Flat.
The five month old son of billionaire Elliot Vance had been declared clinically dead inside the private pediatric wing of Brookhaven Children’s Hospital located in Riverton City, a place known for handling cases that most hospitals could not even stabilize.
Advanced medical machines had already failed, and every leading doctor in the facility had exhausted every known emergency procedure without success.
At that exact moment, a thin and exhausted ten year old boy pushed through the restricted hallway doors with dirt on his clothes and a heavy sack of recyclables hanging from his shoulder.
His name was Miles Arden.
He smelled like damp alleyways and old metal cans, and his worn sneakers made soft scraping sounds against the polished hospital floor as security immediately moved to block his path.
A nurse raised her voice and demanded that he leave the restricted area immediately, yet Miles did not step back because something unusual had already caught his attention.
That morning he had been collecting discarded bottles near the river district of Riverton City while living with his grandfather Samuel Arden in a broken wooden shack beside abandoned rail tracks.