Terminal Loop

The metal door groaned as it opened, revealing the final tunnel Vellan's map had promised. Stale air met Narey's face, heavy with rust, mold, and something metallic beneath it all—blood, perhaps. The corridor ahead was a straight line of dread, dimly lit by flickering emergency strips along the ceiling. Beneath her boots, water pooled unevenly, forming thin rivulets that disappeared into grates too narrow to see into.

Behind her, Arka adjusted the strap of the medkit slung over his shoulder. His flashlight beam cut through the darkness ahead, revealing something almost poetic in its horror—rows of glass pods embedded in the walls like oversized honeycombs. Inside each pod floated a human body.

"Vanrah's supposed to be at the core," Narey whispered.

They stepped forward.

Each pod was a grotesque tableau of life on pause. Bodies in slow, robotic slumber. Tubes snaked into temples, necks, and chests. Monitors blinked softly beside each chamber, displaying names and neural activity. Some had red bars indicating declining signals; others pulsed steadily. These weren't just storage units. They were interfaces.

Narey stopped at one marked "Subject V: Lucas Vanrah". His skin had paled, eyes closed, thin veins glowing faintly with bio-luminescent tracer dye. His mind, according to the monitor, was 94.7% synchronized with something titled VNet Core Loop.

"They didn't trap him," she said under her breath.

"They made him the anchor."

Arka's breath hitched. "Can we get him out?"

She studied the interface. "Not yet. He's too deep inside. We pull him now, his brain might crash from loop decoupling." She stared at the command list on the panel—most options were locked. A few flickered with access: Override Local Feed, Emergency Memory Buffer, Manual Extraction (Unsafe).

Suddenly, a pulse ran through the floor. The lights dimmed for half a second.

Narey's wrist device vibrated. A message.

//Connection Re-established: Root Beacon Detected

— QUIET HELPER //

The same mysterious signal that had helped her back in Chapter 21—the entity that had guided her when all seemed lost. Some believed it was a rogue AI. Narey had another theory: a remnant consciousness. Maybe Vanrah himself. Maybe someone else entirely.

Then a new line appeared:

"They're still watching. You don't have much time. But I'll give you a window."

"Arka," Narey said, voice firm. "We're going to need to initiate a cascade decouple. Quiet Helper is going to open the firewall."

Arka looked hesitant. "Won't that... cause a total brain destabilization?"

"Yes. Unless we catch their consciousness before the loop collapses."

Arka swore under his breath. "This is insane."

"It always was."

She accessed the command override. A hidden command sequence revealed itself: CYCLE-CUT: NODE 01–07. TIME LIMIT: 04:00.

The countdown began.

Narey rushed from pod to pod, marking the seven core subjects the system listed as primary. Rafi. Anjani. Julius. Vanrah. And three others she didn't recognize, but the data showed peak cognitive entanglement. Arka followed her lead, disengaging the chemical stasis units, prepping oxygen flow to restart lungs once the neural loop was severed.

"We'll have four minutes to get them out before the brain begins to disassociate."

"What if their bodies shut down?"

"Then we'll lose them all. Just run."

The lab's walls began to change—the hum deepened. The screens above each pod flashed red: DECYCLE INITIATED.

In the control terminal, a full-screen warning appeared:

INTERLINK STABILITY BREACHED. ENGAGE DEFENSE MODE.

And then came the alarms.

From the far end of the corridor, mechanical doors hissed open. Footsteps. Not hurried, not panicked—calculated.

Black-clad soldiers entered with infrared goggles and rifles. Not campus security. These were Delta Division operatives—state-sanctioned enforcers. Laksana's private hands.

Narey ducked behind a steel cabinet as bullets shattered glass panels nearby. Sparks flew. Arka dragged a metal cart to block part of the hallway. Narey returned fire—non-lethal pulses from her compact rail pistol—designed for stealth missions.

Two soldiers fell. Another advanced with a stun baton, nearly reaching Arka before Narey tackled him from the side and drove her elbow into his throat. The man collapsed, gurgling.

"They're trying to delay us!" Arka yelled.

"No," Narey said. "They're trying to keep Vanrah connected."

From the pod chamber, she saw Vanrah's vitals spike. His pulse was irregular, brainwave patterns dancing erratically. A cascade failure was imminent. The loop was breaking him—just as it had broken dozens before.

Suddenly, another message appeared on the console:"I can help him—but only if you trust me."

— QUIET HELPERNarey hesitated.

"You've guided me this far," she typed.

"What are you?" A pause. Then the reply: "One of them. But not like them."

The screen shimmered, and an interface override took over the system. All seven pod sequences accelerated.

"He's extracting them from the inside," Narey realized. "He's... giving us a way out."

She turned to Arka. "We need to manually carry them out. Get the evac signal ready."

"I already sent it," he panted. "BIN team is inbound. ETA five minutes."

"We don't have five."

Narey rushed to Vanrah's pod and hit the final release command. Steam hissed. The fluid drained. His body slumped forward—she caught him, barely, and pulled the breathing tube from his throat.

He coughed violently, then opened his eyes.

They were glassy. But not empty.

"Where..." he muttered. "Where am I?"

"Back," Narey said. "You're back."

Behind them, the final soldier fell, taken down by Arka. But the console behind them began flashing again—one final message.

"They're still watching. Burn the bridge. Leave no door open."

"They?" Arka asked. "Not just Laksana?"

Narey didn't respond.

She triggered the system core wipe.

The lab trembled.

As Narey and Arka carried Vanrah and two others toward the tunnel exit, the Interlink Node Control Room behind them began to collapse. Overhead lights flickered. Glass cracked. Power surged wildly.

A final sound echoed from the speaker system—a laugh, not human. Not digital. Something in-between.

"Do you think you've won?" the voice whispered.

"The mind is never truly free."

But Narey didn't look back.

She, Arka, and the survivors emerged into the forest clearing just outside Grovement's perimeter as the first rays of morning light broke through the trees. BIN's black van awaited them. Medical teams rushed in, stabilizing the rescued students.

Vanrah held Narey's hand tightly.

"You brought me out... but I think a part of me is still in there."

"We'll find it," she said gently. "And bring it back, piece by piece."

Behind them, in the distant mist, the campus buildings of Grovement University stood tall and unbothered—like monuments hiding ancient sins. Nothing in their structure gave away the horror hidden beneath.

And far below ground, within remnants of a dying system, one screen still blinked.

"Goodbye, Narey. For now."