It was raining.
He didn't know what rain was.
But he sat there, soaked in it. Silent. Barely breathing. Not cold. Not warm. Just... still.
The sky cracked open again—white light, then thunder. The kind of thunder that rolled like something ancient had stirred and instantly gone back to sleep.
He didn't flinch.
There was no thought to react.
No instinct to shiver.
He sat beneath a jagged tree, head tilted slightly downward, hair soaked and clinging to skin as pale as fog.
His eyes were open.
But empty.
No fear.
No curiosity.
Not even confusion.
The body breathed because that was what bodies did.
A vessel waiting for commands that never came.
Until—
> drip...
A droplet slid down his nose and landed on the back of his hand.
He looked at it.
Not because he wanted to.
Not because he noticed.
But because something inside moved—something faint, cold, and wrong.
It wasn't awareness.
It was... resistance.
A flicker of non-compliance.
> This one shouldn't have moved.
Subject #928,363,353,839,265 – reactivation reading... 0.01%
ERROR: Null-state subject responding to external stimuli.
He blinked.
A slow, awkward blink—like the body was testing what it could still do.
From the tree above, a branch broke. A raven-like bird crashed to the ground with a sickening thump, its black feathers soaked through and eyes glazed with death.
The corpse twitched.
He didn't react.
Then the bird's wing spasmed—and it jerked upright with a metallic snap.
Alive. But wrong.
Its beak opened too wide. Its head turned a full 180 degrees, clicking like a broken machine. It stared at him with glowing red pupils, pulsing with something artificial.
> "Query," it croaked, voice layered with static.
"What remains of you?"
He said nothing.
He didn't understand.
The bird's head twitched. "No soul signature. No conscious response. No programming. No override detected."
It stepped closer.
One leg twisted. Its claws scraped against stone as its wings opened wide and trembling. Something inside the bird was trying to scan him—something outside this world.
> "Null subject… reacting," it whispered. "Unacceptable."
Its wings folded back.
Its beak opened.
A faint red circle appeared beneath its talons, forming a destruction rune meant to erase "errors."
The wind went still.
---
And then—
It shattered.
The circle didn't activate.
The ground beneath it cracked—as if rejecting the command.
The bird froze mid-incantation. Its eye dimmed. Its body locked.
> ERROR.
This subject is not in the system.
This subject is not in the world.
This subject... is undefined.
His fingers twitched.
Just barely.
The bird screamed—not in sound, but in data. It fractured from the inside, a burst of light and static bursting from its eye sockets before its entire body collapsed into ash.
Gone.
He remained seated.
The rain still fell.
And now, his head turned—just slightly.
There was no emotion on his face.
No recognition.
But in the far distance… a ripple passed through the clouds. Something had noticed.
And for the first time since the experiment began—
> A failed god didn't stay dead.