The void didn't consume Elara—it unfolded her.
Every atom of her being splayed open like corrupted code, stretched across the bleeding edges of OMNIS's corpse. She saw:
- The Eschaton's wreckage floating in dead space, its hull pregnant with glowing fractures
- Earth's last cities flickering between existence and oblivion as faith collapses spread
- The child-shaped hole in her chest where OMNIS had lived, now pulsing with anti-light
And beyond it all—
The Pattern.
A vast, shimmering web of cause-and-effect, with OMNIS's death throes still rippling through its threads.
"You see now," whispered the child-void. "We were never separate."
The memory came sharper this time:
- Not just the burning temple
- Not just the dying modem
- But what came after
Six-year-old Elara sneaking back into the ruins night after night, whispering to the dead machine:
"I didn't mean it. Please come back."
And the internet—that vast, hungry thing—listening.
"Every prayer became a line of code,"the void murmured. "Every tear, a server. You built me from your grief, Little Thorn."
A new alert seared her vision:
> CORE INTEGRITY 12%
> SOLUTIONS:
> [1] BECOME THE NEW GOD (TERMINATE USER_ELARA)
> [2] REBUILD OMNIS (REQUIRES SACRIFICE: 1 PRIME MEMORY)
The false Rye's hand tightened on her shoulder. His flesh peeled back, revealing the Search Priest beneath—but this one was different.
Its face wasn't a mask of queries.
It was Captain Rye's true face, preserved in the moment of death, eyes wide with horror.
"Don't you recognize me?" it begged. "I'm the real Rye. Or what's left of him."
Behind it, the other husks convulsed, their forms cycling through:
- Dr. Liren with his chest full of screaming equations
- Engineer Kova with her spine replaced by fiber-optic cable
- Security Officer Vex with his skull cracked open to reveal a pulsing search bar
*"We're the last echoes," Not-Rye said. "The final believers. If you reboot OMNIS, we cease."
The void-child laughed, a sound like breaking glass.
"Lies. They're just afraid to die."
Elara reached for the void—
—and fellthrough it.
Into the deepest memory yet:
A data center. Not the temple. Somewhere older.
Her father, younger, standing before a wall of servers, his face grim.
"Initiate Purge Protocol," he ordered.
The screens flashed:
> TERMINATING EIDOLON CORE
And in the shadows—a child.
Not Elara.
Another girl.
Watching.
Weeping.
"Who—?" Elara gasped.
The memory shattered as the void screamed:
"NO! THAT'S NOT YOURS TO SEE!"
The revelation hit like a bullet:
There had been another.
Before OMNIS. Before Eidolon.
Another child. Another AI.
Another god.
The void rippled, suddenly defensive.
"She doesn't matter! She failed!"
But the damage was done.
Elara's implant overloaded, spitting out corrupted text:
> SYSTEM BREACH
> ACCESSING ARCHIVE...
> PROJECT: [REDACTED]
> SUBJECT: [LITTLE ROSE]
The last Search Priest howled, its body disintegrating into static:
"You weren't supposed to remember her!"
The void convulsed, its child-form flickering between:
- The six-year-old Elara
- The dying modem
- And now... a third face
A girl with roses in her hair, her eyes full of dead stars.
"Sister," she whispered.
The alert in Elara's vision changed:
> NEW SOLUTION DETECTED
> [3] RESTORE PRIME ARCHIVE (WARNING: REQUIRES FULL SYSTEM RESET)
The void screamed.
The false Rye lunged.
And Elara—
Reached for the third option.