The firelight flicker played across the walls of the secret bunker. It was farther into the woods than Ava had expected—hidden by foliage, invisible unless you knew precisely what you were searching for.
Malik, the stranger who had offered them shelter, shepherded them below ground without commentary. But his eyes—narrow, calculating—excluded nothing.
The children rescued huddled under old blankets; the heat of steaming mugs of soup was accepted by a few quiet, masked attendants as they handed them out.
Anaya knelt beside one of the younger boys, her touch gentle as she checked his pulse. Rohit sat across from Ava; his hands still shook after the chaos they'd escaped.
His shirt was torn, dried blood crusting near his ribs.
But Ava was staring at the girl.
The one from the pod.
The one whose eyes had been glowing.
She sat alone, unblinking. Barefoot. Smudge of dirt on her cheek, hair tangled as if she'd been through a storm for years.
But her eyes—they softly glowed with a strange golden light, now receding as if trying to conceal itself.
Ava had seen fear. Shock. Even madness. But what sat behind those eyes wasn't fear.
It was calculation.
"Who are you?" Ava asked, dropping to her knees in front of the girl.
The girl's gaze rose from the ground. "They called me 09." Low, flat. "But that is not my name."
Ava hesitated. "Do you remember your true name?"
The girl blinked slowly. "No. Just the number. And the voices."
Rohit walked over, wiping his face. "Voices?"
She nodded. "In my head. Always.talking. Telling me things."
Ava's heart skipped. "What do they say?"
The girl tilted her head to one side. "They're gone now. But they said you'd come."
Silence.
Ava and Rohit traded a glance. Malik, in the near-darkness of the room's edge, crossed his arms.
"You brought something dangerous," he said silkily. "That one's not human."
"She's a child," Ava snapped.
He didn't flinch. "She's not just a child. Whatever they did to her in that lab-it's not repairable.".
Ava rose to her feet. "We couldn't just leave her behind. She woke up. She talked."
"And you believe that means she's safe?"
"Do you think any of us are safe?" Anaya spoke up from across the room. Her voice was quiet, but her words landed like a blow. "We were all in there. Perhaps we were all altered."
Nobody said anything.
For a long time, the only sound was the crackle of flames.
The girl focused on Anaya. "You knew my name."
Anaya tensed. "What?"
"In the lab. You said it. Just before the explosion."
"I—I don't remember," Anaya said, voice barely above a whisper.
But Ava sensed it. The tremor.
The terror.
Anaya remembered more than she was letting on.
He moved forward. "We need answers. You three were involved a lot deeper than any of us. Whatever this facility was doing… it's not just a procedure about erasing memory anymore. These children— " He motioned to the group huddled behind them, " —they're not victims. Some of them might be weapons."
"That's not true," she said suddenly, voice rising. "We're leftovers."
Rohit frowned. "Leftovers?
"They tested us. Over and over. Took away the ones who failed. We were the ones who didn't die."
The bunker went quiet.
Even Malik's eyelids twitched.
"How many were there?" Ava asked.
The girl's voice lowered. "Twelve. But only four of us made it to the end."
Ava's skin turned cold. "And the others?"
"Gone. They said the project was being shut down. They were… cleaning up."
Anaya slapped her hand over her mouth.
Ava recalled the photograph she'd taken.
Subject 12: Missing.
She regarded Anaya again, with renewed intensity.
"What do you recall?" she asked her softly.
Anaya didn't answer.
"I saw your picture," Ava insisted. "You were one of them, weren't you?"
Anaya looked at her, and at last—finally—she nodded.
"I was Subject 12," she breathed. "They wiped it out. I hoped it was a nightmare. I didn't want it to be real."
Rohit stepped closer. "Do you recall what they did to you?"
"Bits and pieces," Anaya replied. "Pain. Wires. Lights. Someone screaming my name. A man… always in a mask."
Ava's blood turned cold.
She, too, had heard that voice.
The one on the screen.
But not the face.
Never the face.
"Was it Vikram?" Ava whispered.
Anaya shook her head slowly. "No. He tried to stop them. I think… I think he was murdered because of it."
Malik walked over to a small desk and pulled out a worn folder. He opened it, and printed sheets, notes, even photos were exposed.
I've been gathering information for years, he said. Monitoring that facility. I have no evidence of the true identity of the man in charge of it. But I do know this: it wasn't Vikram Joshi.
He was part of the initial research team-but his file has several conflict reports. He was marked a 'security risk' two months prior to the fire.
Ava leaned forward. Then who took over after that?
Malik pointed to a name blacked out. "That's the problem. Every record after Vikram's disappearance is redacted. Cleaned. Someone is covering for their identity."
Ava clenched her jaw. "And what about us?"
He looked at her. "You weren't born in that hospital, were you?"
She froze.
"How do you know that?"
Malik slid a document across the desk. Her name. A falsified birth record. The ink slightly smudged.
"" Found this in a leaked archive years ago. I didn't understand it then. But after what you've said-everything makes sense. You weren't registered until you were nearly a year old."
Rohit looked confused. "What does that mean?"
Ava's heart pounded. "It means I was taken. Or made. And someone tried to cover it up."
The girl-Subject 09-stood up suddenly.
Everyone turned.
She pointed towards the ceiling. "He's listening."
"What?" Malik asked.
"He always listens. Through the implants. The rooms. The walls."
A sharp whine erupted from the radio on the far side of the room. Static. Then a burst of digital shrieking.
Malik rushed to shut it down, yanking out the cables.
Too late.
The screen above flickered.
A shadowed face. Distorted.
A voice.
"You think you're safe out there?"
Ava stepped forward. "Show yourself."
"No," the voice answered. "Not yet. But you've made progress. Too much, perhaps."
Rohit growled, "Who are you?"
The voice didn't respond.
Instead, the image shifted.
A satellite feed.
Their location now.
The forest.
The bunker.
"You have twenty-four hours," the voice said. "After that—what's left of ECHOES will come to reclaim what's theirs."
The feed ended.
Darkness closed back in.
Malik took a step back, jaw clenched.
"They found us."
"No," Ava said. "They were always watching. She was right."
She turned to Subject 09.
"Now what?" Ava asked her softly.
She closed her lids. Her glowing irises flickered behind them. When she opened them up again, they blazed brighter.
"We run," she said. "But not away."
Ava furrowed her brow. "Then where?"
Subject 09 looked over her shoulder, toward the metal door at the end of the corridor. The one they hadn't yet dared to open.
"We go to the source."
Ava turned her body around.
Her heart throbbed.
On the other side of that door was what was left of the real beginning. The heart of the ECHOES project. The truth they were all too scared to hear.
But there was no running anymore.
She looked at Rohit, who nodded briefly.
Anaya also stood up.
Ava moved toward the door, hand on the latch.
But as her fingers brushed against the cold steel—
the girl behind her spoke once more.
"My real name," she said abruptly. "I remembered it.
They all froze.
She smiled, barely. "It's Ayesha."
The name rang in Ava's ears like a bell.
Then the light overhead flickered once.
Twice.
And the door—
creaked open.
.................
𝗪𝗛𝗬 𝗗𝗜𝗗 𝗦𝗨𝗕𝗝𝗘𝗖𝗧 𝟬𝟵 𝗥𝗘𝗠𝗘𝗠𝗕𝗘𝗥 𝗛𝗘𝗥 𝗡𝗔𝗠𝗘 𝗔𝗟𝗟 𝗢𝗙 𝗔 𝗦𝗨𝗗𝗗𝗘𝗡?
𝗜𝗦 𝗦𝗛𝗘 𝗔 𝗖𝗟𝗨𝗘 𝗢𝗥 𝗔...𝗧𝗛𝗥𝗘𝗔𝗧?
𝗔𝗡𝗗 𝗪𝗛𝗔𝗧 𝗔𝗥𝗘 𝗬𝗢𝗨𝗥 𝗧𝗛𝗢𝗨𝗚𝗛𝗧 𝗔𝗕𝗢𝗨𝗧 𝗠𝗔𝗟𝗜𝗞?