The darkness was absolute—thick, suffocating, alive.
Lira clutched Damon’s sleeve. Ember pressed against her leg while Shadow’s low growl vibrated through the black. Sowhere above them, the hatch shrieked as Project Echo hamred through tal and bolts.
“Stay still,” Damon whispered. “It detects movent. Noise. Thought.”
Thought?
Lira didn’t want to ask what he ant.
A soft click echoed, and ergency strips along the floor flickered to life—thin lines of pale white guiding deeper into the CORE ARCHIVE. The projection that had spoken to them was gone, dissolved like mist.
But its voice lingered in Lira’s mind.
I’ve been waiting for you...
Damon pulled her forward. “We need to lose it in the central chamber. The Engine confuses everything in here.”
They sprinted down the glowing path. The air grew colder, vibrating with a pulse that felt almost biological. Pods lined the walls—tall glass cylinders filled with swirling fragnts of mory, so glowing red, so blue, others flickering like static torn from forgotten minds.
One pod flashed as Lira passed.
A woman’s face appeared—crying, reaching out.
“Don’t forget ...”
Lira stumbled. Ember nudged her onward.
Behind them, a distant tal boom signaled the hatch finally failing.
Project Echo was inside B4.
Damon cursed under his breath. “Faster!”
They reached the central chamber at last—a massive circular room with a suspended platform over a dark abyss. Machinery humd below, gears and unseen engines shifting like the heartbeat of a buried giant. Thick cables dangled like veins connecting the platform to the ceiling.
At the far side of the platform stood the projection—waiting.
Its form was clearer now, almost human: a young man with hollow eyes and glitching edges. His voice echoed without moving his lips.
“Welco to the beginning.”
Damon raised an arm protectively in front of Lira. “You shouldn’t exist. They shut this place down.”
The projection tilted its head. “They thought shutting it down would erase . But I am not a file. I am everything they tried to bury.”
It lifted one hand, and the air shivered. The surrounding pods trembled as mories inside them writhed like storm clouds.
“W-why are you waiting for ?” Lira whispered, unable to stop the words.
Damon hissed, “Lira—!”
The projection focused on her.
“Because you rember what others forget. You are... compatible.”
A heavy thud echoed through the corridor outside.
Project Echo had found the path.
The projection stepped closer.
“You can restore the Engine. You can bring back what was lost. Or—”
The lights trembled violently.
“—you can destroy all mory forever.”
Lira’s pulse pounded. “I don’t understand!”
“You will.” Its voice softened. “I am the First mory. The seed they used to create Echo.”
Damon froze.
“That thing chasing us,” the projection continued, “is a failed body made to contain .”
Another thud. Closer.
“And it wants what you can give.”
Lira swallowed hard. “What’s that?”
The projection smiled—a sad, fractured smile.
“Identity.”
The corridor behind them shook as the creature’s silhouette erged from the shadows—taller, contorted, hungry.
Damon stepped forward, shielding Lira.
Shadow growled.
Ember bared her teeth.
The First mory extended a hand toward her.
“Choose quickly, Lira. Will you erase the past—”
The creature roared.
“—or rewrite it?”
The platform trembled.
Sothing below began to wake.
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