The Echo's warning

The Echo surged forward.

Idris didn't have time to think—only react. He grabbed Elise's wrist and yanked her backward as Nyla reached for her sidearm. But Rook was faster.

With a flick of his wrist, he pressed a hidden switch on the wall. A pulse of blue energy crackled through the room, and for a brief second, the Echo froze. Its body flickered, its form distorting violently like a corrupted signal.

"GO!" Rook shouted.

Idris didn't need to be told twice. He shoved Elise forward, sprinting toward a narrow exit as the room trembled. The walls warped, the floor cracking beneath them as the very concept of space distorted.

Then—

A hand grabbed his arm.

Idris spun, expecting Elise or Nyla.

But it wasn't either of them.

It was him.

A perfect copy of himself.

Except… not.

The other Idris' eyes were hollow, dark as the void. His skin flickered, shifting between flesh and static, his grip ice-cold.

"Don't trust him," the copy whispered.

Then, just as quickly as it had appeared—

It was gone.

Idris stumbled, his heart hammering. "What the—"

"Move!" Nyla barked, pulling him forward. The Echo behind them was regaining its form, its body stretching like liquid shadow.

They burst through the door into another corridor—narrow, metallic, lit by a series of flickering blue lights. The passage led downward.

Idris forced himself to focus. "Where does this go?"

Rook was ahead of them, moving like a man who had prepared for this moment his entire life. "Somewhere safe—if we make it in time."

Behind them, the Echo let out a sound—not a growl, not a scream, but something in-between. A noise that made Idris' brain itch, like reality itself was rejecting it.

Then—

The hallway shrunk.

No, not physically. But the distance changed.

One moment, the exit was thirty feet away. The next, it was ten.

The Echo was bending space itself.

"Run faster!" Elise snapped.

They reached a heavy metal door. Rook slammed his hand against a scanner, and it slid open just as the Echo lunged—

The door shut.

A silence filled the room. The air was thin, the only sound their ragged breathing.

"We're dead," Lane panted. "We're so dead."

"Not yet," Rook said, walking toward a control panel in the center of the room.

Idris tried to steady his breath, his mind still racing with what he had seen. His own double. His own voice.

"Don't trust him.*

Who was 'him'?

Before he could process it, Rook hit a switch. The room shuddered.

Then the walls turned transparent.

Idris blinked. They weren't in a building. They were in—

"A ship?" Elise breathed.

Outside, beyond the glass, the lower districts stretched in every direction. But they weren't on the surface anymore. The ship had lifted, hovering just above the neon skyline.

"We need to leave the city," Rook said.

"Why?" Nyla demanded. "That thing—whatever it is—can still find us, right?"

Rook turned to face them. For the first time, his expression wasn't cold or distant.

It was grim.

"Not if we leave this timeline."

Silence.

Then—

"What?" Elise snapped. "That's—no. That's insane."

"It's the only way." Rook's gaze locked onto Idris. "You don't get it yet, do you?"

"Get what?" Idris gritted his teeth.

Rook exhaled. "That wasn't the first time you saw the Echo, was it?"

Idris froze.

The vision. The brief flicker back in the observatory. The shadow watching him.

Rook continued, "That thing didn't just appear tonight. It's been following you for a while. You just didn't notice."

A pit opened in Idris' stomach.

"But why me?" he asked quietly.

Rook hesitated. Then, finally, he said:

"Because, Detective… you weren't supposed to exist in this timeline."

A cold chill ran through Idris.

Elise looked between them. "What does that mean?"

"It means," Rook said, his voice deadly calm, "that Idris Vale is a paradox."

And the Echo?

It wasn't trying to kill him.

It was trying to erase him completely.