I. Threshold of the Unknown
The Echo Nexus loomed before them—a spiraling monolith of shifting geometry, suspended above a chasm that pulsed with veins of silver light. Its surface was neither stone nor metal but something alive, flickering between states of matter, its structure rewriting itself with every breath of the void.
Kael stood at the precipice, his symbiont humming in resonance. It had been restless since the battle with the Harbinger, sensing something beyond mortal perception.
"This place is rewriting reality," Veyra muttered, scanning the structure with her holoreel. "The Nexus isn't just a location—it's a construct of the Veil itself."
Tarek adjusted his reforged prosthetic, the void-forged metal vibrating slightly. "So, what's the plan? Knock and hope it lets us in?"
Jara chambered a fresh plasma round. "Or we blast our way in."
Kael didn't answer. His mind was already slipping between here and there, drawn toward the Nexus's pulse. He placed a hand against its surface—
And the world shattered around him.
---
II. The Echoed Reality
Kael found himself standing in a mirrored version of the world, where time and space bent like ripples in a shattered lake.
The others were still with him, but distorted—Jara's movements lagged half a second behind, Veyra flickered between different moments of thought, and Tarek's reflection stood beside him, separate from his true self.
Then he saw her.
Lyra.
She stood at the Nexus's core, her figure wreathed in flowing silver light, shifting between human and something other.
"Kael," she whispered, her voice echoing from a thousand different timelines. "You shouldn't have come."
Kael's breath caught in his throat. "You're alive?"
She took a step forward, and suddenly he wasn't in the mirrored world anymore. He was with her, standing in the heart of the Nexus, staring at an endless expanse of threads woven from starlight and shadow.
This was the true core of the Veil.
And at its center, something stirred.
---
III. The Forgotten's Whisper
Kael barely had time to process Lyra's presence before the air tore open.
The Forgotten Ones emerged.
Not the Hollow cultists who worshiped them—these were the true entities behind the Veil's existence. They unfolded from the rifts in space, their forms shifting between silhouettes of robed figures, writhing tendrils, and vast cosmic entities that bled into the fabric of reality itself.
One of them—its voice a whisper in all languages—spoke.
"You are the Weaveborn. You walk where mortals should not."
Kael felt his symbiont ignite, veins of golden light cracking through his skin.
"I don't care what you call me," he growled. "I came for my sister."
Lyra turned to him, her expression unreadable. "Kael… I am the Veil now."
The words hit him harder than any wound ever could.
---
IV. Fractured Loyalties
Back in the real world, Jara, Veyra, Tarek, and Eris fought to keep their footing. The Nexus had begun shifting, its pathways breaking apart as if reacting to Kael's presence within.
Eris clutched her head. "The Veil's screaming… it knows him."
Jara fired a stabilizer shot into the ground, anchoring their position. "Then we need to get him out now."
Veyra furiously worked through her holoreel. "I can interface with the Nexus… if I can find his exact temporal frequency, I can pull him back."
Tarek tightened his grip on his weapon. "And if we can't?"
Jara's jaw tightened. "Then we go in after him."
---
V. The Choice
Inside the Nexus, Kael stood frozen, torn between the past and present.
"You don't have to fight," Lyra said softly. "The Veil isn't destruction, Kael—it's transformation. It can be reborn."
The Forgotten Ones moved closer, their voices whispering possibilities into his mind.
You could fix the Veil.
You could reshape reality.
You could bring her back.
Kael's heart pounded. He wanted to believe her. To trust her. But his symbiont pulsed a different truth—this wasn't salvation. It was an assimilation.
Then he felt Jara's presence—not in words, but in action. A tether of reality pulled him back, Veyra's holoreel locking onto his fracturing timeline.
Lyra reached for him, her expression pleading. "Please."
Kael clenched his fists. "No. This isn't you, Lyra."
And he tore himself free.
---
VI. The Collapse of the Nexus
Kael's consciousness snapped back into his body just as the Nexus screamed.
The structure began to collapse, the threads of the Veil unraveling. The Forgotten Ones recoiled, their forms flickering between dimensions.
"We have to move!" Veyra shouted.
Kael landed hard, gasping as his symbiont burned like fire in his veins. Jara grabbed him, dragging him to his feet. "Tell me you got what you needed."
Kael's gaze flickered to the collapsing Nexus. Lyra was still there, watching him, her form dissolving into the unraveling Veil.
"Not yet," he murmured.
The Legion ran, the Nexus's ruins imploding behind them. The sky above fractured, reality warping as the echoes of the Forgotten faded into the void.
They had survived. But Kael knew the war was far from over.
---
VII. The Veil's Endgame
Hours later, as they set up camp in the ruins of an abandoned outpost, Kael sat apart from the others, staring at the stars.
Eris approached cautiously. "You saw her, didn't you?"
Kael nodded. "She's part of it now. But… she's still her. Somewhere."
Eris hesitated, then placed something in his hands—a single frostbloom, its petals glowing faintly. "The Veil isn't done with you."
Kael exhaled slowly, his symbiont pulsing one last time.
And in the distance, the Veil whispered his name.