The alley smelled like burnt plastic and old blood.
Adam leaned against the wall, watching his breath turn white in the air. His right arm itched where it had shattered and put itself back together. The skin looked normal now. But if he flexed his fingers, he could see black threads squirming underneath, like spiders crawling under his flesh.
I feels...Wrong.
But also... right.
Behind him, Lyss sat on a broken crate, hugging that eyeless doll of hers. Her left pupil split apart like cracked ice, then snapped back together.
Adam bared his teeth. "You promised answers. What the hell is this place?"
The girl flinched. Her legs kicked nervously, toes scraping concrete. "This world... it's not real maybe it maybe it's not... A broken world." Her voice dropped to a whisper. "It's where the System throws away things it doesn't need anymore."
Adam remembered the faces inside the drone - mouths stretched in silent screams. "Those were people?"
"Pieces of people," Lyss corrected. Her good eye glowed with fear. "Memories. Feelings. Sometimes... whole souls."
A cold laugh tore from Adam's throat. "So what? I'm garbage now? Some deleted file?"
Lyss shook her head hard. "No! You're different." She poked his chest with a bony finger. "You're an Error. The first one who can fight back..."
Adam's hand flew to his ribs. The thing buried under his skin pulsed, and suddenly he felt sick.
Thump-thump.
Like a second heartbeat.
"What is this?" he demanded.
Lyss's eye glitched wildly, the pupil splitting into tiny squares. "It's singing," she whispered.
Adam's blood turned to ice. "The fuck does that mean?"
"The System wants it back." She hugged her doll tighter. "That's why the hunters won't stop. They'll chase you forever."
Adam slammed his fist into the wall. Brick cracked. Black veins crawled up his arm.
"I didn't ask for this!" His voice echoed off the alley walls. "I didn't want to be some fucking glitch!"
Lyss didn't blink. Just watched him with those mismatched eyes - one human, one falling apart.
"You're not alive," she said softly. "Not really. You're a ghost who crawled out of the recycle bin."
The words hit like a knife.
Adam's knees almost buckled. Memories flashed - Janna's cold stare. Lucas's axe. Poison burning his veins. But they were broken pieces, like shards of glass.
"Why can't I remember?" His voice cracked. "Why only... fragments?"
"The System Deletes... Memories..."
Lyss hesitated. Then, with trembling hands, she pulled down her collar.
Adam flinched.
Black cracks spread across her skin - pulsing code, just like his.
"I'm broken too," she admitted. "The System tried to delete me... but it forgot a piece."
The shard in Adam's chest burned hotter. That strange song grew louder, pounding in his skull. His ribs ached from the pressure.
"What do I do?" He slammed the wall again, teeth grinding.
Lyss stared at her doll. "You don't."
Adam grabbed her shoulder, ignoring her whimper. "There's always a way."
Her glitching eye locked onto his. "Then break it," she breathed. "Break everything."
Somewhere beyond the alley, a drone howled.
Adam smiled. It wasn't a nice smile.
"Now that," he cracked his knuckles, "I can do."
[Error found.... Protocol.... Destroy.... Enabled]
The drone shot forward like a bullet.
Adam dug his fingers into the alley wall, ripped out a chunk of brick, and slammed it into the drone's face. The machine staggered, sensors flickering.
No time.
Adam grabbed a twisted metal sheet from the ground.
SNAP.
Broke it in half.
And stabbed the jagged edge into the drone's chest.
Black code erupted from his hands, swarming over the machine like hungry ants. The drone twitched once.
Then vanished, deleted from existence.
More came.
Three. Five. Too many.
Adam dodged, fists flying. One drone exploded when he kicked it into a wall. Another lost its head to a metal pipe swing.
Then he saw Lyss small, trembling, in the kill zone.
His hand jerked toward her.
Stopped.
What if I delete her too?
A drone sliced his arm open. Blood splattered the ground.
No choice.
Adam grabbed Lyss, tucked her against his chest, and ran.
Behind them, the drones screeched, giving chase.
A dead end.
Walls glitched, flickering between brick and static. The hunters closed in, blades humming.
Lyss clutched his shirt. "Sir!"
The ground vanished beneath them.
Adam felt it first the floor dissolving into black code. Then
Weightlessness.
They fell through the sky, wind screaming in their ears.
No glitches here.
Below, a kingdom sprawled towers intact, streets clean, no corruption.
Real?
Adam twisted mid-air, wrapping his body around Lyss.
CRASH.
They hit the grassy field, earth splitting open from the impact.
Adam's back exploded into black code just before landing, absorbing the shock, leaving him unharmed.
Lyss peeked out from his arms, eyes wide.
Adam rolled onto his back, staring at the unchanging blue sky.
Just silence.
This isn't the Broken World.....