The key hummed in Arix's hand.
They had camped at the mouth of a dry ravine two klicks from Site 9. The night was still, broken only by the soft wind weaving through the bone-cracked trees. Riftlight flickered in the clouds overhead like silent lightning, casting pale glows across their camp.
No one had spoken much since the walkers fell.
Selis lay bundled in heatwraps, her breathing stable but shallow. Kael sat cross-legged beside her, rifle in his lap, staring into the dark as if daring it to move. Calyx rested against a stone outcrop, braced leg stretched before her, one hand on her pistol, the other rubbing her temple.
Arix sat alone near the fire, his hands clasped over the three shards now bound to the primary core. The keys. Each pulsing faintly with a different rhythm.
> [Echo Core Stable – Key Integration Complete] [Archive Access Unlocked – Proceed with Caution]
He could feel the invitation.
But more than that, he could feel the weight of choice pressing against his mind.
Across the fire, Calyx stirred. Her voice broke the silence.
"Are you going to do it?"
Arix didn't look up. "Do I have a choice?"
"You always have a choice."
A pause. Then:
"I'm scared of what it'll show me," Arix admitted. "I don't know if I want to see what they made me."
Calyx shifted forward, wincing as her leg protested.
"Maybe that's not the point. Maybe the point is choosing what you do after you know."
Arix met her eyes. Hers were steady, despite the exhaustion. Despite everything.
He nodded once.
And triggered the archive.
---
The world around him melted.
Not into flame. Not into light.
Into memory.
He stood in a sterile chamber. White walls. No windows. The kind of place where silence had texture—where the air carried the weight of screams too long silenced.
A table lay before him. Straps hung limp from its sides. A shard hovered above it, locked in a containment ring that pulsed faintly.
> [Echo Archive Initiated – Subject: Vale-0 / Variant C]
A figure approached—an Obsidian scientist, face half-concealed by a breathing mask. Her voice was clear, clinical.
"This one has potential. Resistance is stronger. Core imprint forming faster than previous iterations."
Arix's hands balled into fists.
More memories. Children pacing in holding pens. Others already lost to the void—eyes vacant, voices wrong.
One child escaped. Vault logs said the system was compromised.
"...He tore through containment with raw Echo surge. Nearly burned his own lungs out. We almost lost control."
Another voice. Cold. "Perhaps losing control is what activates it fully."
---
The memory shifted.
Now he was watching himself—no, not quite himself—hooked into the shard interface. A technician barked orders. Static filled the air. Red lights flashed.
Then came the moment.
He screamed. And the shard responded.
A wave of energy blew the control station apart. Alarms blared. Scientists died. Others ran.
> [Archive Culmination Reached – Processing Final Imprint...]
He stood face to face with his younger self—blazing eyes, cracked lips, chest rising with unspent rage.
"Why did you survive?" the memory asked.
Arix stared at him. "Because I chose not to become you."
The boy smiled. Sadly.
"Then make something of it."
The archive shattered.
---
He returned to the fire.
His hands trembled.
Across from him, Calyx watched quietly. She said nothing, just waited.
"It was worse than I thought," Arix said. "But it's not who I am."
"No," she said. "It's who they tried to make you. You chose the rest."
He nodded slowly.
Then the shard pulsed.
Once.
Hard.
> [Signal Detected – Echo Thread Broadcast Origin: Unknown] [Source: External – Matching Fragment Pattern Alpha-1]
Kael looked up from his position. "Something's pinging us."
Selis stirred. "It's not local?"
Arix rose.
"No," he said. "It's coming from a relay farther west. Deep zone. Obsidian territory."
Kael narrowed his eyes. "Is it bait?"
Arix turned the shard over in his hand. "I don't think it matters."
The fire crackled between them.
Calyx stood slowly, favoring her leg. "Then let's find out who's calling."
---
They broke camp before dawn.
The terrain westward changed quickly. The cracked stone gave way to a forest of skeletal towers—failed terraforming units long since overgrown. Between their roots, glowing moss pulsed dimly, feeding on ambient Rift energy. Strange birds flew overhead, their shapes flickering with cloaking scales.
Kael took point, scanning for movement. Arix stayed near Selis, who walked with support now but tired easily. Calyx brought up the rear, watchful, silent.
Around midday, they passed a field of wrecked transports—Obsidian carriers that had crashed and burned long ago. Half-sunken into the earth, their hulls peeled open like ribcages.
Calyx paused near one and ran her fingers over a scorch mark.
"This wasn't just sabotage," she murmured. "They were trying to destroy what they'd built."
Arix nodded. "Somewhere along the line, they realized the system couldn't be controlled."
Kael's voice came through the comms. "I've found something. Thirty meters ahead."
The team approached carefully. Embedded in a shallow crater was a signal spike—old tech, but active. A repeating pulse thrummed from its core.
> [Fragment Signature Confirmed – Signal Match: Alpha-1]
[Message Encrypted – Decryption in Progress...]
Arix kneeled and touched the spike.
The shard activated.
A hologram burst to life.
It was him.
Older.
Scarred.
Standing in a place none of them recognized—dark skies, towers in ruin behind him, his body wrapped in tattered armor.
"If you're seeing this, it means I failed."
Everyone stood frozen.
"I was too late. I let it in. The shard—it grew. And I let it. Thought I could contain it. Thought I could turn it on them. But it turned on me."
The hologram raised its hand. A glow, deep and hungry, lit his chest.
"The system isn't broken. It's hungry. It adapts. It remembers. And if you're not strong enough to control it... it uses you."
The signal cracked.
"Do not go to the Core. Not unless you've chosen who you are."
Static.
Then silence.
> [Message Ended – Echo Log Archived]
Calyx spoke first. "That was—"
"Me," Arix said quietly. "Or it will be."
Selis gripped Kael's arm. "How is this possible?"
"Thread echoes," Arix replied. "Possibilities recorded. Paths glimpsed."
Kael lowered his rifle. "So what now?"
Arix turned to the west.
"We go to the Core," he said. "But not to win. Not yet."
"Then why?" Calyx asked.
"To choose."
---
The forest faded into darkness as Riftlight swallowed the sun.
And somewhere beyond that horizon, something ancient stirred.
Waiting for them to decide.