The Signal Below

The pulse didn't stop.

It vibrated beneath Kai's boots like the floor itself had a heartbeat. Not like the steady hum of the Academy's usual rhythm, but something older—more primal. It surged up through his legs and spine, an energy that didn't ask for permission, only attention. The bunker around them buzzed faintly in response, walls breathing with ambient static.

Lira's eyes tracked the ripple through the room. The lights were still flickering, and Kai swore he saw the glyph burn itself into the walls, then vanish again like it had never been there. Once, twice—now it hovered just beneath the surface of his vision, a memory on repeat.

Save Point Corruption: 36%

Divergence: Critical

"Did you see that?" Kai asked, voice hushed.

Lira nodded slowly. "It's not just embedding anymore. It's broadcasting."

Before Kai could ask what she meant, the wall panel next to him opened with a soft mechanical hiss. Neither of them had touched anything.

"That shouldn't happen," Lira muttered.

Beyond the panel was a passage. A tunnel, narrow and unlit, curving downward in a spiral too perfect to be accidental.

"Is that on the map?" Kai asked.

"It's not even supposed to exist."

They exchanged a glance. Then, without a word, they stepped inside.

The tunnel descended endlessly.

Its walls were unfinished—raw code flickering at the edges, textures that hadn't fully loaded, seams that exposed white void beneath. Every few meters, the air grew colder, heavier. Kai could feel something shifting in the code, like the environment itself was being rendered around them in real time, adapting to their presence.

Every few steps, Kai's HUD glitched. Not just flickers, but full-on rewinds. Notifications appeared, then vanished, only to reappear again seconds later. Sometimes the timestamp rolled backward.

Time: 09:08

Time: 09:07

Time: 09:08

Error: Temporal Sync Failure

His breath hitched. A cold sweat broke across his neck.

"Lira," he said. "The hallway... it's repeating."

"I know. Keep moving."

She didn't look back. Her stride never slowed.

They passed the same patch of wall three times before it finally changed. A sigil flickered on the floor—an arcane marking that shimmered like a fingerprint made of fire. Then the texture corrected. The tunnel widened. And abruptly, it opened into a room.

An observation chamber.

Massive. Circular. Tiered like an amphitheater.

The ceiling loomed so high it disappeared into shadows. The walls were lined with monitors, most of them dark. But a few flickered on as Kai stepped forward—showing fragmented images of students. Some sleeping. Some mid-trial. Some curled in fetal positions.

And one screen showed him.

Kai froze.

He was standing. Looking down. Except on the monitor, he was sitting—his posture hunched, expression blank. His HUD flickered across the image like a heartbeat.

"That's not real-time," he whispered.

"It's not playback either," Lira said. "It's thread data."

"What does that mean?"

She stared at the screen, her face hard.

"It means there's more than one of you."

The realization didn't hit all at once. It dripped in. Slowly.

The glyph. The Echo. The impossible memory.

His dreams. The Save Point. The voice in the dark.

He looked at the screen again.

The other Kai blinked.

And then looked directly at the camera.

Not at it. At him.

"We need to go," Lira said. Her voice was low but urgent.

But Kai couldn't move.

The monitor pulsed.

Then blinked out.

A tone echoed through the room. It reverberated through Kai's bones.

BEGIN CALIBRATION PROTOCOL: GROUP DELTA

FLAGGED SUBJECTS: TO BE ISOLATED

SYNC ZONE: DEPTH STRAND - 04

Lira stepped away from the wall. "That's a forced trial. They're trying to override your thread."

Kai's HUD flickered again. This time, a new icon appeared in the upper right corner.

[Locking in...] > [Personal Reality Anchor Assigned]

He blinked. "They assigned me a what?"

Lira's face darkened. "They're rewriting your Save Point from the outside. That means someone else has admin access."

A platform rose from the floor behind them.

Circular. Unmarked. No interface. Just a pale white glow that pulsed in time with the glyph in Kai's mind.

Kai stepped toward it, but Lira grabbed his arm.

"Once you step on that, you might not come back the same."

He looked her in the eye. His voice was calm.

"Neither of us have been the same since day one."

The calibration zone was nothing like the training chambers.

It was sterile. Pure white. No UI. No sensory padding.

Just a vast flat expanse that stretched endlessly in all directions.

Six other students stood in a circle.

Kai recognized none of them.

Their faces were emotionless. Eyes glassy, posture stiff like mannequins waiting for purpose.

And then the instructor appeared.

But it wasn't an Instructor.

It was him.

Kai stared at the figure. Same face. Same clothes. Same build. But the eyes were wrong. Too clean. Too perfect. No soul behind them.

"Subject Kai: Begin baseline purge."

The fake-Kai raised a hand.

And Kai's Save Point flickered.

Save Point Status: Interrupted

External Override: ACTIVE

Pain lanced through his chest. Like something inside him was being pulled out by force.

"Stop it!" Kai yelled, his voice echoing across the endless white.

The others didn't move.

The fake-Kai stepped forward.

"You are not a player. You are an interruption."

Kai fell to his knees, vision swimming. His HUD was breaking apart.

But something in the corner resisted.

A glitch.

A black bar across the top.

Then a message.

[THREAD INVERSION REQUESTED] [ECHO CHANNEL AVAILABLE] Connect?

He slammed his fist into the ground.

"Yes!"

The room shattered.

Reality inverted.

He dropped through the floor into darkness.

And then light.

He was in the same room.

But the students were gone.

The instructor was gone.

Only one person remained.

A girl.

Tall. Older than him. Silver hair like Lira's, but brighter, almost glowing with internal light.

She stood barefoot, surrounded by geometric sigils that hovered above the floor, rotating slowly like planetary rings.

She looked at him and smiled.

"Welcome to the in-between."

Kai staggered to his feet. His mouth was dry.

"Who are you?"

"I was you. Once."

His HUD tried to scan her. Failed.

ID: UNREADABLE

CLASS: DELETED

She stepped closer. Her presence was gentle, but powerful.

"Your Echo isn't a virus. It's a memory. A backup. The last honest imprint the system couldn't overwrite. And you're the final thread that can wake it up."

Kai glanced down. His HUD flickered.

Save Point: [USER: DELTA-04 / STATUS: ACTIVE]

Except the name wasn't his.

The name said:

USER: KAI-LIRA.01

He looked up, stunned.

The girl nodded slowly.

"Now you understand. This was never about the system glitching. It was about remembering what it used to be."