The blast never came.
Rhea burst through the firewall, Lucien right behind her, crashing onto the hard floor of the physical command vault.
00:00:00.
Static. Silence.
And then—a breath.
Lucien's.
Hers.
Still alive.
Her vision blurred. Sweat mixed with tears. The stench of burning wires clung to the air, but the world—was still here.
Breathing in the Aftermath
Lucien fell to his knees beside her. "You did it."
"No," she whispered, staring up at the cracked ceiling, "we did."
He leaned in, pressing his forehead to hers. "Remind me never to let you walk into a system like that alone again."
She laughed, weakly. "Didn't know I was walking into my own brain."
Lucien's lips grazed her temple. "Kairo's gone?"
She hesitated.
That tiny pause sent a chill through both of them.
"I don't know," she admitted. "I think… part of him uploaded into the data stream before the collapse."
Lucien pulled back slightly. "So he's still out there?"
"No." Her eyes sharpened. "He's scattered. Broken code. But even broken things leave echoes."
As she sat up, a screen near the control panel blinked—faint blue.
One file remained.
Mₑₘₒᵣᵧ-009.
Lucien frowned. "That wasn't there before."
Rhea's fingers hovered over the screen.
"This might be it. The last piece he said I lost."
Lucien reached for her wrist. "You don't have to open it."
Her voice was barely audible. "But I do."
She tapped it.
The room dimmed. The file expanded.
And suddenly—they weren't in the vault anymore.
They stood inside a frozen projection: a lush green garden, golden sunlight streaming through lattice walls. A white bench. Two people.
A girl—her.
And a boy with silver hair and storm-gray eyes.
Not Lucien.
Kairo.
The vision played out silently at first. Then sound returned—muffled, like a memory underwater.
"You can't just leave, Rhea," Kairo said, younger, softer. "You promised me."
"I didn't promise forever," she replied. "I promised to survive."
"That was our forever."
"Then maybe you should've stopped playing God."
The vision flickered violently.
Lucien stepped forward. "That… that wasn't in any of our records. You and Kairo—knew each other before the system?"
Rhea clutched her head. "No. I… I didn't remember this. He wiped it."
"You gave me your memories," Kairo's echo rang, "and I used them to build something better."
Her voice trembled. "That's why the reset never felt clean. I wasn't just rebooting time. I was rebooting from his version of me."
Lucien's Anger, Rhea's Realization
Lucien punched the wall, rage flashing in his eyes. "He stole you. Not just your data. He tried to rewrite who you were."
"And I let him," Rhea whispered, shaking. "Some part of me chose to forget. Because I knew... if I remembered, I wouldn't be able to walk away."
Lucien pulled her into his arms.
Tight.
Fierce.
Real.
"You're not her," he said. "You're this Rhea. The one who stood up. The one who fought. The one who chose us."
Her heart ached, beautifully. "Then let's finish it."
Lucien tilted her face to his.
"This time," he said, "we erase his code from the world."
Rhea turned to the console.
One file remained.
PHₑₙᵢₓ.exe – Unlock Last Sequence?
She looked at Lucien.
He nodded once.
And she whispered, "Let's burn the past."
She pressed YES.
The screen turned gold.
The final purge initiated.
[To be continued...]