rip.
The blast was ear-splitting. It rattled the scaffolds, shook the stage monitors, and brought the roaring crowd to an instant, stunned silence.
“Zora!” Brian hissed, covering one ear even as his other hand stayed on the keys. “What the hell—”
But Sophie already knew. She dashed to the side console, fingers flying across the override pad. The ventilation control came up—she slammed the emergency shutdown.
The arena lights flickered as the airflow halted. The faint shimmering mist above the crowd dissipated before it could spread further.
From her position near the drums, Natalia glanced up in confusion, then saw it—the dark figure climbing down the scaffolding, retreating into the access corridor.
“Zora!” she shouted, pointing.
Zora turned just in time to catch a glimpse of Lena’s pale face in the strobe light, framed by a smile of cold fury. Then she was gone, swallowed by the chaos as alarms began to blare.
Delta’s voice crackled through their in-ear comms. “Lockdown initiated. Stay put—I’m sealing the arena.”
Emergency barriers slid into place around the exits, and the crowd began to murmur in confusion. Zora grabbed the mic, forcing her voice to steady.
“Everyone stay calm! Just a technical issue—part of the show!”
The audience, unsure but trusting, erupted into applause as though the blaring horn and flashing lights had been intentional.
Brian leaned close, voice low. “You really think she just tried to gas thousands of people?”
Zora’s answer was grim. “Not gas. Influence. Just like we talked about. She was about to turn this crowd into her experiment.”
Sophie returned from the vent panel, sweat beading her forehead. “Ventilation’s sealed. Whatever she released—it didn’t spread.”
Delta appeared on stage moments later, tablet in hand, her face pale. “Security’s sweeping the maintenance levels. No sign of her yet. Whoever she is—she’s fast.”
Zora’s gaze drifted upward again, toward the high catwalks still shrouded in flickering light.
“She’s not done,” she said quietly. “This was just her test run. Next time, she won’t miss.”
The crowd began chanting “Aurora! Aurora!” as the lockdown cleared.
Somehow, some way, they finished the concert—Zora cracking jokes between songs to keep the tension from showing, Sophie playing with fierce determination, Natalia continuing to pound out rhythms that shook the dome itself.
But even as the final notes of “Twentieth Century Throwback” thundered through the air, Zora and Sophie exchanged a single look across the stage—a wordless understanding that the night’s victory was only skin-deep.
Somewhere out in the lunar shadows, Lena Intriago was still moving her pieces.
In one of the private conference suites attached to the arena, Zora’s Aurora, as well as their allies, sat gathered around a long curved table. The mood was subdued but steady—an undercurrent of relief tempered by the knowledge that their battle wasn’t quite over. But all in all, there were some welcome developments.
Delta stood at the center, tablet in hand, her posture crisp but her eyes weary. Behind her, a holo-map displayed the Las Estrellas district—red zones flickering where security teams had swept through only hours earlier.
“Alright,” Delta said at last, breaking the silence. “We have confirmation from Luna law enforcement. The compound Lena tried to disperse was fully contained. The aerosol never reached the crowd—Sophie’s cutoff stopped it cold.”
Zora leaned back, releasing a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. “So, no one was affected?”
“None of the spectators,” Delta confirmed. “A few of the security techs near the vents had minor exposure. They’re fine—mild dizziness, nothing permanent.”
Sophie, perched on the edge of the table with her guitar case still beside her, gave a small nod. “That’s good. One more minute and it would’ve been a disaster.”
Delta went on, “A couple of Lena’s thugs were apprehended outside the arena. One of them sang like a canary. According to LE, this guy wasn’t the brightest nova in the galaxy. He did spit out one very interesting detail. That hit on Leo the first night, which we all thought at first was random? Not so. The intended target was you, Brian. It was a case of mistaken identity. But it was part of Lena’s scheme.”
“Me?” said a stunned Brian. “But why? I don’t look anything like Leo.”
“Which says a lot about the competence of those hit men,” said Sophie. “But it seems like the rest of Lena’s operation was top-notch, a couple of dumb hacks aside. As for why they targeted you in particular? Who knows? My guess is it was some kind of opening gambit she staged on our arrival.”
Brian, taking all this in, rubbed his temples. “And Lena herself?”
At that, Delta’s tone hardened. “She’s gone. Security drones tracked her to an industrial zone near the colony’s perimeter—she ditched her transport and vanished into the maintenance tunnels. But there’s good news. They found her lab.”
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