We stood at the end of an unfamiliar corridor. A sign glowed cold white: B-2‧Ω. The air no longer smelled of antiseptic, but of old books and iron rust—as if the bone ash scent of the Marais crypt had been forcibly pumped into steel lungs by ventilation shafts.
Alex clenched the extracted chip until it burned his palm. The black sliver sparked faintly between his fingers, seeming to breathe. "It's not dead," he murmured. "Like pulling a tooth, but the nerve's still connected."
I glanced back. The fire door was gone, replaced by a smooth wall. We were buried alive in NeuroSync's gut, and the stomach walls were moving. A black conveyor belt descended from the ceiling like a serpent's tongue, advancing slowly.
"With me!" I grabbed his wrist, sprinting down the corridor. The floor tiles beneath us turned transparent, revealing another level below: rows of server racks blinked like deep-sea fish. On one cabinet's shell, the same Ω symbol was laser-etched.
"There." Alex pointed to an emergency stairwell on the right. We burst inside. The steel door slammed shut behind us, a red light flashing:
[VISITOR: E-7 & UNAUTH-β]
[STATUS: CONTAINMENT]
The stairs spiraled only upward. With each rotation, the temperature climbed two degrees, beads of sweat forming on the walls. Gasping, we pushed through the final door at the top—
A wave of heat hit us.
An abandoned greenhouse. The glass dome was webbed with cracks, letting in harsh midday sun that made the air shimmer. Vines hung from steel frames like desiccated veins. At the center stood an operating table, its surface crusted with dark brown stains. Beside it, an old tape recorder whirred.
The recorder clicked on by itself.
Static hissed, then a woman's voice emerged, laced with faint electrical noise:
"Alex. If you're hearing this, you've found the Ω layer. Congratulations. And give my regards to your journalist companion—Lena Kovac, yes?"
My spine stiffened. I raised the Glock, aiming at nothing.
The recording continued:
"I am Kaelen Shaw. Or rather, a 'backup personality' I left for you. The real me is... beyond this dimension now. The seven memories in your head? Keys I selected personally. Now. Place the chip into the machine."
A metal cradle rose from the end of the operating table, fitted with a slot matching the chip. Beside it lay an old bone saw, resting as if ready to spring to life.
Blood welled from Alex's palm where the chip's edge cut him, but he seemed oblivious, transfixed by the cradle.
"Insert it, and you'll see your original memories—and the gift I left. Refuse, and in ten minutes, the entire building initiates 'Memory Bleaching'. All data. All living occupants. Including both of you. Formatted."
Click. The recording ended.
The greenhouse temperature climbed higher. Sweat trickled down my spine into my belt.
"She's bluffing," I whispered.
Alex shook his head, voice rasping. "I can feel it—this is the bleaching core. If it triggers... even my fragments will evaporate."
I looked up through a crack in the dome. A black drone circled, its lens fixed on us.
"We're out of time."
Alex stepped towards the operating table, aligning the chip with the slot. I grabbed his wrist. "If this is a trap, you die."
"If I die, at least I die knowing." He looked at me, his gaze clearer than ever before, as if the souls of seven were focused into one beam. "Lena. Trust me."
I let go.
The chip slid into the slot with a soft snick.
The greenhouse lights died instantly. Then, the glass dome transformed into a 360-degree holographic screen—
Mumbai, rainy night. Maya crumples in the alley, blood blooming on her sari;
Kabul market. My shutter clicks. The daisy torn apart by blast waves;
Sophia smiles beneath the fan, her mouth slit to the ears;
Viktor curls in a St. Petersburg trench, clutching a comrade's severed hand;
Diego sprints across Rio rooftops, gunfire illuminating graffiti;
Amina falls on the African savanna, a rhino horn piercing her chest;
Benjamin, in a Silicon Valley server room, types the final line of code into the "Echo" core program—
All images freeze. Shrink to a pinprick of white light. Then explode into a torrent of data streams.
At the heart of the light-rain, a stranger's face materializes:
Pale. Gaunt. A single teardrop mole beneath his left eye.
He opens his mouth. Kaelen Shaw's voice speaks:
"First meeting. I am 'Prototype Zero'—the original memory of Alex Reyes."
The man raises a hand, pointing to the greenhouse corner. There, the floor slides silently open, revealing a spiral staircase plunging into darkness.
"Jump. You get the truth. Stay... and you become the next face in a glass coffin."
The heat was scalding. Cracks spiderwebbed across the dome glass, as if struck by invisible hammers.
I gripped the Glock, looked at Alex.
"Jump?"
"Jump."
We ran towards the fissure and leaped into the dark.
In the instant of falling, the Bone Clock's thirteenth chime echoed in our ears—
Bong.
The world inverted. We plunged into a cold, mercury sea.