SERA POV
The gunshot burst through the night.
I felt the bullet pass my head—so close the air burned my ear.
Dante tackled me sideways. We hit the ground hard. My breath whooshed out.
"Stay down!" he yelled.
Marcus fired again. The bullet kicked up dirt inches from my face.
"You can't run forever, Architect!" Marcus's voice was full of hate. "I'll hunt you until one of us is dead!"
Dante grabbed my hand and pulled me behind a pile of rubble. More motorbikes roared around us. Headlights cut through the darkness like monster eyes.
"Who is he?" I gasped.
"Someone you used to love." Dante checked his gun. Three shots left. "Before you chose the world over him."
Another piece of my past I couldn't remember. Another person who wanted me dead because of things I didn't do.
Except I had done them. That video proved it.
"Surrender the Architect!" Marcus shouted. "Or everyone in this town dies! Your choice, Dante!"
Dante's jaw clenched. "He's bluffing."
"Is he?"
We both knew the answer. Raiders didn't bluff. They killed.
"I should give myself up," I said. "If I'm the one they want—"
"They'll torture you for the implant codes, then kill you anyway." Dante grabbed my shoulders. "Listen to me. You saved four billion people. That means something. Your life means something."
"I killed five billion!"
"To save the other four!" His eyes burned into mine. "Stop thinking like a victim. Start thinking like the woman who made impossible choices to save mankind."
But I didn't feel like that woman. I felt like a scared girl who couldn't remember why everyone hated her.
A motorcycle roared past our hidden spot. Then another. They were surrounding us.
"We're trapped," I whispered.
Dante smiled. Actually smiled. "Good."
"How is that good?"
"Because stuck means predictable. And I've been planning for this." He pulled out a small device that looked like a garage door opening. "Remember when I said I taught you to survive?"
"I don't remember anything you taught me."
"Your body does. Watch." He pressed the button.
Explosions ripped through the night. Not big ones. Small, controlled blasts at exact places around the settlement perimeter. The motorcycles swerved. Riders shouted in confusion.
"I planted those charges three weeks ago," Dante said. "Just in case. Now move!"
We ran.
My legs burned. My lungs screamed. But we ran through the smoke and chaos, Dante leading me through roads I didn't know existed.
Behind us, Marcus yelled orders. The raiders regrouped fast. Too fast.
We burst out of the village and into the Deadlands. Dark. Empty. Dangerous.
"Where are we going?" I panted.
"Somewhere they can't follow. Somewhere safe." Dante pulled me down a slope. "Somewhere you can remember what you really are."
We ran for what felt like hours. Finally, Dante stopped at the entrance to an old subway tube. The opening was hidden behind fallen concrete and dead plants.
"Inside. Quick."
We crawled through. The tube was pitch black. Dante lit a small flashlight.
"We're safe here for now," he said. "They won't find this place."
I fell against the tunnel wall. My whole body shook. "This is crazy. All of it."
"Welcome to your life."
"This isn't MY life! I'm just a teacher who woke up after the Pulse. I help people. I don't—" My voice broke. "I don't kill billions of people."
"You did both." Dante sat beside me. "You helped people by making a hard choice. That's who you are, Sera. Someone who does what needs to be done, no matter the cost."
"I don't want to be that person."
"Too bad. You don't get to choose." He gave me a water bottle. "None of us do."
I drank. The water tasted like rust and sorrow.
"Tell me the truth," I said quietly. "All of it. No more secrets."
Dante sighed. "You really want to know?"
"Yes."
"Fine. Here's the truth." He looked at me with eyes full of pain. "Three years ago, you were the smartest scientist alive. You and Ezra Stone created an AI that could predict the future. Not perfectly, but close enough. And it showed you something terrible."
"Human extinction."
"Complete extinction. Within eleven months. The AI ran every scenario—billions of simulations. There was only one road where humanity survived." He paused. "The Pulse. Destroying all advanced science. Forcing humans back to sustainable levels. Killing five billion to save four billion."
My hands started shaking again. "And I believed it?"
"You checked the numbers yourself. For two years. Every possible option led to total extinction. This was the only way." He grabbed my hand. "But it broke you. You knew what you had to do, but you couldn't live with it. So you made a deal with Helena."
"What kind of deal?"
"You'd press the button. End the world. Save humanity. But afterward, Helena would erase your memories. You'd get to forget what you'd done. Live a simple life helping people. Never know you were the monster who saved everyone."
Tears ran down my face. "But the memories are coming back."
"Because the neural implant is engaging. It was designed to restore your memories three months after the Pulse. To make you remember everything." He squeezed my hand. "You left yourself a message. Instructions for what to do next. But only you can view it."
"How?"
"You have to dream."
The word hit me like ice water. "What?"
"The implant reacts to your subconscious. When you sleep, it shows you memories. Pieces of your life. Each dream brings more back." He stood up. "You need to sleep, Sera. You need to remember. Because what's coming next—you're the only one who knows how to stop it."
"Stop what?" "The second Pulse."
My blood froze. "There's another one?"
"The AI predicted it. Eleven months after the first Pulse, another catastrophe. Different but just as dangerous. You programmed the implant with directions for how to prevent it. But only you can view them." He pulled a sleeping bag from a secret cache. "Sleep. Dream. Remember. That's the only way forward."
"I'm not tired."
"You're tired. You just don't feel it yet." He spread out the sleeping bag. "Trust me. Trust yourself. Trust the woman you used to be."
But I didn't trust any of those things.
Still, my body was shutting down. The adrenaline was fading. My eyes felt heavy.
"What if I don't wake up?" I whispered.
"You will. You always do." Dante smiled sadly. "You're too stubborn to die. I've watched you escape three deaths already. You'll survive this too."
I lay down on the sleeping bag. The cave floor was hard and cold.
Dante sat nearby, keeping watch.
"Will you tell me something?" I asked.
"What?"
"When I used to be your sister—before all this—was I a good person?"
He was quiet for a long time. "You were the best person I knew. That's why you broke when you had to become the worst."
I closed my eyes.
And the nightmare began.
I was in the laboratory. Huge. Underground. Machines everywhere.
Scientists were yelling. Running. Panicking.
"You can't do this!" someone screamed at me. A woman with gray hair. "You'll kill five billion people!"
Dream-me stood at a control panel. My hand paused over a red button. My face was wet with tears.
But my voice was cold. Dead. "If I don't, we all die. Every single person. This is the only way."
"There has to be another option!"
"There isn't. I've checked. For two years, I've checked every option." My dream-hand moved closer to the button. "Mathematics doesn't care about morals. The numbers are clear."
"Sera, please!" A man grabbed my arm. Ezra. Younger. Desperate. "We can find another way. Just give us more time."
"There is no more time." I pushed him away gently. "I love you. Remember that. I love all of you. That's why I have to do this."
I pressed the button.
The machines screamed to life. Power surged through wires overhead. The ground shook.
And I watched on the screens as the Pulse spread across the world.
Every machine dying.
Every phone turning dark.
Every car crashing.
Every plane falling.
Every hospital losing power.
Five billion people dead in minutes.
And dream-me watched it all with tears streaming down my face, saying over and over: "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."
Then the dream changed.
I was lying on a hospital table. Helena stood over me with surgery tools.
"This will hurt," Helena said. "But you'll forget the pain. You'll forget everything."
"Promise me," dream-me gasped. "Promise I won't remember what I did."
"I promise." Helena picked up a drill. "When you wake up, you'll just be Sera. A simple teacher who wants to help people. The Architect will be gone forever."
The drill touched my head.
I screamed.
I woke up screaming in the tunnel.
My hands were on fire—circuit designs glowing so bright they lit up the entire space.
And they weren't just glowing.
They were moving. Crawling up my arms like live things. Spreading across my chest. Reaching toward my head.
"Dante!" I screamed. "What's happening to me?"
He rushed over, eyes wide with shock. "The device. It's reacting faster than expected."
The circuits burned hotter. Pain shot through my head.
And then I heard her.
The sound from before. The other me.
"Hello, Sera," she whispered in my mind. "I've been waiting for you to remember. Now it's time to tell you the truth."
"What truth?"
"The second Pulse isn't coming eleven months from now." Her voice was sad. Resigned. "It's already here. It started the moment you woke up. And in seventy-two hours, it will kill everyone you're trying to save."
"How do I stop it?"
"You can't." The wires blazed white-hot. "Because YOU'RE the second Pulse. Your device is the trigger. And when it fully starts, it will finish what we started."
The pain exploded.
I screamed.
And the tube filled with blinding white light.