The elevator creaked.
Not beeped. Not chimed. It creaked—like something ancient and resentful of being used. Caleb shifted uncomfortably in his seat as the steel cage descended deeper beneath Sector Zero, the walls of the shaft glowing faintly with Rift-stabilized glyphs.
Director Yu stood silent, arms crossed, while the two armored guards flanked her like statues. Caleb, on the other hand, was very much not statue-like.
"So, uh," he started, glancing at a faded sticker on the elevator wall, "is it comforting or terrifying that this thing has a 'Rift Emergency Ejection' button?"
No one responded.
He leaned forward. "Do people actually use that?"
Still silence.
"Because I feel like 'emergency ejection' and 'Rift' shouldn't be in the same sentence unless we're talking about throwing monsters into a volcano."
Yu didn't look at him, but one of the guards made a noise that might have been a stifled snort.
Caleb grinned a little. "Just sayin', if this thing drops us into a dimensional meat grinder, I want my last words to be, 'I told you so.'"
The elevator finally clunked to a halt.
Beyond the sliding door lay a massive underground chamber—vaulted and lined with obsidian stone laced with glowing, angular veins of Riftlight. Dozens of terminals lined the room, all attended by masked technicians in Union black. At the far end sat a huge spherical structure—silver, suspended mid-air, rotating slowly with hums of energy.
Yu gestured him forward.
"This is the Vault of Echoes," she said. "The Union's deepest archive. It stores everything—data, records, sometimes people."
"Sometimes—what?"
"Don't worry," she said. "You're not important enough to go in."
"Gee, thanks. You sure know how to boost a guy's self-esteem."
As they walked toward the sphere, Caleb couldn't help noticing how many people stopped what they were doing just to look at him. Whispers followed him like shadows.
"That's the Riftborn."
"He survived contact?"
"Shouldn't he be locked up?"
He clenched his fists.
The more they stared, the more he felt like… a time bomb.
Yu led him to a terminal. A holographic screen flickered to life.
"I'm giving you access to your father's restricted file. But don't expect sentimentality. What you'll find is truth. Cold. Undeniable."
She tapped a glyph.
Marcus Calen's profile appeared.
Caleb stepped forward. His father's face stared back—young, stern, and shadowed. There was a long list of mission logs. Rift encounters. Warnings.
But one entry was different.
[Project Riftborn – Entry 17: Ghost Protocol Initiated]
He clicked it.
A recording began.
The camera was shaky. His father was breathing hard, bleeding from his forehead. The background looked like a destroyed lab—runes torn apart, alarms blaring.
"If you're seeing this," Marcus said, "then the Union lied. They didn't shut down Project Riftborn—they repurposed it. They used us as prototypes. Me, others… and eventually, they started looking for inheritors."
His father's eyes burned into the screen.
"They found one."
Caleb's heart thudded.
"They called you 'Ghost' in the internal files. You weren't supposed to survive the bonding. But you did. You're… you're my son, Caleb. And if you're still human, get out. The Rift wants more than hosts. It wants doors. Don't let them turn you into one."
The screen went black.
Yu turned to him, unreadable.
"Well?" she asked.
Caleb stood still. The information whirled through him like a storm. He wasn't just born with Rift energy.
He was built for it.
"I need time," he muttered.
Yu nodded once. "You'll have it. Training starts tomorrow. Level C-Arena. Try not to get vaporized."
As she walked away, Caleb muttered, "Inspirational as always, Director Doom-and-Gloom."
He turned toward the vault one last time, then glanced down at his hands. No glow. No surge.
Just silence.
He was still weak.
Still unsure.
But for the first time, he understood the stakes.
And somewhere in this abyss of secrets and shadows…
He planned to break the chain.
One truth at a time.