FLASHBACK – The Architects' Deep Vaults
A chamber buried beneath concrete and sea.Steel pods line the walls. Most cracked open. Emptied.
But one — Vault 9B — was newly active.
Inside, a figure floated in preservation fluid.
Female. Identical to Obi 9, but with a subtle difference: a scar beneath her left eye. Unlike Obi,
her expression was tranquil — not asleep. Not alive.
Just waiting.
A man in a black porcelain mask stood outside the pod.
"She was never designed to wake," he whispered. "Not unless the original failed."
Behind him, another Architect approached. "The original is unstable. The time has come."
The masked man nodded.
"Then wake the twin."
---
MAKOKO SEARCH OPERATION – NIGHT
Rain hammered the stilts and plank bridges of Makoko. Generators hummed under corrugated
roofs. Rats danced through puddles of gasoline and fish guts.
Ikenna moved ahead, soaked in a hooded jacket. Obi 9 followed beside Briggs and Timi.
"I don't like this," Briggs muttered. "Too quiet."
"No drones above either," Timi said. "They're being jammed."
Obi 9 suddenly stopped. She turned sharply.
"Do you smell that?"
Ikenna paused.
The air held a sharp scent — ozone mixed with something else.Metal. Old blood. Plasma charge.
Then they heard it.
A voice — soft, modulated — echoing from a broken shack just ahead.
"…She's not yours to find."
They drew weapons immediately.
Obi darted forward and kicked the door in.
Inside, only a speaker on a rusted table.
Then a flash — too fast to stop.
EMP blast.
The entire district went dark.
Briggs cursed. "Fall back! It's a—"
A figure dropped from above — full-body cloak, face covered.
She moved like Obi 9. Fluid. Deadly.
Before Briggs could aim, she swept his legs out and vanished through the side wall like smoke.
Obi went after her.
She sprinted across broken bridges, leapt rooftops.
Every movement the twin made, Obi matched — until they met mid-air on a collapsed
houseboat.
Fist collided with fist.
Identical strength. Identical form.
But not identical eyes.
The twin's were dead. Ice behind flesh.
Obi's breath caught. "You…The twin tilted her head.
"No name. No past. Only protocol."
Then she whispered a phrase that made Obi freeze.
"Delta Zero Override."
Her body convulsed.
Something unlocked.
Her eyes flared red — then black.
Then she fell limp.
Obi caught her, heart pounding.
Timi and Briggs reached them seconds later.
"She's—" Obi gasped, "—shut herself down. She triggered a lockdown in her own neural core."
Ikenna arrived, expression unreadable. "That means someone remote-activated her."
Briggs lifted the limp twin over his shoulder. "What now?"
"We take her back," Ikenna said.
"And we find out what the Architects have wired inside her head."
---
IBESHE SAFEHOUSE, MEDICAL CORE
The twin lay on the table, sedated but still humming with low-frequency data pulses.
Timi ran scans. Lines of code scrolled across the monitor — some unfamiliar even to him.
"There's a gatekeeper protocol in here," he said, frowning. "Something ancient. It predates
Lazarus coding. Even Ghost never used this cipher set."
Obi hovered near the bed. She watched her twin's face, pale and peaceful."She didn't want to fight," she whispered. "She wanted me to see her."
Briggs folded his arms. "Or she wanted to learn from you. Mirrors don't always tell the truth."
Ikenna's voice came from behind.
"She didn't come here to kill. She came to a stall."
Obi turned. "Stall for what?"
He held up a secure pad. "We've been breached."
Briggs moved fast. "Which node?"
"Not a node," Ikenna replied. "Our communications log. Someone's been transmitting encrypted
updates since Obi's awakening."
Obi stepped back from the twin.
"You think it's her?"
"No," Briggs said grimly. "I think it's one of us."
---
INTERROGATION ROOM – One Hour Later
The safehouse locked down. Every device was scanned. Every room is sealed.
Timi checked logs manually. Obi 9 searched the airwave spectrum. Briggs double-checked the
perimeter.
Then they gathered again, silent.
The traitor was among them.
Ikenna broke the silence.
"There were six data leaks over the last three days. Only someone with level-zero clearance
could've accessed those logs."
Briggs: "That's only us four.Obi 9 glanced at Timi.
His eyes widened. "You can't be serious—"
Ikenna's gaze cut him off.
Then Obi said, quietly: "We'll run full memory verification. Bio scan each of us."
Briggs was first. Clean.
Obi — clean.
Ikenna — clean.
Then Timi.
The scan paused.
Lines of code blinked.
Hidden partition.
Encrypted.
Briggs reached for his weapon.
Timi raised his hands, face frozen in disbelief.
"I swear, I didn't know—"
"Shut up," Ikenna growled. "What is this?"
Timi's voice broke. "I didn't install it. I found it this morning. I was going to tell you, I—"
Obi 9 looked closer.
Then her eyes widened.
"This isn't a betrayal code."
"What?" Briggs snapped.
She turned the screen to show them"This is a fail-safe protocol. Ghost embedded it. It's a backup transmitter — hidden inside Timi's
cortex."
Ikenna frowned. "You mean he's been sending data unconsciously?"
Obi nodded. "Triggered by proximity to her."
She gestured toward the twin.
"She's the key. Ghost knew the Architects would try to resurrect her. So he made sure someone
in the Fog would always know if she came back."
Briggs slowly lowered his gun.
"Then we don't have a traitor."
Timi laughed bitterly. "Just a walking surveillance camera."
Ikenna nodded. "And now we know."
Obi added, "But now they know we know."
---
THE TWIN AWAKENS
Hours later.
Obi sat alone in the medical room. The twin still hadn't moved.
She reached out and took her hand.
"It's not your fault," she whispered. "None of this is."
The twin's fingers twitched.
Her eyes opened.
Black. Empty. Silent.
Then a voice — not hers — filled the roomMale. Ancient. Echoing from her vocal cords.
"Do you think you've won?"
Obi recoiled.
The twin sat up.
Eyes glowing now with raw code. Something alien behind them.
"The cradle never forget you," the voice said. "And the Architects never left."
Obi stood.
"What are you?"
The twin smiled.
"Not her."
Then she fell backward.
And when her body hit the bed again — it was empty.
No vitals. No signal.
Just ash.