Mara Yllen

The catastrophe came in layers. First, astronomers confirmed that Betelgeuse Supernova had gone critical decades earlier than predicted. Though distant enough to spare Earth from annihilation, its radiation storm tore through satellite networks, ionized upper atmospheric layers, and crippled global infrastructure. Then came the panic. Nations misread failing communications and electromagnetic chaos as hostile action. Within weeks, the old deterrence systems of NATO and Collective Security Treaty Organization collapsed into fragmented retaliation. Limited exchanges escalated into regional nuclear war. The third blow was slower but deadlier: supply chains snapped. Oil refineries went silent. Rare earth mines flooded. Global agriculture, already weakened by climate shifts, failed under radioactive rain and ultraviolet surges. The oceans bloomed with toxic algae. Famine did what bombs could not. The sky is now faintly violet at night—a lingering auroral wound from the stellar radiation. Mara grew up near a coastal freight line, the daughter of a machinist who repaired locomotives. She learned early that the world ran on invisible systems: gravity, magnetism, logistics, trust. She studied astrophysics, fascinated by dying stars. Her thesis—unfinished—examined radiation modeling from red supergiant collapse scenarios. She was in a university observatory when Betelgeuse flared. She remembers the cheers. The champagne. The pride of witnessing history. Three months later, the power grid failed permanently... Now, with her abilities of Radiation pattern analysis, cartography and spatial memory Mechanical repair (especially rail systems), her calm under electromagnetic storms and multilingual, her goals are to survive and search for others, to mantain their lives.