Rhea
We didn't get far.
The emergency exit had already sealed.
The backup hatch was jammed shut.
And the final corridor—the one with biometric override access—required a keycode I hadn't heard in years.
"Adrian," I whispered, panic rising.
He was pacing behind me like a caged animal, blood still dripping from his knuckles, hair sticking to his forehead with sweat and fury.
The corridor lights dimmed.
Then flared white.
The overhead screens flickered to life—but this time, it wasn't footage of us.
It was her.
The woman behind the project.
Behind all of it.
---
Adrian
She didn't look like a monster.
That made it worse.
She looked like a doctor. A woman in her late forties. Hair tied up. Calm expression.
Like someone about to give a lecture. Not a death sentence.
> "Adrian Vale," she said, as if greeting a student.
> "Rhea Virelle. Echo-000. You've made quite the mess."
Rhea didn't respond.
But I felt her tense beside me.
And suddenly—I knew.
> "You know her," I said quietly.
Rhea's silence was confirmation enough.
The woman on the screen kept talking.
> "You were never supposed to last this long," she told Rhea. "You were the control subject. The blank slate. The failure."
> "But instead you became the constant."
> "And Adrian... was our final variable."
---
Rhea
She'd always worn gloves during testing.
Always smiled like she wasn't killing something sacred.
Her name was Dr. Amira Kesslin.
Head of the Echo Program.
Creator of the Memory Alignment Trials.
And the woman who decided who deserved to feel love—and who would be programmed to obey it.
> "We didn't break you properly," she said, almost to herself.
> "You clung to your fear. Twisted it into identity. Somehow, you infected him."
> "Now we have a corrupted host and a broken subject."
Her voice hardened.
> "Terminate yourselves, or we will do it for you."
---
Adrian
I stepped forward until I was right in front of the screen.
Blood down my wrist. Anger in every breath.
> "Do it, then."
> "But you'll watch me choose her, again and again, until your system rots."
> "Because I'm not your variable anymore."
Her face didn't change.
But the screen glitched.
Once.
Twice.
Then blacked out.
We were alone again.
Only for a second.
Then the walls began to hiss—gas.
I grabbed Rhea and pulled her back.
We had less than thirty seconds before we blacked out.
> "Do you trust me?" I asked her.
She nodded.
Eyes wide. Heart racing.
> "Always."
---
Rhea
I didn't ask what he was doing.
I just followed.
He slammed the emergency override. Hot sparks rained down. The metal beneath the keypad sizzled open.
Inside—a ladder. Narrow. Rusted.
And old.
> "Maintenance shaft," he muttered. "You said they built over older blueprints. This wasn't part of their design."
He remembered.
Not just from memory, but from me.
From everything I told him, even when I thought he wasn't listening.
We climbed.
Past locked chambers and echo chambers.
Past floors with numbers that had long been erased.
And just when I thought we wouldn't make it—
> Light.
Real light.
Blinding.
Burning.
Unfiltered by the system.
---
Adrian
We stumbled out into the cold air like newborns.
It was raining.
Sharp, clean rain.
No sirens. No drones.
Just the sound of something dying beneath our feet.
I turned to Rhea.
She was soaked. Shivering. Her hands clenched at her sides like she didn't believe this was real.
> "Is it over?" she asked.
I looked at the facility behind us.
The vents were still spitting gas.
The screens were dark.
But the ground was still humming.
> "No," I said.
> "But it's our turn now."
Rhea
Freedom didn't feel like freedom.
It felt like exposure.
Cold wind. Grey sky. Mud soaking into my shoes.
And silence.
The kind that made your ears ring.
I kept expecting the ground to open beneath us. For a siren to call us back like dogs. For the system to realize it had let us slip through.
But nothing happened.
Not yet.
Adrian didn't speak for a long time.
He just stood there, rain slicked through his shirt, jaw clenched, eyes fixed on the treeline like he expected it to vanish.
> "We need to move," he finally said.
> "Someone will come looking."
---
Adrian
We walked until our lungs ached.
Until the rain blurred the dirt roads and the forest swallowed the sky.
We didn't know where we were.
Just that it was far enough away from the city.
From the dorms.
From the lie they called St. Augustine's Academy.
Rhea was trembling beside me.
But not from cold.
> "We're still being tracked, aren't we?" she asked.
I didn't answer.
Because I didn't know.
Maybe we were.
Maybe the system still had its hooks in us, some buried piece of code ready to activate.
> Or maybe the danger wasn't just behind us.
Maybe it was us.
---
Rhea
We found an abandoned shelter before nightfall.
Wooden. Cracked walls. Smelled like dust and mold.
But it had a roof.
And a lock.
Adrian checked every corner before letting me sit down.
He didn't speak much. Just kept pacing, eyes flicking to the door, the ceiling, the shadows.
I could tell he was unraveling.
Not loudly. Not in a way most people would notice.
But I'd learned how to read him.
> "They'll say we're unstable," I said.
He looked at me.
> "They'll say I corrupted you. That I made you run."
> "They'll call me a threat."
He knelt in front of me.
Voice low. Dangerous.
> "Let them."
> "They've been calling you that since the beginning."
---
Adrian
I watched her fall asleep.
Or try to.
She curled against the wall like she was afraid to take up space.
Still wearing her gloves.
Even now.
Even after everything.
I didn't ask why.
I just sat beside her.
Back to the door.
One hand near the rusted metal pipe I'd found outside.
And for the first time in my life—I didn't want control.
I just wanted her to wake up safe.
Still real.
Still her.
Because if she disappeared again—if they came for her—
> I wouldn't survive it.
> And neither would they.
---
Rhea
At 3:17 a.m., the power flickered on.
Only for a second.
Just enough for the cameras to click.
Adrian lunged toward the corner and smashed it with the pipe.
I didn't scream.
I already knew it was coming.
> No one leaves the system.
Not really.
---
System Reboot Detected
> SUBJECT 001: ACTIVE
> SUBJECT ECHO-000: ACTIVE
> Trace Signal: FOUND
> Retraction Protocol: INITIATED
---
Adrian
I saw it.
The blinking light under her collarbone.
A remnant of the trial phase.
I had one too.
They'd hidden it deep in our bodies—part tracking device, part memory fail-safe.
> "We have to cut it out," I said.
Rhea didn't flinch.
Didn't ask how.
Didn't even hesitate.
She just looked at me and said—
> "Do it."
Adrian
I didn't want to do it.
Even though I said I would.
Even though I meant it.
But when Rhea lay back on the wooden floor, pulling her collar down to expose the faint glimmer of embedded metal near her clavicle—
I hesitated.
My hand shook.
The knife we'd stolen from the lab wasn't meant for this. It was too dull. Too jagged.
> "Don't look away," she whispered.
Her eyes locked on mine.
> "If you do, I'll think you're becoming one of them."
That was all it took.
I pressed the blade to her skin.
And cut.
---
Rhea
Pain was irrelevant.
I'd felt worse.
But something about this—about Adrian, hand trembling, jaw clenched, eyes wide with horror as he tore open the place they'd marked me—
It made it real.
> "There," he gasped.
> "I see it."
It was small.
Silver. Organic-coded.
Still pulsing faintly.
A dying heartbeat of surveillance.
He dug it out with a shard of glass.
My hands clenched around the floorboards, breath ragged, but I didn't scream.
I wouldn't give the system that satisfaction.
> When he dropped it into the tin cup and crushed it with a rock, I finally let myself exhale.
I was free.
Bleeding, shaking—but free.
---
Adrian
She tried to stand afterward.
Collapsed.
I caught her.
Held her against me, her blood soaking into my shirt, her breath warm against my neck.
> "Now you," she whispered.
I almost said no.
Almost told her I didn't care if they tracked me—as long as she was safe.
But she looked up at me with those storm-gray eyes and said—
> "If they get to you, they get to me."
And I knew she was right.
So I lay back.
Gritted my teeth.
And handed her the knife.
---
Rhea
It wasn't as clean.
He bled more.
Fought harder not to flinch.
But he didn't stop me.
Even when I hesitated.
Even when I whispered, "You don't have to do this."
He looked me dead in the eye.
> "Yes, I do."
When I crushed his tracker next to mine, we both stared at the broken pieces in the cup.
Shaking. Pale. Alive.
> "We're ghosts now," I said.
> "Good," he whispered.
> "Ghosts don't obey."
---
Elsewhere: UNKNOWN
The monitor beeped.
Once. Twice.
Then flatlined.
The technician frowned.
"Echo-000 and Host 001—connection lost."
The Director's eyes narrowed behind the glass.
> "They've gone off-script."
> "Activate the retrieval unit."
> "No," the woman beside him said softly.
The Director turned.
> "No?"
She smiled.
Cold. Certain.
> "Let them think they've escaped."
> "Let them run."
> "We'll see how far they get… before they break."