Chapter 20 – The Weight of Tomorrow
Morning never truly came to Nova Haven.
The city existed in a half-light of perpetual neon, its false dawn painted by billboards and orbital satellites.
Yet as Liora stood at the window of her quarters, watching the skyline flicker with electric bruises of color, she could feel the difference.
The air itself was tighter, the hum beneath the streets more insistent.
The Rift's song—muted but ever present—stalked her like a predator that enjoyed the wait.
Kai was awake before she turned.
He sat on the edge of the couch, elbows on his knees, the sharp lines of his soldier's frame tense with unspent energy.
He hadn't slept.
Neither had she.
"They'll know we left the compound," he said, voice rough from silence.
"Commander Seryn will demand answers."
"She'll get the same lies as before," Liora replied quietly.
"She always does."
Kai looked up at her, gray eyes storm-lit and unyielding.
"She's not a fool. And neither is the Spiral. Last night wasn't a warning. It was a declaration. That… thing knew you."
Liora's fingers drifted to the mark beneath her collarbone, still faintly warm, as though the Doppelgänger's touch lingered in her blood.
"She was me," she said.
"A future I might still become."
The admission tasted like rust on her tongue.
Kai rose and crossed to her, the low hiss of the door seals barely masking the quiet urgency in his movements.
When he stopped in front of her, his presence filled the room with a steady heat that almost drowned out the Rift's hum.
"Then we find a way to break it," he said.
"Before it breaks you."
---
The words were simple.
But the way he said them—low, certain, unflinching—struck something deep inside her.
A promise forged in a world that might not survive long enough to keep it.
Before she could speak, the comm-link on her wrist flashed with an encrypted signal.
Not the Spiral's spiraling insignia this time, but the sharp, angular code of Authority Command.
Commander Seryn's voice followed, clipped and cold.
"Operative Kane. Immediate briefing. Containment Protocol Omega. Top floor, War Council Room. Now."
The link went dead.
Kai swore softly.
"That didn't sound like a friendly check-in."
Liora turned from the window.
"Protocol Omega is for world-tier breaches," she said.
"It means the Rift isn't just waking—it's accelerating."
---
The War Council Room felt like stepping into the heart of a weapon.
Steel walls lined with tactical holograms.
Generals and intelligence officers clustered around a central table that glowed with a living map of the planet.
Red zones spread like a disease across the continents—containment failures, Rift surges, cities flickering out of communication.
Commander Seryn stood at the head of the table, her silver eyes sharp enough to cut glass.
She acknowledged Liora with a single nod, then activated the holo-map with a swipe of her hand.
"Three simultaneous anomalies," Seryn said.
"Sector Nine, where you were last night. Sector Thirteen, eastern hemisphere. And the Arctic Rift. All spiking beyond measurable parameters."
The map zoomed to Sector Nine—the very platform where Liora had faced her future self.
At its center pulsed a new signal: a violet spiral blooming like a wound.
"Satellite analysis shows a pattern," Seryn continued.
"A harmonic pulse radiating outward. Whatever triggered it, Kane, you were at ground zero."
Every head turned toward Liora.
Her skin prickled beneath the weight of their scrutiny.
"I was investigating," she said evenly.
"Containment irregularities. I… encountered a Rift anomaly."
"Define anomaly," Seryn said.
Liora hesitated.
How could she explain herself without condemning herself?
The Doppelgänger's words echoed in her mind: The Rift doesn't give. It takes what you love first.
If she told the truth, the Authority would treat her like a weapon—or a threat.
Before she could answer, Kai stepped forward.
"Hostile energy surge," he said crisply.
"No entities confirmed. We neutralized and withdrew."
Seryn's silver eyes lingered on him for a long, unreadable moment.
Finally, she nodded.
"Very well. But understand this, both of you: whatever is awakening, it's escalating faster than any model predicts.
Omega Protocol means we no longer contain. We eradicate."
The word hung in the air like a blade.
---
Back in the transport bay, Kai exhaled sharply, his soldier's mask cracking for a breath.
"You're welcome," he said, not looking at her.
"You shouldn't have covered for me," Liora replied.
"It puts you at risk."
Kai turned to her then, eyes hard and unyielding.
"You think I care about risk? Liora, they'd dissect you if they knew what's under your skin.
I'd rather lie and keep you breathing."
Her heart twisted.
No one had protected her in her first life.
No one had chosen her over duty.
The warmth of it was terrifying.
"Don't," she said softly, though the word trembled.
"Don't make promises you can't keep."
Kai stepped closer until the faint violet glow of her mark reflected in his eyes.
"Try me," he said.
---
That night, the city's false dusk deepened into an electric storm.
Violet lightning crawled across the high towers, silent and wrong, like a sky remembering how to break.
Liora sat on the edge of her narrow bed, the room dark except for the faint shimmer beneath her collarbone.
The mark pulsed in a slow, deliberate rhythm.
Three nights.
The Doppelgänger's voice slithered through her mind.
Power or extinction.
Her hands trembled as she pressed her palms to her knees.
In her first life, she had fought and failed.
She had died as the world cracked open.
Now she had been given a second chance—
but what if the Rift hadn't sent her back to save anything?
What if it had only sent her back to become the very thing she feared?
A soft knock broke the silence.
Kai entered without waiting for permission.
He carried two steaming mugs and an expression that tried, and failed, to mask worry.
"Couldn't sleep," he said simply.
He handed her a mug.
The scent of bitter synth-coffee filled the room.
A small, human comfort in a night that felt anything but human.
They sat in silence, the storm outside flickering violet against the walls.
Finally Kai spoke, his voice low.
"You don't have to carry this alone."
Liora turned her head, meeting his gaze.
The storm reflected in his eyes made them look like fractured silver.
"Yes," she said softly.
"I do."
Because deep down, beneath fear and defiance,
she could already feel it—the pull of the Rift, patient and endless, waiting for the night when choice would no longer matter.
And she knew, with a clarity that made her stomach twist,
that when the moment came,
it would not only take her power.
It would take him.