The silence of the empty room was no longer suffocating. It felt more like a blank canvas, waiting for something new to emerge. Clyde stood up, slowly stretching his stiff muscles as he took in the desolation around him. The sterile walls and the lack of any tangible memories in this space made him feel disconnected, as if he were suspended between two realities—neither of which felt truly like home.
Beside him, the woman who had become his reluctant ally in this strange journey stood silently, gazing out at the horizon. There was an air of contemplation about her, as if she too were struggling to understand what came next.
"How do we even start?" Clyde finally asked, his voice breaking the quiet. "Everything we knew, it's gone. What's left for us to rebuild?"
The woman turned to face him, her expression unreadable yet thoughtful. "The world we knew is gone, yes," she said slowly. "But that doesn't mean we can't forge a new one. We'll have to build it from the ground up. But this time, we have the power to shape it the way we want."
Clyde frowned. "It sounds impossible."
"Nothing worth doing is ever easy," she replied softly, her tone laced with a quiet determination. "But we can't let the past define us. We can't keep looking back at the wreckage."
Clyde wasn't so sure. The past was hard to shake off, especially when it felt like the past had defined everything about him—the facility, the Soul Core, the endless cycle of rewrites. He couldn't help but feel that he was standing at the edge of a cliff, looking out at a vast, unknown future, with no clear path forward.
He glanced at the woman beside him. "And you? What are you going to do?"
Her gaze softened. "I'm not sure. I've spent so long trying to fix what was broken, trying to undo the damage. But I think it's time to let go of that. To accept that some things can't be fixed, and that maybe… maybe the only thing we can do now is build something new."
Clyde nodded, understanding the weight of her words. He had spent so long trying to piece together the shattered remnants of his own identity that he hadn't stopped to think about the bigger picture. They weren't just rebuilding the world—they were rebuilding themselves.
Suddenly, a low hum vibrated through the floor beneath them. The room shifted, ever so slightly, as if the very space they occupied was reacting to something.
"What's happening?" Clyde asked, his eyes narrowing in suspicion.
The woman's expression darkened. "I don't know."
Before they could react further, a pulse of energy surged through the air, briefly lighting up the room in a wash of blue light. Clyde instinctively took a step back, his heart pounding as he scanned the space for any signs of danger.
The hum intensified.
"I think it's time we moved," the woman said urgently, her voice tense. "This place is starting to destabilize. The energy from the Soul Core—what was left of it—is reacting with the system we destroyed. We need to leave before it implodes."
Clyde didn't need to be told twice. He turned to follow the woman as she moved quickly toward an exit he hadn't noticed before, a door blending seamlessly into the wall. The air around them felt charged, as if the entire facility was on the verge of collapsing.
They rushed through the doorway and into another long corridor, the hum of energy growing louder behind them.
"What now?" Clyde panted, his breath coming in short gasps as they ran.
"We need to find the exit. We have to leave this place before the core collapses completely. Once it does, everything will be lost." The woman's voice was steady, but Clyde could sense the urgency in her every word.
They turned a corner, and Clyde saw a faint flicker of light at the end of the hallway. The exit, finally in sight.
But as they neared the door, a dark shape appeared in front of them—another distortion in the air. A figure, tall and imposing, stood between them and the exit, blocking their path.
Clyde skidded to a halt, his eyes widening as he recognized the figure.
It was the other version of himself—the twisted reflection, the doppelgänger that had taunted him before.
"You're not getting away that easily," the doppelgänger said, his voice distorted, as if coming from deep within a static-filled signal. His form flickered in and out of existence, the instability of his being reflecting the unstable energy of the facility around them.
Clyde clenched his fists, his heart racing. "I'm done with you. You're just another piece of the past I need to leave behind."
The doppelgänger's eyes narrowed. "You think it's that easy? You think you can just walk away from this?"
The woman stepped forward, her expression hardening. "We don't have time for this."
Clyde glanced at her, then back at the doppelgänger. The hallway felt even colder now, the walls seeming to close in as the two versions of himself faced off.
It was clear that this was no longer just about survival. It was about finding peace with the past and embracing whatever came next.
"I'm done running," Clyde said, his voice steady.
The doppelgänger's lips twisted into a cruel smile. "Then prove it."