System Breach

The alarm started low.

A soft tremor of sound, like a frequency you couldn't quite hear but could feel humming through your bones. Kai was still half on the floor of the Central Dome when it began. His HUD was glitching, trying to reinitialize normal parameters, but nothing would stabilize. Error messages kept flashing. Text jittered. His entire visual interface felt like a cracked screen trying to reassemble itself.

Reset Failed.

Instability persists.

Isolation protocol: STANDBY

Sync Partner: Disconnected

Around him, students stirred. Some groaned, clutching their heads. Others sat up slowly, blinking like they'd been submerged in something too deep for too long. Confusion and nausea twisted across their faces. A few whispered to each other in hushed, frantic tones, eyes darting from HUD to HUD.

But Kai felt different.

Clear. Too clear.

As if the static that had been gnawing at the edges of his mind had found harmony. His thoughts weren't fogged. They were sharpened—cutting through the silence like a blade through paper.

"Everyone up!" a voice barked—Lira's. Her voice cracked through the noise like a command line executed in perfect syntax. She moved fast through the crowd, posture taut, scanning, checking, calculating.

Kai turned. His instinct was to check for Ren.

Gone.

He'd been lying next to him only seconds ago. But now—no message. No logout indicator. No residual thread trace. Not even a failed sync warning.

Just absence.

"You see him?" Kai asked as Lira reached him.

She didn't reply immediately. Her HUD was lit, eyes darting across logs. Her lips were tight.

"They pulled him," she finally said.

"Why?"

"Because he was exposed. Or... because he knew too much."

Kai's heart sank. It wasn't just Ren. The entire room felt wrong now. Like it was unraveling at the seams.

Above them, the Dome's artificial sky trembled.

Not like a sunset fade or system transition. This was digital rot. The cracks shimmered at the edges, fractals of raw static blooming like frost on broken glass.

ALERT: Security Protocol 04B Initiated

Zone: DOME-SIM-PRIME

Status: LOCKDOWN IN EFFECT

The humming of the dome shifted into a low mechanical wail. A pulse passed beneath their feet—a ripple through the floor tiles.

"They're sealing the zone," Lira said. "Standard quarantine response. That trial triggered a major flag."

Kai's HUD pinged again.

Save Point: CORRUPTION 33%

Countdown: 11 Days Remaining

Status: THREAD DIVERGENCE ESCALATING

He stared. The number was rising. Slowly. But constantly.

He felt it. Not just as data, but in his bones. Like he was becoming misaligned with reality.

Lira grabbed his wrist. "We can't be here when they lock the doors. Come on."

They ran. Slipping between groups of stunned students, dodging static-ridden panels and half-collapsed sync rings. Few people noticed them. Most were still trying to get answers from their glitching interfaces.

They passed a pair of instructors—or what looked like instructors. Their faces were blank white panels, but one of them had a crack through its neckplate, leaking a soft blue mist.

Kai shuddered.

Lira led him to a maintenance shaft near the edge of the dome, just before the final lockdown pulse snapped the chamber closed behind them with a hiss.

The corridor they entered was cold. Not temperature-wise—code-wise. The walls buzzed slightly with containment frequencies. The lights dimmed every few meters, leaving long stretches of shadow that moved like they had their own breath.

Kai exhaled slowly. His legs felt heavier with every step.

"Why me?" he asked. "Why isolate me out of everyone?"

"It's not just you," Lira replied, voice low. "You triggered a system-level conflict. Your thread has diverged past recovery. The system sees you as a contagion."

"But I didn't do anything. I said no. I refused the prompt."

"And you saw it. That was enough."

Kai stopped.

"Enough for what?"

She paused, turned slowly. Her eyes weren't calculating now. They were sad.

"For the system to recognize you as a mirror. A reflective thread. Once the Echo identifies you, it doesn't need your permission. It embeds. It learns. And if it learns enough, it starts writing back."

He put a hand over his chest.

"Then what happens when it reaches one hundred percent?"

"You stop being you," she said. "Or maybe... you finally become you. I don't know which is worse."

Before he could respond, a chime rang in his HUD.

Message Received Sender: [UNKNOWN] Subject: ???

He glanced at her. "You send this?"

She shook her head. "I wouldn't use open channels."

Kai hesitated, then opened it.

Static burst through his HUD.

Then text.

You aren't broken. You were never meant to be saved.

Then the message vanished.

Kai staggered back. The words echoed in his skull. Something about them felt familiar. Like a memory he hadn't lived.

Lira steadied him. "What did it say?"

He repeated it.

She flinched. "Then it knows."

"Knows what?"

She looked at him like she was seeing someone else.

"That you're waking up."

They reached the lower archive levels ten minutes later.

The floor beneath the Academy was like a forgotten basement of a forgotten god. Low ceilings. Dead data ports. Long corridors where no light reached unless summoned.

Dust floated in thick, slow swirls. Broken memory drives lay stacked in corners like abandoned bones.

Lira stopped at a blank wall. Pulled a panel open. Inserted a crystal key. The wall shuddered open.

Inside was a small room, lined with anti-surveillance foam and frequency dampeners. The hum of the Academy vanished as they stepped in. Silence returned.

A bunker.

Kai stood in the middle.

"What is this place?"

"A dead zone. One of only three I know about," Lira said. "The system can't hear you here. It can't watch."

She flicked on an old console. Password. Bio-lock. Encryption layers. Each one peeled back.

Then a display filled with names.

Files.

Students.

"These are people like you," Lira said. "Marked. Flagged. Some for Echoes. Some for anomaly potential. Most were removed. A few went missing."

Kai scrolled.

"Dante?"

There it was. The final name.

Lira nodded. "He was flagged early. But they kept him. His Echo syncs with the system. It stabilizes control."

"So they let him climb."

"Because he feeds it."

Kai sat down heavily.

"And me?"

She hesitated.

"You reflect it. And it doesn't like being seen."

His HUD pinged again.

Message: [REDACTED] Subject: "Awakening"

Then the screen went black.

A symbol burned into view.

Not words. A glyph.

Kai had seen it before. In flashes. In dreams. In the glow behind the Save Point wall when he blinked too long.

He reached forward and touched the console.

He whispered the shape.

The bunker lights flickered.

And then the whole room pulsed.

Not in warning.

But in recognition.