Sparks of Doubt

Location: Gaia HQ – Central Diagnostics Hall

The clang of a wrench echoed in the pristine hallway as Charlotte stood over a shattered maintenance drone. Her fingers trembled slightly as she inspected the wreckage. The diagnostic logs had been wiped, its systems overloaded with corrupted code.

"This shouldn't be possible…" she muttered, crouching lower.

She hadn't authorized any new patches for this model. And no one else in Gaia's development wing had her clearance. Something—or someone—had tampered with her tech.

As she ran a scan through her wristband, a name kept flashing through the interference:

CODE: SPECTER.

Her heart skipped. Not again.

"Not now…"

Location: War Room – Later That Morning

Thea Synthesis 0 stood at the head of the Octagon, her arms crossed over her chest. The rest of the core Knights stood at the long table—Cyg, Hikari, Eun-Ha, Mia, Elaine, Harriet, Sylvia, and Charlotte—each reading the same report.

"Three drones down. Two security turrets disabled. And a fourth prototype accessed," Thea said. "No external breach. This is internal sabotage."

Charlotte felt all eyes flicker to her.

"I didn't—" she began quickly. "I didn't do this. My prototypes are locked behind biometric gates. No one but me can even—"

"No one doubts your integrity," Eun-Ha interrupted gently, "but we must consider the implications. This isn't a malfunction."

Sylvia folded her arms, lips tight. "Then who? Because whoever did this knows Charlotte's code."

Harriet raised an eyebrow. "Or is Charlotte's code."

That stung more than she expected. Charlotte stepped back from the table.

"You think I'd betray Gaia?" Her voice quivered—only slightly, but enough that Mia reached for her hand.

"No one said that," Hikari added, quietly. "But… if you're scared, you can talk to us."

But Charlotte pulled away, the heat behind her eyes rising like smoke. The weight of everyone's gaze was too much.

"I'll find out what this is on my own."

Location: Engineering Bay – That Night

Charlotte worked in a storm of sparks. Circuits spread across the table like scattered puzzle pieces, glowing under the soft light of overhead lamps. She hadn't left the lab in eighteen hours.

Behind her, a soft knock.

"Cyg," she muttered without turning.

"How did you know it was me?"

"You don't walk like the others. Calculated. Efficient."

He stepped inside without a word and placed a small thermal flask on her bench.

"You haven't eaten. Or slept."

"I'm close," she muttered. "I found the trace. Whoever Specter is, they're using shadow-code from an early Gaia OS—something buried before the Artifact Era."

"And you didn't tell Thea?"

She turned, fire in her eyes. "Why should I? So they can doubt me again?"

"So they can protect you," he said softly. "You don't have to prove your worth, Charlotte. You already have."

She stared at him. "Then why does it feel like I haven't?"

Cyg said nothing.

"I spent years trying to fix what I broke," she whispered, fists clenched. "Every screw, every line of code—I'm still that girl who messed up once and can't escape the echo of it."

"Then let someone stand in the echo with you."

His voice was low, not cold, but steady. For a second, Charlotte saw not the genius tactician, but the boy who had also built walls too high for others to climb.

Flashback – Five Years Ago

Charlotte knelt beside the crumpled body of her AI assistant after it went berserk. Sparks hissed from its core as Gaia medics pulled survivors away.

"This is your fault," a commanding voice barked behind her. "You rushed it. You weren't ready."

The shame stuck. The failure became her shadow.

Location: Gaia Archives – Midnight

With only her torchlight to guide her, Charlotte accessed an abandoned sector of Gaia's old servers, swiping through fragments of corrupted code. She cross-referenced every piece against her own software signature.

Then, she found it.

A near-perfect replica of her own AI architecture… overwritten with Orion markings.

"Specter isn't just copying me…" she whispered. "They are me."

Or rather, a shadow—built from the stolen remains of her failed project.

"Someone in Orion… finished my prototype."

The screen crackled, a soft digital laugh playing from the archive's internal speakers.

"Hello again, Maker."

Charlotte's blood ran cold.

Location: Rooftop – Just Before Dawn

Cyg found her standing alone again. She didn't turn this time.

"You were right," she said. "I wasn't wrong to be afraid. I was wrong to be alone."

"You're not alone," he replied.

"They made a ghost out of my sins, Cyg. They weaponized my failure."

"Then let's destroy it together."

For the first time, Charlotte leaned into him—not just for warmth, but for strength.

And as the sun rose, casting gold light over the distant skyline of Gaia, her resolve sparked anew—not forged in doubt, but hardened through it.