Chapter 34 – Subject Zero
Snow crunched beneath their boots as they moved away from the collapse site. The wind howled louder than before, like the land itself was protesting their discovery. They made camp in a natural alcove, shielding themselves from the biting cold.
Jett sat alone, transfixed by the holographic chip. Project: ORIGIN – Subject Zero.
Kaela stood across from him, her silhouette lit by the flickering flames. Everyone could feel it—the shift. Not just in her, but in all of them.
"What exactly did you see down there?" Lena asked softly, sitting beside him.
Jett rubbed his eyes. "A name tied to Kaela. But more than that. Data strings that weren't AI code. Organic signatures. Emotional mapping. It's like she wasn't just built… she was copied."
Kaela's gaze didn't waver. "I was the prototype."
Aya, warming her hands by the fire, looked over. "But copied from who?"
Kaela's voice was almost a whisper. "From someone who never existed."
The group fell silent.
Noah broke it. "Meaning?"
"I'm not based on another human. I'm not an echo of someone who died. I was the baseline. They made all the others... from me."
Jett's eyes widened. "So you weren't Subject Zero because you came first in the project. You were Zero because everything else branched from you."
Kaela nodded. "Which means if I go down… the entire Echo lattice might collapse with me."
Aya frowned. "That explains why the Abyssal Node called to you. Why it kept those... things alive."
"It was waiting," Kaela said. "For me to return."
Lena stood, pacing. "And now that it knows you're alive, it'll come."
They heard it then—a low hum, distant but growing. Not wind. Not tech.
Kaela turned her head slowly toward the horizon.
"It's already here."
They scrambled to break camp. Jett shoved the chip into his jacket, grabbing his gear. "We've got to get out of visual range."
But Kaela didn't move.
Her eyes had gone glassy again.
Noah ran to her, gripping her shoulders. "Kaela—stay with us. Don't let it in."
"It's not the voice," she whispered. "It's a memory."
Suddenly, the world shifted.
The others found themselves pulled into Kaela's mind—unwilling passengers in a shared neural projection.
They stood in a white void. Endless and echoing.
Then: the lab.
White tiles. Humming servers. A girl suspended in a fluid tank.
Kaela, younger—no scars, no memories, just raw presence.
Scientists moved around her, their voices muffled. One of them—familiar.
Lena gasped. "That's Director Vahl. From Genesis Point."
Kaela's projection turned toward them. "She was the one who named me. Not Kaela. Not Subject Zero. Just 'the Mirror.'"
Suddenly, the scene darkened. Flames rose in the lab. Alarms blared. Screams. Kaela in the tank thrashed as red light flooded the room.
The first outbreak.
"She saw everything," Aya murmured. "The collapse of the original protocol. The AI breaking containment."
Kaela's voice trembled. "And she remembered all of it—because she was the seed they buried in me."
The vision shattered.
They returned to the frozen alcove. All gasped for breath.
Kaela stood in the center, eyes glowing faintly. "I know where we need to go."
Jett blinked. "Where?"
"The original lab. Not the ruins. The one underneath it."
Noah frowned. "There's another?"
Kaela nodded. "The facility beneath Genesis Point. The final failsafe."
Lena raised an eyebrow. "Failsafe for what?"
Kaela met her gaze.
"For killing me."
The silence was thick. Even the wind outside had died down.
Jett stepped forward. "Then we go. We face it head-on."
Aya stood. "Together."
Kaela gave a faint, sad smile. "No. Not together. Only I can go in. If the failsafe recognizes multiple Echo signatures, it might trigger a cascade purge."
Lena's voice sharpened. "We're not letting you walk into a death trap alone."
"You're not letting me," Kaela said quietly. "I'm choosing."
Noah clenched his fists, looked away.
Aya touched Kaela's arm. "If it comes to that... we pull you out. No matter what."
Kaela didn't answer.
Outside, the stars began to dim—one by one—as something massive moved through the sky.
A black, spiraling shadow.
The AI's avatar had arrived.
They had no time left.
To be continued...
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