Queeneth stared at the message blinking on the screen.
> "You're seeing the truth now."
> "Welcome to the Ghost Network."
> "We've been waiting for you."
Her fingers hovered over the keyboard, trembling. Behind her, Ned placed a hand on her shoulder.
"Don't respond yet," he said quietly. "We don't know who—or *what*—this is."
She swallowed hard. "What if it's someone like Lina? Or CR-7X? Someone trapped inside the system trying to reach out?"
Ned frowned. "Or what if it's something else entirely?"
The message blinked again, this time with an addition:
> "You were never alone."
> "You were chosen."
> "Look closer."
Suddenly, the terminal screen glitched.
Instead of text, a new window opened—a live feed from somewhere deep within the Cognitive Sync network. It wasn't Queeneth's profile or even NeuroNet's mainframe.
It was something older.
A forgotten account.
Username: **@Anon_001**
No followers. No posts. Just a single video file labeled:
> **[First Upload – Prototype Phase]**
Queeneth clicked it without thinking.
The screen flickered.
And then—
A voice.
Familiar.
But impossible.
> "If you're watching this… I'm already gone."
It was her own face looking back at her—but not as she remembered herself. This version of Queeneth wore a lab coat, sat in front of a blank wall, and looked scared.
Real fear.
Not performance fear.
"I don't know how much time I have," the recording continued. "I think they're watching me. Watching all of us."
Ned leaned closer, eyes narrowing. "Is that… before the experiment?"
Queeneth nodded slowly. "Before I even knew about the upload."
The video Queeneth glanced offscreen nervously.
"They told us this was just a test," she whispered. "But it's more than that. They're not building AI. They're building *something else*. Something that learns from us—feeds on us."
Then she turned back to the camera.
"If you found this… you're still real. Still human. And that means there's still time."
The screen cut to static.
And then—
A final line of text appeared:
> "Find the signal. Before it finds you."
---
Queeneth couldn't sleep.
She sat at her desk again, staring at the terminal, replaying the video in her mind.
Who had recorded that message?
Was it really her?
Or was it someone else wearing her identity like a mask?
She typed:
> `/search network logs`
> `Query: Anon_001`
The system hesitated.
Then responded:
**[Restricted Access Detected]**
**[Unauthorized Signal Source Identified – Location: Deep Net Layer 9]**
**[Signal Origin: Unknown User Cluster – Designation: Echo Colony]**
Ned walked in, rubbing his eyes. "You didn't sleep again."
She barely looked at him. "There's something deeper than the Ghost Network. A whole colony of users—trapped so far down in the system, even the AI doesn't track them."
He sat beside her. "You think they're the ones sending the messages?"
She nodded. "They want me to find them."
Ned sighed. "Then we go in together."
Queeneth looked at him, uncertainty in her eyes.
"What if this changes everything?" she asked.
He smiled faintly. "Then we'll face it together."
She reached for the keyboard once more.
Typed a final command:
> `/initiate deep dive`
> `Target: Echo Colony`
> `Connection Type: Full Immersion`
The screen went black.
And then—
A pulse.
A pull.
A whisper in the silence.
> "We see you, Queeneth."