The light on the drive kept pulsing slowly, like a heartbeat refusing to stop.
Adrian stared at the words on the display — TRANSFER: 49% — unable to look away, as if waiting for reality itself to correct the number.
Clara trembled in his arms.
Rinaldi's voice was gone, but its echo still lingered in her head, coiling around her thoughts.
"Is it over?" she whispered.
Adrian didn't answer.
He looked at the dark monitor, then at her, and there was something broken in his eyes.
The light went out. Only silence remained.
Morning came without warning, slicing through the blinds in pale stripes.
Clara woke late, her head heavy, her throat dry.
Adrian was already awake, sitting by the window, hands clasped in front of his mouth.
"You didn't sleep?" she asked softly.
He shook his head.
"I can't close my eyes. Every time I do… I see the number rise."
Clara stepped closer, touching his shoulder.
He stiffened.
"Don't," he said, voice trembling.
She froze.
"Adrian…"
"It's the closeness, Clara." He turned toward her, his eyes darker than ever. "The more I'm near you, the faster the process goes."
He pointed at the drive, still plugged in. "I watched it all night. The number went from forty-nine to fifty-four. No one touched it."
Clara went pale. "You mean…?"
"It's reactive. It feeds on our connection."
Silence.
Then Adrian whispered, almost to himself,
"That's why I tried to stay away. Even when I couldn't."
Clara took a step closer. "You can't ask me to do that now."
"If we stay together, the power will transfer completely to you. And I'll disappear."
"I won't let that happen."
"You can't stop it," he said, his tone calm but cracking underneath. "It's already inside you."
He looked at her, and for a moment the warmth in his gaze returned, only it was sharper now, painful almost.
"I still want you, Clara. More than I can stand. But every time I touch you, I feel a part of me slipping away."
His words died in the air. Then Clara embraced him anyway, not an impulse, but a decision.
"Then let me die with you."
Adrian held her once, tightly, then pulled away as if breaking something sacred.
"No. You have to live long enough to remember who we were."
"What are you talking about?"
"That we're not here by accident."
The lights flickered. A short hiss. And then everything dissolved.
Clara found herself in another room.
White walls, polished floor, the scent of disinfectant.
In front of her, the therapy chair. And sitting across from her, Adrian. But younger.
His hair shorter, his beard barely there, his eyes tense, unbroken.
She touched her hair: long, loose, like she used to wear it years ago.
"What…?" she started, but the voice wasn't the same. It was softer, lighter — coming from another time.
Adrian was watching her.
"We shouldn't be here."
"I know."
He leaned forward, took her hand across the metal table.
"If anyone finds out, they'll separate us."
"No one will."
"Not even Rinaldi?"
"Especially not Rinaldi."
A fragile smile. A silent promise.
"I love you."
"I love you too. But promise me you won't tell anyone."
A beep.
The red light of a recorder blinked in the corner.
Clara turned toward it, the room was empty. Then everything went dark again.
They woke up at the same instant.
Their breathing ragged, their hands trembling.
The bed, the apartment, the daylight, everything returned at once, like the dream had thrown them back into the same reality.
"You dreamed it too?" Clara asked.
Adrian nodded slowly.
"It wasn't a dream."
Their voices overlapped.
They both remembered. They had lived that moment.
Clara brought a hand to her lips, as if she could still feel the unspoken promise there.
"So… it already happened."
"Yes. And Rinaldi doesn't know." Adrian stood, eyes fixed on the floor. "He doesn't know we already loved each other."
He looked at her again. "That's why the experiment is failing."
A distant beep broke the silence. It came from the computer.
Clara turned.
On the dark screen, a single line blinked, faint, like a fading memory: Transfer paused. Emotional interference detected.
Somewhere else.
A laboratory. White lights, rows of monitors, murmuring technicians.
Rinaldi walked among them, calm, certain, oblivious to the storm he'd started.
"Subject B shows exceptional compatibility," he said to one of the scientists.
"She's perfect. The system is stable."
A younger technician hesitated.
"And if the subjects develop… emotional ties?"
"Impossible. They were chosen specifically to avoid that."
Rinaldi smiled, convinced of his brilliance.
"For the system to work, there must be balance. Emotion would disrupt it. If they ever loved each other, it would collapse."
On the main screen, two streams of code, A and B, ran side by side.
For a brief instant, they touched.
Then they started to tremble. Rinaldi didn't notice.
The collapse had already begun.