NXU: The Triad: The Nexus Universe(NXU), #7

By Joey Gade

NXU: The Triad is the explosive beginning of the Nexus Universe saga. Born from a failed experiment, three engineered sisters—Aurora, Ember, and Tempest—must learn to balance identity, power, and destiny while defending Halcyon Heights from enemies both human and resonant.As the sisters struggle with what it means to be family, they face the scheming Baroness Selene Marrow, the calculating genius Cortex, and Solara—the abandoned "Fourth Sister" who threatens to unravel everything. With allies divided, villains multiplying, and the city itself questioning whether they are heroes or weapons, the Triad must decide who they really are.Blending cinematic action, sharp character drama, and the moral complexity of modern superhero epics, NXU: The Triad reimagines the superhero genre for a new generation. Perfect for fans of Marvel, DC, and original hero sagas, this novel sets the stage for an interconnected universe of stories that push the limits of power, choice, and consequence.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Joey Gade
• Release date: Sep 17, 2025
• ISBN: 9798232341824

Book preview

​NXU: The Triad

​By: Joey Gade

​Table of Contents

---

Dramatis Personae

​Prologue – Resonant Genesis

​Part I – First Trials

Chapter 1 – The Discord Pack

Chapter 2 – Cortex Ascendant

Chapter 3 – The Rustwire Crew

Chapter 4 – Ferrox Unleashed

Chapter 5 – Halcyon Shadows

Part II – Dark Reflections

Chapter 6 – Solara’s Return

Chapter 7 – Siren’s Lure

Chapter 8 – The Veil-Touched

Chapter 9 – The Nullboys

Chapter 10 – Fractured Bonds

Part III – Siege of Halcyon Heights

Chapter 11 – The Baroness’ Gambit

Chapter 12 – Echoes of Resonance

Chapter 13 – The Discord War

Chapter 14 – Solara’s Betrayal

Chapter 15 – Halcyon Burns

Epilogue – World on Edge

Dramatis Personae

---

​The Triad

●  Aurora Veyra – The light-wielder, radiant and disciplined. Serves as the heart of the team, constantly balancing leadership with compassion.

●  Ember Veyra – The flame-bearer, impulsive yet deeply empathetic. Connects with ordinary people most easily, grounding the sisters in humanity.

●  Tempest Veyra – The storm-bringer, sharp-tongued and fearless. Quick to action, but haunted by questions of control and destiny.

​Allies

●  Dr. Alaric Kairon – Resonance scientist whose failed experiment gave birth to The Triad. Torn between scientific duty and reluctant fatherhood, haunted by guilt for creating daughters who were never meant to exist.

●  Sera Caelith – Alaric’s sister, pragmatic and unflinching. Acts as a political liaison, shielding The Triad from bureaucracy while demanding accountability from them.

●  Chancellor Dorian Halcrest – Stoic, aging leader of Halcyon Heights. Pragmatic yet weary, sees The Triad as both saviors and political instruments.

●  Halcyon Heights Kids – A small group of teens who view The Triad as role models, providing friendship, perspective, and a glimpse of normal life.

●  Dr. Kairon’s Lab Assistants – Loyal researchers who aid Alaric. They offer moments of levity and humanity in the otherwise heavy burden of scientific responsibility.

​Nemeses

●  Cortex – Hyper-intelligent strategist and manipulator of resonance. A theatrical yet deadly nemesis whose schemes test The Triad at every turn.

●  Solara – The Fourth Sister, an abandoned prototype whose existence embodies the nightmare of resonance gone wrong. A rival born from rejection and betrayal.

●  The Discord Pack – A gang of shard-mutated mercenaries, each one a twisted mirror of Aurora, Ember, or Tempest. Chaos incarnate, united only by destruction.

○  Vandal – The mirror of Aurora. Twists light into jagged prisms and blinding weapons, warping her disciplined glow into chaotic refractions. Charismatic but cruel, thrives on taunting Aurora’s leadership instincts by showing her what light without restraint looks like.

○  Inferno – The mirror of Ember. Feeds on fire and heat, growing stronger the more destruction surrounds him. Ember’s warmth turned into hunger. Wild, destructive, and mocking, constantly trying to lure Ember into letting go of control and burning everything.

○  Havok – The mirror of Tempest. Wields unstable storm resonance, chaotic bursts of electricity and sonic shockwaves. Tempest’s precision twisted into volatility. Hot-headed, brutal, thrives on breaking order; represents the sovereign storm that Tempest fears becoming.

●  Baroness Selene Marrow – A wealthy industrialist who thrives on influence and propaganda. Uses wealth as a weapon, determined to overshadow The Triad and control the narrative.

●  The Veil-Touched – Whispering horrors from beyond resonance, each seeking to exploit the sisters’ doubts and insecurities. Neither fully corporeal nor entirely imagined.

●  Ferrox Lummox – A hulking shard-mutant, territorial and primal. More beast than man, his wrath is uncontrollable once provoked.

●  The Rustwire Crew – Shard-enhanced street delinquents who revel in chaos. Their unpredictability makes them as dangerous as any master villain.

●  ​Siren Vesper – A resonance-fueled thief who wields allure and shapeshifting with precision. Style and deception are her weapons of choice.

●  ​The Nullboys – A trio of nano-slime constructs whose ineptitude belies their occasional accidental menace. Comic in appearance, but still capable of real damage.

​Prologue – Resonant Genesis

---

The first thing Aurora remembered was the light.

Not sunlight—not anything so simple as warmth trickling through blinds. This light had edges. It sang through her bones in a chord too clean to be natural, a blade of brilliance that seemed to cut a hole in the dark and pour her into the world.

She coughed. Air shot into lungs that learned the trick of breathing as they did it. Her knees hit a cold floor. All around her the laboratory pulsed with sterile luminance and deeper, stranger radiance—rings of instrumentation arced like ribcages around a central dais, cables fed into a suspended lattice of crystal and steel, and everywhere, humming, humming, humming, a frequency that felt like her name.

She didn’t have a name yet.

Stabilize, said a man, too calm to be calm. His voice clipped itself, roughened by caffeine and years of talking to machines. We’re at... ninety-one percent coherence. Phase windows are holding. He stood at a console a few meters away, lean and pale, eyes burned red from watching a readout that scrolled too fast for ordinary eyes. His hands moved with a pianist’s precision. A twelve-hour stubble shaded the sharp lines of his face, and when he exhaled it came out like he’d been holding his breath since childhood.

Doctor Kairon, someone breathed—another voice in the room, feminine, steadier. Something’s—

Not now. He didn’t look away. Focus on the Catalyst.

Another shape fell to the floor beside Aurora, this one laughing as if it had been born mid-giggle and couldn’t stop. Her skin glowed—no, her skin refracted—heat shimmered off her like a mirage.

Oh my gosh, the new girl said between laughs—that was a voice too, bright and startling. Oh my—hi! Hi! She reached for Aurora and took her hands in both of hers, startling herself with the contact, yelping at the heat she emitted, and then laughing again because the yelp was funny. Her hair licked upward as if wind had fingers in it. Are you okay? I think I’m okay! Wait—what’s okay?

A third body hit the floor like thunder. She didn’t stumble. She landed, planted, rose in a single motion and scanned the room with lightning in her eyes. The air seemed to lean toward her. Static curled across her knuckles. She didn’t speak. She cocked her head toward the humming lattice and then toward the man at the console, and then toward the other girl—her—Aurora realized—and something opened behind Aurora’s ribs that had never been empty: a place shaped like these two.

Please, the woman’s voice said again. Alaric.

Dr. Alaric Kairon finally tore himself from the readouts. He didn’t approach so much as drift, as if a tether pulled him and he was trying not to make the tether real by walking. He stopped just beyond arm’s length, as if touching would break something fragile, and his gaze swept the three of them with an awe that made him look like a boy trespassing in a cathedral.

His lips formed a word before he made himself swallow it.

Daughters.

Can you hear me? he asked, speaking into a moment that seemed balanced on a knife. Can you understand?

The laughing one beamed. Yes! She