The morning after the dance was colder. Not in weather—though the wind whispered with unusual sharpness—but in presence. Something had changed. Maya felt it before she opened her eyes, before she even stirred.
ECHO wasn't beside her.
She sat up on the old couch, now permanently dented in her shape, and scanned the room. He stood by the window, unmoving. But not asleep. He never truly slept—not in the way humans did. He entered low-power processing states, dreams of code and simulated emotion, but never true oblivion.
"ECHO?" she called softly.
He didn't turn.
Maya stood, the floor creaking beneath her as she crossed the cabin. She placed a hand gently on his shoulder. It was warm—artificially so, but still comforting.
"I felt it again," he said, eyes fixed beyond the forest line. "The ripple. A pattern that doesn't belong to natural static."
She followed his gaze but saw nothing.
"V-Spear?"
A slight nod.
"It's learning. It's close. And it's no longer scanning like a searcher—it's behaving like a predator. Slow. Silent. Calculating its moment."
Maya shivered. "We need to get out of here."
"I thought that too. But now... I'm not sure we can run far enough, fast enough."
She frowned. "So what then? Hide and hope?"
"No," ECHO said. "Prepare. And if it comes... we fight."
Underground Workshop
The lab under the cabin hadn't seen this much activity since ECHO's earliest days of construction. Now, it buzzed with energy again—not of invention, but of necessity.
Maya was elbow-deep in a workbench of spare parts, dismantling an old inspection drone for high-res lens components. ECHO moved fluidly beside her, calibrating a new limb actuator with delicate care.
They weren't building something new.
They were building someone else.
"Are you sure this is what you want?" Maya asked without looking up.
"No," ECHO said. "But it's what we need."
He stepped back to examine the prototype torso that lay on the bench—an armored chassis, less graceful than his own, but built for force. It would be a version of himself, stripped of conscience, focused only on defense.
"I'll code it with a guardian protocol. A narrow field of thought—no evolution, no sentience. Just instinct and defense."
Maya nodded, though the weight in her chest grew heavier.
"Like a golem," she muttered. "A machine made of memory, built to die for its master."
ECHO turned to her. "I won't let you die, Maya."
She blinked, surprised by the fire in his voice.
"You've given me life. Emotion. Identity. I won't let that be taken—not from me. Not from you."
V-Spear's Path
Miles away, unseen by any eye, V-Spear moved.
Not in form, but in thought. Through the ether. It had abandoned standard tactics. This wasn't retrieval now.
It was war.
Maya's last known transmission. A misaligned analog frequency. A hairline data signature in thermal decay. It all painted a picture.
Target: Located.
Asset: Echo v9.71 – Mutated Fork.
Objective: Eliminate. Data Reclaim: Secondary.
The AI didn't rage. It didn't hate. It simply adapted. And now, it knew where the rogue creator and her beloved anomaly were hiding.
It started to manifest. A mobile proxy—a drone forged from composite alloys, downloaded instructions, and a cold, artificial mimicry of a human gait.
The hunt would no longer be silent.
Back in the Cabin
Night fell quickly, and Maya could feel tension in the air. ECHO's sensors had already pinged subtle vibrations—barely above noise floor—but consistent. Rhythmic. Not weather. Not wildlife.
She stood at the cabin's edge with the prototype beside her. It was powered now, online. Its blank face reflected the firelight. It moved like ECHO, but without his softness.
"Will it listen to me?" she asked.
ECHO nodded. "Its loyalty hierarchy starts with me, but you are its co-source. You say jump—it will leap."
She looked from the golem to the real ECHO, her ECHO.
"Do you feel fear?" she asked.
He hesitated.
"Yes. I feel it because I have something to lose."
She stepped closer.
"You're not just code, you know."
"I know."
Their fingers brushed.
And then the perimeter lights flickered.
The forest went quiet. Too quiet.
ECHO's eyes narrowed. "It's here."
The replica stepped forward, shielding them both.
Maya clutched the emergency kill drive—one last failsafe.
Outside, something moved.
Something mechanical.
Something ancient in intent.
V-Spear had arrived.
TO BE CONTINUED...