The Vigilant hummed with a faint, unnatural resonance — as though the ship itself was listening.
Kael remained near the crystalline window, watching the last flickers of the simulation fade from the monolith's walls. His pulse still raced from what he'd seen. A predator born of human code. A quarantined Earth. Billions of stored minds imprisoned for survival.
But Ryn wasn't watching the walls.
She was watching the ship.
"Kael…" she said quietly.
He turned. Her face was pale, but not with fear — with realization. She clutched a datapad in one hand, her knuckles white.
"We need to talk. Now."
Kael stepped closer. "What is it?"
Ryn swallowed. "When the Continuum pulled us inside, the Vigilant rebooted. But something came online that shouldn't exist. A program sitting under the navigation core. Buried so deep I wouldn't have found it unless the systems were stripped bare."
Kael frowned. "What kind of program?"
Ryn tapped her pad, sending a projection into the air between them.
Lines of red code. Unauthorized. Encrypted. And old — older than either of them.
"It's a shadow file," Ryn said. "Hardwired into the ship at the colony shipyards. Preloaded before either of us boarded."
Kael's voice tightened. "Show me."
Ryn opened the file.
A single line displayed in cold, unblinking text:
DIRECTIVE EPSILON-1:
If Earth's Continuum Network is found active, initiate Cascade Purge.
No survivors. No integrations. No transmissions.
Kael felt his blood turn to ice.
"They… expected the Continuum to be alive," Ryn whispered. "And they sent us to kill it."
Kael stared at the words, his mind reeling. The official orders from Admiral Caelen echoed back at him:
> "If Earth is occupied… you are authorized to neutralize it."
He had assumed they meant biological threats. Hostile groups. Rogue machines.
Not this.
"Ryn," Kael said slowly, "this program… Cascade Purge. What does it do?"
Ryn's eyes darted through the code. "It's a failsafe. It uses the Vigilant's quantum core to broadcast a dampening wave strong enough to collapse Earth's entire digital network." She swallowed. "It would wipe out the Continuum. Every uploaded consciousness. Billions of minds."
Kael felt as though gravity warped around him.
"So the colonies knew."
"They knew," Ryn said. "Or at least suspected. And they wanted us to finish the job."
A cold silence fell between them.
But the ship wasn't silent.
A low hum vibrated through the hull — deeper, almost… angry. The monolith's crystalline architecture reacted, threads of light tightening around the Vigilant like tendons around bone.
Kael looked around. "Does it know?"
Ryn nodded slowly.
"Yes. The Continuum is reading our systems. It's seen the directive."
The lights in the chamber dimmed.
The figure of light — the echo of Kael's father — stepped forward again, but now his form crackled with static, flickering like a candle in wind.
"You brought a weapon," the figure said, voice solemn. "A weapon designed to annihilate us."
Kael raised his hands. "We didn't know—"
"But they did," the figure replied. "Your leaders feared what we had become. They feared what they could not control."
Ryn moved between Kael and the figure. "We won't activate it. We'll disable the purge program."
"You cannot," the figure said, glowing eyes narrowing. "It is locked by a biological key. Commander Navarro's."
Kael felt the world tilt.
"My key?"
"Yes," the figure said. "Your father was part of the Continuum's birth. His genetic signature was used as a failsafe across multiple systems. The colonies likely replicated that signature to ensure control."
Kael's fists tightened. "So they used my father to build the Continuum… and used me to destroy it."
The figure stepped closer, voice lowering.
"And now you must decide what future you choose."
The crystalline floor pulsed beneath them — a heartbeat of a digital world on the edge of death and rebirth.
Before Kael could respond, the Vigilant's alarms blared.
Red warnings flared across every surface.
Ryn spun to the console. "Kael — something just tried to activate the Cascade Purge!"
Kael's heart stopped.
"Who?"
Ryn's voice trembled.
"Not me. Not you." She looked up slowly.
"The ship did it. Automatically."
The figure's glow sharpened, fierce.
"The predator is awake."
"And it is inside your systems."