he spiral of light stretched higher, unfurling like a living constellation. Symbols bled into shapes, shapes into shifting landscapes—cities suspended in void, stars drawn close enough to touch, endless corridors lined with mirrors of glass and fire.
The Archive wasn't just data. It was memory, alive.
Maya staggered forward, the rifle dragging her with a pull deeper than muscle. Every step she took made the visions sharpen, as though her presence was the key sharpening focus.
Rei's face was bathed in shifting colors, his eyes wide, reflecting towers that weren't really there. "This… this is the source. Echo didn't just preserve history. They preserved themselves. Thought. Will. Entire consciousness strands."
Vector stayed back, gun still leveled, his jaw tight. "Don't get lost in it, Maya. That's what it wants."
But her breath caught, because she already felt it—the Archive's touch wasn't just showing her things. It was speaking through her blood. Each symbol was a word she shouldn't know, yet somehow understood.
A woman's voice whispered through the stream of visions:
"Welcome, Heir of Kade. You carry what we could not finish."
The shape of the woman formed out of the light, tall and sharp-eyed, her features a haunting echo of Maya's own. It was Lysa—no, it was her imprint, caught in eternity.
Maya's throat tightened. "You're not real. You're… data."
Lysa's smile was knowing, patient. "Data endures. Flesh fades. Which of us is more real?"
Rei took a hesitant step forward, his hands half-raised in awe. "That's not a projection. That's a stored consciousness fragment. Gods… they made themselves immortal through the Archive."
Vector barked, "Immortal parasites, more like. Feeding off her."
The drones bowed low as if in worship, lenses dimming in reverence. The chamber lights shifted, syncing to Maya's pulse.
Her arms burned brighter, cracks crawling toward her shoulders. She clenched her teeth, forcing words through the heat. "If you wanted me to inherit this, why does it feel like I'm breaking apart?"
Lysa's gaze sharpened, sorrow threaded with steel.
"Because fire does not pass gently. To inherit us is to burn. But only in burning do you forge anew."
The visions intensified—battlefields of ruined worlds, Echo operatives fighting shoulder to shoulder, ships like blades piercing night. Every image pressed into Maya's skull, weight of centuries collapsing into her veins.
Her knees buckled. Vector lunged to catch her, but the moment his hand touched her, the Archive flared, shoving him back with a shockwave of light. He hit the floor hard, teeth gritted. "Maya! Don't let them take you!"
She gasped, caught between his shout and Lysa's calm voice inside her skull.
Two paths pulled at once—one human, raw, desperate. The other vast, eternal, promising power enough to reshape everything.
Her heart thundered. The rifle's hum deepened, not just in her hands anymore—inside her chest, her bones, her mind.
And the Archive whispered:
"Choose, or the choice will make itself."