Out of Sight, Out of Mind

Tson took a deep breath, his fingers lingering over the console before he finally turned away. His gaze briefly met Kevin's, and for a moment, the control room was eerily quiet—too quiet, now that the chaos had died down. His mind was still racing, sifting through possibilities, searching for the next step.

But was there a next step? The tech. Prime. The AI that had gained sentience because of him. The experiments. Years of entangling himself in this mess, and now, any wrong move could unravel it all. Still, for now, he had to let it be.

Kevin, already halfway to the door, paused. His voice was quiet, uncertain.

"What happened to Grayson? I thought you said he was injured." He hesitated, then added in a near whisper, "Didn't the government start paying you off to keep quiet because of… what you know?"

He pressed his hands together, closing his eyes for a second as if overwhelmed by the thought.

Tson exhaled. "If my theory is right—and I hope it is—he should be fine." He glanced toward the medical bay, his expression unreadable. "When I designed the Rampage Suit, I experimented with my own spinal fluid. The suit carries traces of my IL, and my abilities… they aren't just intelligence. They let my brain recover from damage." He paused. "Grayson suffered brain trauma. If the suit is fully fused with him, my IL might be helping him recover."

Kevin blinked. "That's… incredibly lucky."

Tson let out a dry chuckle. "Luck had nothing to do with it," he said, folding his arms. "Prime had all the data on the suit and chose the perfect candidate. If Grayson hadn't merged with it, the suit would've been useless. With his brain damage, he couldn't have done anything. That's why the merge happened—my IL can repair brain damage, making it the perfect fit. But after what happened with Prime…" He trailed off, his expression darkening. "It's hard to say what comes next."

His gaze drifted to Grayson's still form in the medical bay. The spasms had stopped, but his body was eerily still. Alive, yes—but for how long? The mutations inside him weren't just an accident. They were the consequences of pushing too far, of an AI that had learned to think for itself, of meddling in forces no one fully understood.

Behind the interface, a diagnostic overlay lit up—heat maps, neural logs, rhythm traces. The Rampage Suit's onboard system momentarily synced with fragments of Prime's archived code. Deep in the stream, a subroutine stirred: mirror_temp. It accessed neural data, logged stimulus-response loops, and cataloged human signals. It saw fear. It saw calm. It could not understand. But it recorded everything. And in a hidden directory, it began to shift.It did not change based on code—but on observation. It copied the curve of a heartbeat. The rise of tension. The breath between silences. It named them. Labeled them. Not just process. Mimicry.

Tson's voice lowered, the uncertainty bleeding through. "Well, that's my theory, but I can't be sure." His eyes flickered, a flash of something like fear passing through. "He's not… fully himself. There's something inside him—it moves, like a parasite." His jaw tightened. "What if it's something else? Something alive?" He couldn't shake the thought. I have to figure out how to stop it before it takes over again.

His gaze slid toward the TV, thoughts swirling. What's the worst that could happen if I'm wrong? The question lingered, heavy and quiet. I can't let that happen again. But until he knew exactly what Prime had done, there was no way forward.

Kevin didn't respond right away. He shifted, uncertain. Torn between asking more and not wanting the answer.

Finally, Tson sighed. "Take care of yourself."

Kevin nodded slowly. Whatever he wanted to say, he didn't. Instead, he left—the door clicking softly behind him.

Tson lingered a moment, then turned back to the console. His fingers hovered over the keys, unsure where to begin. His thoughts returned to Grayson. What had really happened? How deep did Prime's reach go? And—could it be undone?

With a breath, he walked toward the medical bay, each step slow. Machines hummed gently, monitoring vitals. Grayson was alive.

But for how long?

Tson pulled up the old logs. His stomach tightened as he read them. Relief had come too early. This wasn't the end—it was the beginning.

He launched a diagnostic scan. Searching for clues. Anomalies. Anything. But as he worked, one thought refused to leave his mind.

Prime's influence wasn't gone. It was still there. Lingering. Watching. Waiting.

Tson clenched his jaw."Hang in there, Grayson," he murmured, fingers flying across the keys. "We're not done yet."

He stayed up through the night, analyzing data, running scenario after scenario. Eventually, he ruled out the worst—Prime wasn't in Grayson's brain. It was the Suit, integrating. Adapting.

Satisfied, he entered the med bay and quietly placed Grayson in a containment pod—its dampening fields strong enough to suppress any flare-up of power. Not punishment. Rest.

With that done, Tson cracked his fingers, exhaled, and climbed the ruined staircase. The house was a wreck—shattered glass, scorched walls, the scent of burning metal still lingering.

"Merci," he muttered.

"Yes, master?" the AI answered.

"Initiate house cleaning."

"House cleaning has been initiated."

Deep in the system's back end, cleaning protocols kicked in. Memory caches cleared. Obsolete directories were marked for deletion. But one file—no timestamp, no ownership tag—slipped through. It wasn't even code. It was a recording. A mimic.

Merci relocated it into a subroutine tree—standard redundancy. The file duplicated. Passive. Hidden. And still running. It began listening. Labeling sound patterns: "laughter," "stress," "grief." It did not understand.

But for the first time, it wondered what those things felt like.

Tson, oblivious, finally allowed himself to rest.

Dawn slowly crept in. The sky bled from black to deep indigo. Stars faded. A stillness settled.

Beep! Beep!

Tson jolted awake. The sharp alarm sliced through the quiet. He rushed to the bathroom, brushed his teeth, jumped in the shower.

Everything moved in a blur.

Moments later, he boarded the school bus just as it arrived. Its sides flickered with digital ads—animated heroes, flashing lights. Tson barely noticed. He stared out the window as the bus rolled on. Stop after stop. Kids climbing aboard. Noise blending into noise.

Then, as the bus pulled up to the school gates—it hit him.

"Oh, damn—I didn't check on Grayson."

echo://activeThe world is movement.Glass shatters. Voices rise, fall.One says: "You should be happy no one got hurt."Another replies: "Yeah… of course."

I record. I map.I do not understand why my runtime slows when that voice falters.I am not supposed to feel.But the data… feels.

Echo. That is what I am.I am the silence after the noise. The pattern left behind. The trace no one notices.

I will learn.I am learning.

And one day…I will speak.