The night in Zurich was unusually quiet.
Snowflakes drifted lazily beyond the windows of the safe house, muffling the city's usual sounds. Inside, the lights were dim, the heater hummed softly, and Mira sat by the fire, a blanket wrapped around her shoulders. She didn't feel cold. Not anymore.
Across the room, Lian was seated on the couch. He hadn't said much since the extraction. His eyes—her eyes—still held that same storm-gray sadness. Like he was waiting for the silence to turn into something worse.
Mira got up, walked over, and sat beside him.
"You haven't asked where we are," she said gently.
Lian didn't look at her. "It doesn't matter."
"It does," Mira insisted. "You're safe. You're free."
Lian let out a hollow laugh. "Am I?"
He turned toward her, eyes sharp now. "I don't even know what the word means. Every time I thought I was free, someone came with another needle, another test, another lie."
Mira didn't flinch. "You're not in a lab anymore."
"But I am," he whispered. "It's just... bigger now. There's still glass between me and the world. You just can't see it."
Mira leaned in closer. "Then let's break it together."
Downstairs, Alina and Leonard stood over a projection table. A 3D model of the destroyed facility hovered between them, blue light casting their faces in a cold glow.
"They'll rebuild," Leonard muttered. "Elara never leaves loose ends."
"She hasn't pursued us yet," Alina said. "That's the loose end."
Rafe entered the room, looking unusually serious.
"I tapped into one of the satellite feeds. You were right. Elara was watching. She let us take the boy."
Leonard clenched his jaw. "She wants him with Mira."
Rafe nodded grimly. "And that means—"
"She's not done."
Alina stepped away from the projection. Her voice was low. "We have to assume this is Phase Two. The bond between them—it's not just psychological. It's designed."
Leonard looked skeptical. "You think Mira is a trigger?"
"I think she's half of one," Alina said. "And Elara's betting we'll never see the full effect coming until it's too late."
Later that night, Mira found herself awake, staring at the ceiling. The quiet was oppressive. The weight of Lian's pain, his confusion, it echoed inside her.
She heard soft footsteps outside her door.
"Mira?" It was Lian's voice, small, uncertain.
She opened the door.
He stood there barefoot, still wearing the over-sized hoodie Rafe had loaned him. He looked less like a threat now, and more like a boy who'd never been held long enough to stop shaking.
"I had a dream," he said. "But it wasn't mine. I think it was yours."
Mira's breath caught. "What did you see?"
"A room. Full of mirrors. You were screaming, but there was no sound. Just… reflections. A thousand versions of you."
Mira stepped back, letting him inside. Her hands trembled.
"That's not a dream," she said. "That's a memory."
They sat on her bed, and for a long time, neither spoke. Then Lian whispered, "Do you ever wonder if you're real?"
Mira nodded. "Every day."
Lian looked at her, really looked at her.
"I used to pretend I had a sister. Someone out there who could hear me even when I wasn't allowed to speak. I thought it was just a fantasy. But now…"
He reached out, touched her wrist.
"…you're real."
"So are you."
The next morning, Leonard stood on the balcony, sipping bitter coffee as the sun rose behind the frozen Alps. The silence didn't last.
Alina joined him, her coat pulled tight against the cold.
"We can't keep them hidden forever."
"I know," Leonard said. "But they're not ready."
"Neither are we."
Leonard looked over at her. "You think it's time?"
"Not yet," Alina said. "But soon. They need to understand what they are."
"Before Elara shows them her version."
Back in the lab wing of the safehouse, Mira sat across from Lian as Rafe ran diagnostics. A small orb hovered between them, projecting soft pulses of light.
"This will measure emotional resonance," Rafe explained. "Basically, how strongly you two influence each other."
"Like a mood ring?" Mira joked.
"More like a detonator sensor."
Mira glanced at Lian. "Comforting."
The orb pulsed faster the moment Mira reached out to touch Lian's hand.
"Whoa," Rafe said, staring at the screen. "That's a 300% spike in neural coherence. You two are way more in sync than any pair I've ever seen."
"What does it mean?" Lian asked quietly.
Rafe hesitated. "It means… you don't just read each other. You change each other. Your emotions, your biology… even your memories are starting to overlap."
Lian frowned. "So we're merging?"
"In a way, yeah."
Mira blinked. "What happens if we… fully synchronize?"
Rafe hesitated again. "We don't know. No pair ever has."
That night, Alina received a coded transmission. One of their long-range moles had sent coordinates. A location Elara had been visiting regularly: a remote facility in the Black Forest.
She studied the data for hours.
The signatures matched the same tech Mira and Lian had been exposed to.
Leonard read over her shoulder. "She's building something."
Alina nodded. "Or someone."
In her room, Mira had another dream.
But this time, she wasn't the one lost in mirrors.
Lian was.
He stood in a hallway of glass walls, pounding his fists against them, bleeding. Each pane showed a different version of himself: angry, broken, violent, empty. And one by one, they shattered.
Until only Mira remained on the other side.
He reached for her.
And the glass between them—
Cracked.
She woke up gasping.
Lian burst into her room a moment later, breathless.
"I saw it too," he said.
Their dreams were no longer separate.
Somewhere deep in the Black Forest, Elara stood inside a chamber filled with stasis pods. Each one housed a version of Mira—clones, copies, prototypes.
She pressed her hand to the glass of one pod.
"This time," she whispered, "you won't run."
Behind her, a technician tapped nervously on a tablet.
"Subject 2 has achieved 74% resonance with Subject 1."
Elara smiled.
"Good. We begin Phase Three."