The coordinates led them to the edge of the known zone—and then past it.
As the sun vanished behind fractured hills, the land grew alien. Trees with crystalline bark glowed faintly in the dark. Roots shifted when stepped on. Even the air changed, heavier somehow, like it was saturated with memory.
Selene felt it in her lungs. In her skin. In her blood.
> This place knows me.
And it hated that she forgot it.
Kai walked beside her, his rifle held close but idle. "We're off map now."
Arin checked her scanner. "No comms. No signal. We're alone."
"No," Selene murmured. "We're not."
The canyon narrowed into a winding path framed by jagged stone. Strange glyphs pulsed along the walls, too perfect to be natural—etched by something that didn't use tools. They shimmered softly when Selene passed, dimming when the others followed.
Kai noticed. "Uh… that's not creepy at all."
They pushed on in silence until the path spilled into a basin—unnaturally round, like a crater formed by impact or design. In the center stood a single, obsidian spire. Smooth. Silent. Towering.
Selene froze.
She didn't know why she knew it—but she did.
"That's not a building," she whispered.
"It's a lock," Arin said softly, stepping forward.
Kai frowned. "A lock for what?"
Before anyone could answer, the spire lit up—runes spiraling from the base to its jagged tip. The light pulsed in time with Selene's heartbeat. Her chest tightened. Her breath caught.
Then came the voice.
Not spoken. Not heard.
Felt.
> "Echo protocol recognized. Initiate memory convergence."
Selene's knees buckled. Pain lanced through her skull—sharp, surgical. Her eyes rolled back.
---
She wasn't in the basin anymore.
She stood in a chamber of white glass and black metal. Men and women in sterile suits moved around her, arguing in clipped voices. A name was being repeated.
"Subject Echo-Seven."
A tall woman stood before her—eyes bright, voice calm.
> "You're not a weapon, Selene. You're the echo of everything we lost."
Selene reached toward the woman—but her hand passed through. A memory. A ghost.
The woman continued:
> "We put the past inside you. You are the last map."
Then—alarms. Screams. Fire. A roaring wind of voidlight tearing the lab apart. A command was shouted:
> "Initiate cryo-sequence. Lock down the project. She must forget."
---
Selene gasped awake.
She was lying in the basin. Arin knelt beside her, shouting, but the words came slow and distant. Her ears rang. Her mind swam.
Kai stood between them and the spire, weapon up.
Something was coming.
Not from the horizon—from the air.
Figures descended in silence. Not Void hunters. Not human.
Draped in robes that shimmered like starfire. Faces hidden by mirrored masks. No weapons visible, yet the pressure in the air was suffocating.
Arin's voice finally broke through. "Selene. Selene! Get up!"
"I know them," Selene whispered hoarsely. "I think they made me."
One of the masked figures stepped forward, robes whispering like static. The voice that emerged was soft—but wrong, like a song played backward.
> "Echo-Seven. We thought you lost."
Selene rose slowly. Her body still ached, but her balance had returned. She stood tall.
"I don't remember you," she said. "But I remember enough."
Another stepped forward. "That is acceptable. Memory will follow function. You were designed for convergence. The seal has been opened. You are returning."
Kai scoffed. "She's not returning to anything. She's free."
The masked figure turned toward him without emotion. "You misunderstand. Freedom is the illusion. Function is the truth."
Selene stepped between them. Her voice was steady now.
"I'm not your tool. I don't care what you made me for. I'm done being something designed."
The air pulsed.
For a moment, no one moved.
Then the lead figure extended a hand. Not in attack. In invitation.
"Then come, Echo. And choose. Memory... or will."
Selene stared at the outstretched hand.
Arin's voice was low. "You don't have to go."
Kai's grip tightened on his rifle. "We fight if they move."
Selene shook her head slowly. "No. This… this is why they called me here. Not to take me. To see what I'd become."
She stepped forward.
Stopped inches from the masked figure.
Her fingers hovered near the offered hand.
"I'll choose," she said softly. "But not tonight."
And with a sudden motion, she grabbed the mask—and ripped it off.
Underneath—
A face.
Human. Familiar.
Her own.
But older. Sharper. Eyes like ice.
The doppelgänger stared back at her, emotionless.
Selene staggered back.
The figure did not follow.
The others vanished in a shimmer of light.
Only the empty basin remained. The spire dimmed.
Kai broke the silence. "Okay. What the actual hell just happened?"
Selene didn't answer.
She couldn't.
She was still staring at the spot where her own face had looked back at her.
> Not a clone. Not a reflection.
A future?
Or worse.
A version of herself who never broke free.