Chapter 5: Echo Drift

They ran.

Not because they were afraid.

But because time, in the end, was still their most ruthless enemy.

The city's lower sector blurred past them—alleyways built between rusted towers, concrete still smeared with faint bio-luminescence coding from old surveillance grids. The purge sirens had faded, but the silence left behind was worse.

Every motion felt observed. Every step felt late.

Eros didn't speak.

Prion didn't look back.

Not even when the building collapsed behind them—hacked to implode once the safehouse's location had been confirmed. A clean burn. No traces left. No bodies expected.

New Era didn't care about evidence.

They only cared that the kill order failed. Again.

Three blocks in, they ducked into a supply shaft—a cramped, metallic corridor lined with abandoned wiring and leaking coolant.

Eros pressed his back to the wall. His breath was sharp but controlled.

Prion remained standing, silhouetted by flickering blue panel light.

The silence between them, once jagged and antagonistic, was now filled with something else.

Uncertainty.

Eros broke it.

"You didn't hesitate when the shots started."

"You did," Prion said.

That stung.

And it was true.

Eros had aimed. And for a split second, his gun hadn't known where to land—on the invaders, or on Prion.

But instinct had won. Again.

Just like every other time.

And that—that was the problem.

"They'll consider me compromised now," Eros said flatly.

"They already do."

Eros looked up.

And for the first time, really looked at him.

Hood up, black hair dishevelled, blood crusting one sleeve from a cut he hadn't mentioned. Skin still too pale. Posture too relaxed for someone constantly one breath away from annihilation.

"Why did you smile when they called you the glitch?" Eros asked suddenly.

Prion blinked. "Because it means their system isn't perfect."

"And that matters?"

Prion's voice dropped.

"It's the only thing that gives me hope."

Eros studied him in the dim light.

"Thirty-seven times I was sent to kill you," he said. "You remember them all."

Prion nodded once.

"Then why didn't you kill me first?"

The look Prion gave him wasn't cold.

It was almost mournful.

"Because even broken, you were the last part of me that still believed in something."

A flicker of static echoed down the shaft—radio bursts, encrypted.

Eros stiffened. Prion didn't move.

"I'm still linked," Eros muttered. "They haven't severed my uplink yet."

"They're watching," Prion said.

"No," Eros corrected. "They're waiting. They want to see what I'll do."

He turned his face away.

"They're not testing you anymore, Prion. You already failed."

Prion didn't argue.

He didn't have to.

The silence that followed made it clear:

This time, Eros was the one on trial.

And there were no clean verdicts left.

The system hasn't cut Eros off. It's waiting. Watching. Deciding. But will he?

The shaft led to an old transport tunnel—one of the many buried beneath the city before the infrastructure was rerouted through New Era's pulse grid. Abandoned. Silent. Forgotten.

Like them.

They walked side by side in the dark, only the quiet hum of Prion's disruptor casting faint flickers across the damp metal.

Eros moved ahead, eyes constantly scanning.

Prion followed, slower than before.

Eros noticed it after the fourth bend.

The sound of his footsteps—one short. One dragging.

He turned.

Prion was leaning slightly against the tunnel wall, breath sharp. His hoodie sleeve was darker now—blood soaking through where the earlier gash hadn't closed properly.

"You didn't say you were hit."

"I didn't need to."

Prion pushed off the wall, but his legs faltered.

A step. A stumble.

Eros caught him without thinking.

His arm shot out, gripping Prion by the waist before he could fall.

For a second, they didn't move.

Chest to chest. Breath against breath.

The tunnel buzzed with the low sound of old wiring and memory ghosts.

Eros held him longer than necessary.

And Prion didn't pull away.

Then Prion muttered, "Is this also the part where you say I'm manipulating you again?"

Eros's grip tightened instead of loosening.

"No," he said quietly. "This is the part where I ask why you're shaking."

Prion gave a faint smile. Not the sharp kind.

This one was tired. Human.

"Overclocked," he said. "The Echo drive was syncing too fast earlier. I haven't recalibrated. Side effects… happen."

"You're bleeding out and you still prioritize memory syncing?"

"It's the only part of me they haven't taken yet."

Eros helped him to a ledge carved into the wall—old maintenance seating from when trains used to run here. He sat Prion down carefully, then crouched in front of him.

"Let me see it."

Prion hesitated. Then slowly pulled back the soaked fabric. The wound wasn't just shallow—it had been seared by a pulse round. A cauterized burn at the edge, but it hadn't held. The skin was too pale around it. Too cold.

Eros tore a strip from his own sleeve and began cleaning the wound without a word.

Prion didn't flinch.

Just watched.

"You were never trained for this," he murmured.

"I wasn't supposed to protect you either," Eros replied.

Minutes passed. Slow. Heavy.

Eros's hands were steady.

Too steady, considering everything.

When he was done, he leaned back—but not far.

And for the first time, he looked at Prion not as a target.

Not as a threat.

But as someone still bleeding for reasons no one had ever asked.

"You shouldn't have to do this alone," Eros said.

Prion's gaze flickered. He almost looked startled.

Then he laughed, barely a breath.

"You say that now. Wait until the override kicks in again."

Eros's jaw tightened.

"Then maybe I'll fight it."

They sat in silence again.

But this time, it wasn't heavy.

It just was.

Two people, caught between memory and protocol.

Breathing the same air.

A wound, a promise, and a silence that isn't trying to hurt them. But the system isn't done watching.

They moved slower now.

Not because of weakness—but because neither of them wanted to admit the fragility settling in between breaths.

Eros walked half a step ahead, but his senses were split—one eye on the shadows, the other on Prion, who limped with quiet defiance. He hadn't said a word since they'd stopped to treat the wound. Hadn't asked for help. Hadn't leaned in again.

But he didn't pull away when Eros offered his arm.

That was new.

The deeper they went into the under-level maze, the more unstable the pulse tracking became. Old grid lines blinked and failed. Static stuttered in the air. Something was interfering with the neural sync points embedded in Eros's spine.

He could feel it—like a tightening coil behind his eyes.

Override pulses.

Slow. Gentle.

Dangerous.

And next to him… Prion staggered.

Just once.

Eros turned, caught him again.

This time, Prion didn't stop falling.

He collapsed—his body folding forward in a graceless slide. Eros dropped to his knees, catching him against his chest before his head could hit the concrete.

"Prion—"

No answer.

His pulse was there. Weak. Fast. Skin ice cold.

Whatever sync acceleration he'd forced on himself had finally caught up.

Eros gently lowered him, brushing back sweat-matted black hair. He didn't realize his hand lingered—thumb brushing across the edge of Prion's cheekbone.

Not cold anymore.

Human.

Too human.

"You idiot," Eros whispered. "You could've said something."

A low groan escaped Prion's throat.

He wasn't fully unconscious—just drained. Overclocked. Maybe worse.

Eros sat down beside him, letting Prion's head rest lightly against his shoulder.

The moment felt unprogrammed.

Wrong.

Right.

Prion stirred, voice barely audible.

"Override?"

Eros shook his head.

"Not yet. But it's coming. I can feel it."

Silence.

Then— "You'll kill me next time."

It wasn't a question.

Eros's fingers curled slightly, brushing Prion's sleeve.

"No," he said.

"Then you'll break."

"Maybe I already did."

A long pause. Then Prion exhaled—slow and steady.

"I used to tell myself it was better if you forgot," he said. "That forgetting meant you weren't suffering."

Eros didn't speak.

"I lied."

Somewhere above, a faint echo of movement—another patrol, maybe. But Eros didn't move.

Not yet.

Not while Prion was still breathing against him like that—like he didn't know what it meant to rest, even now.

Eventually, Prion opened his eyes again.

And for the first time, they weren't sharp or cold or mocking.

They were tired. Raw.

Real.

"You stayed," he murmured.

Eros nodded.

"Yeah," he said softly. "I'm starting to forget why I shouldn't."

Prion fell. Eros stayed. But with override pulses closing in, how long before memory fractures them again?

They didn't move for a long time.

Not because they couldn't.

But because the silence finally felt like theirs.

For once, no mission hung between them. No countdown. No gun. No order whispering in Eros's spine.

Just the slow rhythm of Prion's breathing against his side, shallow but steady. Just the dull hum of a city's underbelly pretending to sleep.

Eros didn't know how long it had been since he'd let himself… pause.

But it was this stillness that scared him more than any order.

Because he didn't want to leave it.

Eventually, Prion stirred again.

"You shouldn't carry me," he murmured.

"I didn't," Eros replied. "You collapsed into me. There's a difference."

Prion huffed quietly. A ghost of a laugh.

"You used to be more clinical."

"I used to be more blind."

Their eyes met in the dark.

No deflection. No evasion. Just two people—threaded together by pain neither could forget.

"I can walk," Prion said after a moment.

"You're not walking anywhere until your heart rate stabilizes."

"Since when do you monitor my heart?"

"Since you started syncing your brain into overdrive and bleeding on me."

He expected Prion to push back. To deflect.

But instead, Prion looked down.

Fingers curling lightly into the fabric of Eros's sleeve.

"...I didn't think you'd stay," he said.

"You fainted on me. What can I do? It would've felt rude to walk away."

"You're not good at lying, Eros."

"You're worse at dying."

A flicker of light blinked through the tunnel far ahead—surveillance drones moving into sweep formation.

Eros's body tensed.

Prion saw it.

"They're searching," Eros said.

"Not for me," Prion replied.

Eros turned toward him. "You're still the priority asset."

Prion's expression hardened. "Not anymore."

He reached slowly into his coat, pulled out a small data shard. Black-coded. No identifier.

"I intercepted this a week ago. It's a protocol shift. They changed targets."

Eros stared at it. "What does that mean?"

Prion met his eyes.

"It means you're not just the weapon anymore."

He paused. Then added, quieter:

"You're the liability."

The word hung in the air like a detonated echo.

Not because it was shocking—but because it confirmed what Eros had already begun to suspect.

That the hesitation New Era once tolerated had curdled into threat classification.

That he was now the flaw.

Just like Prion.

The drone hum grew louder.

Prion stood—slowly this time, body stiff but eyes alert. He didn't ask for help. But he stayed close. Close enough that their arms brushed when they moved.

Eros didn't step away.

As they walked deeper into the tunnel's maze, Prion spoke again—quieter now.

"You know why they kept calling me the glitch?"

Eros didn't answer.

"I was the first successful subject, but they expect me not to last. They only need the data. They thought I'd break after, but I woke up, was able to adapt and worse part of their nightmare is I was able to develop the skill to rewrite. They did everything for me to break. They wanted me to."

A pause.

"And maybe I would've. If not for you."

Eros didn't say anything for a while.

Then:

"You remember every loop."

"Yes."

"But in each one, I forget."

"Yes."

Eros exhaled.

"Then tell me something I said once. Something I wouldn't say now."

Prion's smile was faint. Not cruel. Just… sad.

"You once said," he began, "if they wiped you again, you'd claw your way back to me with no memories and still choose me."

He looked away.

"I didn't believe you."

Eros stopped walking.

"I believe it now," he said.

And for a single, breathless moment—Prion's eyes softened like something finally cracked behind them.

The roles have shifted. The system's watching. But now both are considered liabilities. So what happens when the weapon and the glitch walk the same path?

They were designed to be erased. One forgot. The other didn't. But now, memory isn't the enemy—it's the reason they're still standing.

If someone forgot you over and over but still chose you—would you forgive them, or start choosing them back?