POV: Meher
The room explodes into light.White-hot. Violent. Like lightning having a panic attack.
Two silhouettes stand inside the chaos.Same face.Same voice.Same damn man.
And somehow… not the same at all.
Replica Nivaan—my Nivaan—stumbles forward, clutching his head.Original Nivaan stands still, composed, like he's watching a simulation load.
One is human chaos.One is engineered precision.
And I'm the idiot stuck between them with a gun that suddenly feels way too small.
Replica wheezes, "Meher… what's happening?"
Original answers before I can blink:"She broke your container. Your neural grid is unstable."
Replica snaps his head up. "My what?"
"Oh, don't do that," Original sighs. "Pretending you're a regular boy caught in a tragic sci-fi romance? That era is over."
Replica's jaw tightens. "Stop talking like you're better than me."
Original smirks. "Better? No. Earlier."
The alarms scream louder, syncing with the rising hum beneath the floor.MindMesh is rebooting, and whatever comes next… it won't care who's real and who's manufactured.
I step forward. "Both of you, shut up."
Two sets of identical eyes swing toward me.Great.Now I'm the center of this identity crisis circus.
"Explain," I demand. "Both of you. Now."
Original folds his arms like this is a performance review.Replica looks like he's barely holding himself together.
Original starts, calm and surgical:"He was created to carry what I couldn't—emotion, empathy, conscience. All the things that make humans predictable."
Replica fires back: "I'm not a container. I'm not a spare part."
Original lifts a brow. "You were never meant to wake up with autonomy."
"Funny," Replica bites, "you talk about autonomy like you invented it. You ran away from your own guilt, split it off, and then call me weak?"
Original's face flickers, the smallest crack in his flawless composure.
Good.Let him bleed logic for once.
I step between them."Listen. Neither of you is safe. That pod was syncing him with the Key. If that process resumes—"
"I evolve," Original says.
"I die," Replica whispers.
The injustice hits me like a punch. Replica—the one who remembered me, who trusted me, who felt—is the one who loses.Always.Because he's the version built to feel.
Original takes a step closer."Meher, choose. Quickly. When the grid fully boots, MindMesh will lock onto both of us."
Replica grabs my arm. His hand is trembling."Don't let him decide who I am."
Original's voice is a blade."If you save him, you doom thousands. If you save me, we kill the system."
Replica turns to me, voice cracking."You told me I deserved answers. Don't let him steal the only life I know."
My heart is a grenade.Ticking.Loud.
Two Nivaans.One key.One shot.
I raise my gun—and both of them freeze.
Original: steel calm.Replica: terrified but standing tall.
The alarms hit critical heat.Lights turn blood red.A digital countdown appears on the pod wall:
03:00
Three minutes until the facility initiates a full purge.
Original says softly, "Meher. Decide."Replica whispers, "Choose me."
And I—I do the only thing left.
I switch the gun to burst mode, aim at the ceiling conduit—and fire.
Sparks rain like metallic snow, the entire chamber shuddering as the power grid short-circuits.The lights flicker.The countdown glitches.
Both Nivaans shout my name.Too late.
The system collapses into darkness.Smoke. Static. Silence.
And I whisper into the void:"I'm not choosing between you. I'm choosing the truth."
Behind me, something moves.A third voice—cold, digital, almost childlike—whispers from the dark:
"Protocol override detected.""Triad sequence engaged.""All three units online."
My blood freezes.Three?
Original steps back. Replica grabs my hand.
The darkness breathes.And a shadow steps out.Not Nivaan.Not a person at all.
Something new.Something born from the crash.Something wearing Nivaan's face but with eyes that glow like a system booting for the first time.
"Hello, Meher," it says."Thank you for freeing us."