🕒 Ashlands Outskirts – 01:13 PM
The air felt heavier now. Still—but threatening.
Far across the sky, a dark formation moved—too slow for a storm, too deliberate to be nature.
Liana stood in the silence, her clone beside her.
Daniel kept his eyes on the horizon. Mason's mouth opened, but no words came.
> "Reaper-3..." Daniel said softly, like the name alone could stop the world.
"You knew?" Liana asked him, voice sharp but quiet.
"I caught a trace when the MIRROR files opened," Daniel replied. "It was dormant. Until now."
---
🧠 Mobile Command Tent – 01:45 PM
Inside a hastily assembled tent, the team reviewed what little data they had.
The clone sat cross-legged on the floor, her hands gripping her head. She didn't speak—but her eyes flicked rapidly, as if reliving something deep and buried.
> "It's not a normal Reaper," she finally said. "It knows us. Me. You. Even... him."
Liana crouched next to her. "Why?"
The clone met her gaze.
> "Because it came from us."
---
🧬 Echo Files – Mirror Core Debrief – 02:12 PM
Daniel dug deeper into the encrypted ECHO files Mason had unlocked. There was still one that hadn't been fully decrypted.
He forced it open.
> "REAPER-3: Custom prototype. Engineered to hunt its template through psychological mimicry."
Underneath:
> Target template: Liana-Prime.
Daniel's jaw clenched. "This thing was designed to break you."
---
🔪 Ashlands Barrens – 03:05 PM
The team moved toward the last known signal. The clone wore a scarf and a helmet now, blending in. Liana walked beside her, rifle loaded.
Mason kept scanning the comms.
Daniel walked in silence—until he broke it.
> "Mason," he said, "how many of them did you code with shutdown protocols?"
Mason didn't answer.
> "When you ran, how many were still locked in their pods, screaming to die, while you told yourself you were a hero?"
"Shut your damn mouth," Mason snapped. "I didn't know they were alive."
Daniel gave a hollow laugh.
> "You didn't want to know. That's worse."
---
💀 Derelict Echo Facility – 04:22 PM
They reached what remained of Echo-9: a scorched facility with no signage, buried under decades of ash.
Inside—death.
A corpse hung from the ceiling, suspended by old data cables.
Daniel recognized the face.
> "Talek. He was with our breach unit."
Written on the wall in thick red paint:
> "This isn't your war anymore. It's ours now."
— Liana?
But the handwriting wasn't hers.
The clone stepped closer, breath catching.
> "There was another. One of us. She woke up before I did."
---
🎥 Surveillance Logs – 05:00 PM
Through a damaged server, Daniel found one working clip.
A static-heavy video.
A different version of Liana.
Her face—scarred, hair half-burned, but her eyes… ruthless.
She spoke to the camera:
> "You think waking us was mercy?
You made us remember pain.
Now we give it back.
To all of you."
---
🌩️ Ashstorm Warning – 05:45 PM
A storm brewed fast, cloaking the ashlands in a looming darkness.
The team prepped the gates of the facility for lockdown.
Daniel approached Liana, speaking low.
> "If there's another you out there—and Reaper-3 is following her... Are you sure she's a victim?"
Liana didn't flinch.
> "Just because she wears my face... doesn't mean she's me."
---
⏳ End of Chapter 35
> Reaper-3 isn't hunting Liana.
Not exactly.
> It's following something made from her.
A version twisted by fire, forgotten pain, and the desire to watch the world burn.
> And somewhere out there...
She's waiting.
---
🔥 NEXT TIME — Chapter 36: "The One With My Face"
> A rogue clone awakens.
Reaper-3 isn't the only predator in play now.
> As loyalties crack and identities blur, the team must face one truth:
> Not everyone in their circle...
is still human.
---
Reaper-3 develops emotions?
---------
This chapter was a turning point—for Liana, for the clone, and for the world they thought they understood.
When I started writing The Silent Core, I always knew the story wasn't just about survival in a broken world—it was about identity, legacy, and what's left behind when the systems that shaped us finally collapse.
With the reveal of Reaper-3, the buried past is no longer content to stay silent. The idea of a weapon crafted from your own shadow—something engineered to erase you not by force, but by understanding you better than you understand yourself—is terrifying, and deeply personal. Especially for Liana, who has already spent a lifetime being used, mirrored, and manipulated.
And for Mason? This is the fracture line. His past is no longer something he can bury beneath guilt and good intentions. He has to confront what he helped build. Whether he likes it or not.
The clone—who still doesn't have a name—isn't just a victim anymore. She's a wildcard. And maybe, just maybe... a mirror that doesn't reflect the past, but a future no one expected.
There are more versions of Liana out there.
And at least one of them... is not here to heal the world.
She's here to burn it down.
Stay with me. Things are only going to get more twisted from here.