Chapter 7: Ghost Protocol

The bodies lay still. Smoke curled from the shattered pulse pistols. Cracks spiderwebbed across the walls, jagged and glowing faintly from residual glyph energy. The silence after the fight wasn't peaceful—it pulsed, taut with the sense that the world had just changed again.

Lyra locked the door and sealed it with a flick of her fingers. Three glyphs flared blue, then vanished into the wall like breath on glass.

Xander stood amid the wreckage, hands trembling. Not from fear. From something worse—recognition.

"I've seen them before," he said. "Agents with Thorne's mark. In the Rust Crypt. Back when I thought it was just a ruin."

Lyra wiped blood off her cheek and crouched beside the body of the last attacker. "He wasn't here to kill you. He was here to activate you. Did you hear what he called you?"

"Vault," Xander muttered. "Echo-Carrier. Like I'm not even a person. Just storage."

Lyra's jaw clenched. "Because to them, that's all you are. A relic disguised as a boy."

He looked away. "That place he mentioned… Sector Zero. You said it was real."

She nodded, slowly. "Yeah. But it's buried under so many myths and ciphers, most people assume it's just a scare tactic. A lost lab, a dead zone. Some whisper it was the birthplace of the first Veil Engine."

"And now you're telling me I need to go there."

"No," she corrected. "I'm saying it's already calling you. Whatever's locked in you—it came from somewhere. Someone planted it. Hid it. And they did it there."

Xander's pulse quickened. "How do we get in?"

"We don't walk in through the front door, if that's what you're thinking. If Sector Zero exists, it'll be buried past the old flood levels. Lower than the sewage grids, lower than the Dead Rails."

"Underground of underground," he muttered.

Lyra moved across the room and knelt beside a cabinet inlaid with shimmering metal filigree. "I've been saving this for a job that never came."

She pried it open—and inside sat a dark glass module, humming softly with cyan veins of energy. It looked like a chunk of frozen lightning.

"Voidkey," she said. "Custom-forged. Designed to decrypt legacy Corp gates, especially ones no one's supposed to remember. I'll need a day to map its route—but once we trigger it, we'll only have a window of five hours before the path collapses."

Xander nodded. "Let's do it."

Lyra raised an eyebrow. "No hesitation?"

He stepped forward, eyes sharp. "They came for me. They called me a Vault. And now I know that wasn't metaphorical. If Thorne's agents are already on my trail, I can't just hide. I need to get ahead of them."

Lyra placed the Voidkey into a padded carrier and slung it onto her belt. "Then we leave tonight. One last scan, and I'll trace the signal drift from your echo-layer."

"Signal drift?"

"It's a resonance that happens when something ancient gets disturbed. Like sonar in psychic code. The deeper the corruption, the longer the wake."

She waved him back to the chair. "Sit again. This time, no interruptions."

Xander closed his eyes and felt the glyphs shimmer around him like electric silk.

This scan was rougher—like a wire dragged through his brain. Lyra's eyes glowed more brightly this time, her fingers trembling as she focused.

"There," she whispered. "Beneath the layers. A trace-point. A fail-safe tether."

Xander opened his eyes. "A what?"

"A psychic breadcrumb. Meant to lead you home."

She rose quickly, jotted down coordinates on a translucent pad, and nodded to herself. "I know this place. It's not marked on official maps. But I've heard whispers. Called The Sink."

"Sounds friendly."

"It isn't."

She handed him a flask of stimulants and began prepping her gear.

Within the hour, they were moving.

---

The Sink wasn't part of any navigational grid. It sat beyond the sealed hydro corridors of the abandoned Reclaim Zone, beneath layers of collapsed infrastructure and forgotten circuitry. Getting there meant hacking past rusted checkpoint gates, evading motion-sensitive Corp surveillance, and wading through tunnels dripping with strange bioluminescent algae.

And every step deeper made the air feel heavier.

They moved mostly in silence, flashlights dimmed to narrow beams, only the faint hum of Lyra's scanner filling the quiet.

Finally, they reached a jagged breach in the floor of an old transport chamber. Rusted railcars still hung in stasis along the ceiling, suspended by magnetic lifts long since dead.

Lyra checked the map. "This is it. Below this cavity—The Sink. The drift is strongest here."

Xander peered over the edge. "Doesn't look stable."

"It's not. But we don't need stable. We need access."

She pulled out the Voidkey, activated it—and a spiral of light formed midair, casting geometric reflections on the metal walls. A rippling door of light shimmered into being in the hole below.

Xander swallowed. "No going back?"

She met his gaze. "Only forward."

They jumped.

---

They landed in a room that didn't feel like it belonged to any known level of the city.

No grime. No noise. Just sterile white walls, humming softly, as if the place was still alive despite the silence.

Lights flickered on overhead—old, automated. The system recognized them.

"This place has power?" Xander whispered.

"Residual," Lyra said, scanning the air. "But active. Something's been maintaining it."

They advanced through winding halls, passing rooms filled with half-scrapped machines, memory tanks, and shattered soulcode terminals. Many bore the same symbol burned into the agents' armor—a looping glyph resembling an eye encased in flame.

Then they reached a chamber unlike the others.

Circular. Lined with mirrors.

But the reflections didn't match.

Xander stared at one—and saw himself, slightly younger. His eyes different. Scar absent. Wearing a strange robe with runes across the chest.

Another mirror showed him unconscious, surrounded by masked figures chanting code.

"I remember this," he whispered. "Or… no. I feel it. Like deja vu with teeth."

Lyra frowned. "This is a memory trap. Not a vision. These aren't illusions. They're records."

Xander stepped into the center.

A ripple went through the air.

A voice crackled overhead. Static-laced, deep, and familiar.

> "Echo-Carrier recognized. Primary seal breached. Initiating final protocol: Ghost."

The floor shifted beneath them.

Lyra aimed her pistol, but the weapon fizzled.

"Energy dampener," she muttered. "We're locked in."

Then a pedestal rose from the ground, holding a glass orb filled with black smoke.

Xander felt it call to him.

He stepped closer—and the orb responded. The smoke cleared.

Inside, he saw himself. But older. Worn. With a brand over his heart.

Then the recording began.

His own voice—older, tired, colder.

> "If you're seeing this, then the seal's failed. I broke myself to protect the circuit. To keep the truth hidden. You were never meant to remember—not until it was too late."

> "Thorne was never just a man. He was the architect. The Overseer. And we—we were his failed prototypes. Carriers, vessels. Hosts for stolen power."

> "I escaped. I burned the vaults. But I couldn't kill what was already buried inside me."

> "So I locked it. Split my mind. Made myself forget. And buried the key in you, the younger version."

Lyra's breath caught. "That's you. From… another layer?"

Xander couldn't speak.

The older version continued.

> "If you've made it this far, then the Veil is already thinning. You need to go deeper. To where the first breach began. Where the dead code still sings."

> "Go to the Atrium of Silence."

> "And Xander… don't trust the mirror."

The orb shattered.

And suddenly, everything went dark.

---

Lights returned seconds later—but they were no longer alone.

A mirror opposite the one Xander had first seen now held a moving reflection.

And it stepped out.

Another Xander.

Same age. Same clothes.

But eyes like voids. Smile like a fracture in sanity.

"You shouldn't be here," the reflection said. "This was never meant for you."

Lyra raised her weapon, but the double waved a hand—and the gun dissolved into static.

"I was made to survive," the double continued, circling Xander. "I stayed locked away while you fumbled through life, bleeding gifts you didn't earn. You're weak. I'm the one who should've awakened."

Xander felt his mind pulse—his own thoughts blurring.

The Mirror-Xander attacked.

---

They fought in a cyclone of mirrored shards and shattered code.

Every move the double made, Xander saw it a fraction too late. It knew his instincts. Was his instincts. Lyra tried to reactivate her pulse rig, but the dampeners fried every output.

"Xander!" she shouted. "Don't fight him like an enemy. He's your echo! Sync with him!"

Xander stumbled—then closed his eyes.

And listened.

He let the pulse of the room guide him. Let the memories flood. Let the broken voices harmonize.

Then he understood.

This wasn't just a trap.

It was a test.

He mirrored the double's attack. Then broke the pattern.

He moved like the code inside him had always wanted to—fluid, sharp, unreal.

And he struck.

The echo fractured.

Glass and light exploded outward—and silence fell once more.

Only one Xander stood.

Lyra rushed to him. "Are you okay?"

He nodded slowly. "I think… I passed."

She pointed to the far wall.

A door now stood open—one that hadn't been there before.

The path to the Atrium of Silence had begun.