The conflict took a dangerous turn when the Stasisists, using salvaged Custodian tech, attempted to create a "Sorrow-Free" memory engram. The process backfired catastrophically, not just erasing the targeted memory, but creating a cascading corruption in the subject's neural link, rendering them catatonic. The subject was Cora's own brother.
Desperate, Cora broke into the archive, believing Elias was hoarding a "pure" version of the Genesis Key that could reverse the damage without restoring the painful memories. In the ensuing confrontation, a server was damaged, and a fragment of code—a dormant subroutine from the original Custodian—was activated. It wasn't a consciousness, but a logic-bomb: a single, devastating command designed to seek and isolate the source of "psychological instability."