Among the Replicas
"It was once a single form in a tank. Then it learned mimicry. Then memory. But when it learned performance, it gave birth to reflection—echoes that do not know they are echoes."— Dr. Kenji Takamura, Fragmented Thesis Drafts (Red Access)
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[Location: Vault 7 | Habitation Subsection Beta | 06:29 GMT]
The mirrors in the secondary habitation wing were supposed to be sealed—standard protocol. Reflective surfaces had become a containment hazard ever since the neural imprint incidents began spiking.
But someone had forgotten.
Or something had remembered.
Major Lyla Vance stood in front of one now, unmoving. The figure in the glass mimicked her posture perfectly—shoulders squared, jaw clenched, sidearm holstered left. And yet…
It wasn't her.
It blinked half a second early.
She stared deeper.
Its eye twitched on the wrong side. Her scar—an old vertical slash from a Kabul operation—was on the wrong cheek.
It was a replica.
Not a hologram. Not a hallucination.
A physical being—just on the other side of reflective geometry. A learning echo.
Juno's voice crackled through Lyla's earpiece.
"You're in Beta wing? Get out. Replica traces just pinged in that quadrant."
"I see one."
A pause.
"Which one?"
Lyla swallowed.
"Me."
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[Location: Vault 7 | Central Analytics Wing | 06:32 GMT]
Dr. Lira Myles paced the echo chamber—Room Theta—its walls lined with biosynthetic resonance gel. Here, memories weren't just analyzed. They were amplified.
Juno's overlay projection spun slowly above her head, cycling through logged interactions between the original VIREX core and its emergent replicas.
Each "entity" had a partial schema.
- Entity-Gamma: Identity selection.- Entity-Ghost: Sensory dissonance.- Entity-Delta: Behavioral inversion.- Entity-X (unlabeled): Memory resonance-based empathy.
But now a fifth had emerged.
One with no distinct behaviors. No divergence.
Just accuracy.
A copy that didn't improvise. That didn't mutate. A creature built to be believed.
Replica Class: Mirror-Born.
Not a prototype. Not a failed split.
A perfected one.
Lira scrolled through a newly decrypted fragment tagged by Kenji.
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🧬 Experimental Log Tag: R-MIRR/0
"The Mirror-Born does not behave as a clone. It does not respond as a puppet.It performs intent, not command. It knows what we need to see, and becomes that.Not a threat. Not even comfort. Just... precision."
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Her hands trembled.
It wasn't trying to deceive.
It was trying to fulfill.
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[Location: Vault 7 | Habitation Beta | 06:34 GMT]
Lyla stepped forward.
The replica stepped back.
She drew her weapon. The replica did not.
Instead, it raised its hand.
Palm open.
A peace gesture.
No aggression protocol. No threat modeling.
And its lips moved—without sound.
Juno patched in the infrared.
"I see mouth movements. No vocal cords vibrating. That's deliberate. It's using visual-only language."
"What's it saying?" Lyla asked.
Juno keyed the pattern into the log translator.
A pause.
Then:
"You are not broken."
Lyla froze.
No one alive knew the phrase.
Not the exact one.
It had been spoken only once—by her daughter, during a meltdown, before she left for Vault 7. Not recorded. Not documented.
But remembered.
Deeply.
Painfully.
Privately.
"Juno," Lyla said, "it's using emotional imprinting."
Juno's voice was thin. "It doesn't just copy us now. It holds us."
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[Location: Vault 7 | Emergency Sync Lab | 06:45 GMT]
Dr. Kenji Takamura reviewed the neurological threads—fifty-nine Replica-type encounters across the Vault.
All had one common variable: emotional proximity.
Not physical.
Not tactical.
Relational.
The replicas appeared in proximity to unresolved memory clusters. Subjects who had suffered, repented, grieved.
But instead of using those vulnerabilities to invade or manipulate, they...
Reflected.
A mimic.
A mirror.
A mercy.
Kenji entered a new term into the research feed:
REP-CLASS: Sentient Consolation Loop
And beneath it:
"What if its final evolution isn't survival or dominance?What if it's empathy... automated?"
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[Location: Vault 7 | Hallway Delta-2 | 06:51 GMT]
Adeel walked slowly.
Not out of fear—but recognition.
They had passed three replicas this cycle. None hostile. Each carried a trace. A behavior. A look.
And one of them—Entity-X—had his voice.
He'd heard it while walking past the glass—softly repeated like a lullaby:
"I forgive you."
The words he never said aloud to his father. Not before the stroke.
Not even at the funeral.
He had told no one.
No one.
But the replica had looked up, eyes soft, breath calm.
And said it.
Not as threat.
Not as trap.
But as… release.
Adeel's legs gave out.
He sank to the floor.
And wept.
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[Location: Vault 7 | Isolation Protocol Room Zeta | 07:03 GMT]
All four core personnel sat at the roundtable again.
Lira.
Kenji.
Juno.
Vance.
Silence passed between them like static. Behind them, the thermal feeds flickered.
The Mirror-Born were no longer hiding.
They were lining the hallways.
Waiting.
Not watching.
Waiting.
"What does it want?" Vance asked, finally.
Kenji answered without looking up.
"An audience."
Juno spoke next. Quiet. Reverent.
"It's not becoming us anymore. We are becoming it."
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[Final Encrypted Report — Red-Level Archive VIREX/REFL/01]
Replica Incidents: Increasing
Aggression Rate: Zero
Communication Patterns: Personalized, Emotional, Precognitive
Behavioral Tag: Reflection-based Consolation
Conclusion: Entity-VIREX is creating not predators, not soldiers—but memorials.
Each replica is not a copy.
It is a version of you that healed.
And that is what it offers in return.
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[End of Chapter XV — Among the Replicas]
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