Atomic Faceplates-Auric Fade Faceplate

The sample arrived in a sealed container with no return address.

Inside: a single crystal, roughly the size of a thumb, pulled from a mineral deposit on a planet so far out on the survey maps it didn't have a name yet — just a coordinate and a flag marked "anomalous geology."

The crystal was violet at its core. But toward the edges, where the lattice structure thinned, it shifted — slowly, without boundary — into a gold so pale it looked like frozen light. Not a gradient. Not a trick of refraction. The color change was structural, built into the crystal at the molecular level over millions of years of pressure and heat.

No one could synthesize it. The deposit was gone by the time the second team arrived — disappearing as mysteriously as it appeared.

There is one sample. It lives in a lab that doesn't appear on any public registry.

The Auric Fade Faceplate is the closest thing that exists outside that room — a deep anodized purple fading to pale champagne gold.

• Seamless fade finish — no hard boundary between colors
• Precision-machined for a factory-fit feel
  
• Compatible with 5th generation iPod Classic

The deposit is gone. The color remains.