The void did not simply break. It screamed.
The horizon cracked like glass under pressure, and the sound was both thunderous and intimate, as if it echoed inside Ava's skull. Black fissures spiderwebbed through the once-pale dome, bleeding darkness into the world. Every fracture poured out streams of cold wind that tasted of metal and ash.
She sprinted, lungs burning, every step echoing on a ground that was no longer solid ice but something stranger—slabs of translucent crystal breaking apart as she moved across them. Caroline kept pace, her rifle bouncing against her chest, her face set in raw determination. Behind them, the remains of Jules' charge flickered in the air, unstable energy gnawing at what was left of the shard.
The world tilted. Chunks of the sky fell like meteors, smashing into the ground in slow, impossible arcs. Ava ducked instinctively, dragging Caroline with her as one massive shard of the Hollow Sky slammed down a few meters ahead, the impact shattering the path and opening a yawning chasm below.
Caroline's voice was hoarse over the chaos. "We're not gonna make it!"
"Yes, we are!" Ava shouted back, gripping her hand tighter. The line of light—small, impossibly far—called to her like a beacon. She didn't know if it was a door, a fracture, or just another trick of the veil. But it was the only way forward.
They leapt the gap together. Ava's boots skidded on the other side, the fragile surface cracking under their weight. For one horrible moment she thought they'd both tumble back into the abyss, but Caroline shoved her forward, teeth gritted, using her momentum to drag them both to safety.
Behind them, reality warped. The illusionary echoes returned, screaming from the edges of the fissures: Cassandra reaching with burning hands, Marin's face pale and accusing, even Ben whispering her name in a broken rasp. Ava forced her eyes ahead. Looking back was death.
Another tremor hit. The ground rose, then split, tossing both women off their feet. Ava rolled hard, shoulder cracking against jagged crystal. Her vision blurred from the pain, but she forced herself up, ignoring the warm blood on her arm. Caroline staggered beside her, coughing, eyes wild.
"There!" Ava pointed to the door of light, now closer—close enough to make out a faint outline. It wasn't a door at all. It was a fracture, raw and unstable, its edges fraying into sparks of white. Beyond it was… nothing. Just more void. But maybe that nothing was freedom.
The Hollow Sky roared one last time. A shard the size of a mountain sheared off above them, plunging straight down. Its descent was impossibly slow, yet Ava knew when it hit, it would annihilate everything.
She grabbed Caroline's hand again. "Now!"
They ran. Every breath was a knife in her chest, every step a war against collapsing ground. Behind them, fragments of false memories screamed louder, chasing them in a tide of faces and voices. The weight of every soul devoured by the veil pressed down, trying to drown her in despair.
But the light grew larger. Brighter.
At the final stretch, the path broke completely. Nothing but a gap of swirling void separated them from the fracture. Ava didn't stop to think. She tightened her grip on Caroline and hurled herself forward, legs pumping one last time as they both leapt into the abyss.
The roar of the Hollow Sky vanished.
There was only silence, blinding light, and the sensation of falling forever.
---
The fall felt endless.
There was no air rushing past her, no sense of up or down—only weightlessness and the crushing silence that came after the Hollow Sky's collapse. Ava tried to open her mouth to scream, but sound no longer existed here. Even her heartbeat seemed swallowed.
Then the light shifted.
The nothingness around her broke into fragments—shards of memory, tumbling alongside her like debris in a storm. She saw glimpses of her childhood home, fire consuming its walls. She saw the day she first put on her uniform, her mother's trembling hand fastening the collar. She saw Marin's face at the exact moment the veil stole him, his eyes filled with terror and apology.
Each vision hit her like a physical blow. She flinched, twisting in the endless fall, and realized Caroline was beside her—also suspended, arms flailing in the void. Their hands brushed once, then again, before Ava finally managed to lock her grip around Caroline's wrist.
The touch grounded her.
The visions slowed. The light condensed. And then the fall ended.
Ava hit hard stone. The impact jarred every bone in her body. She rolled, gasping, clutching her ribs until she was sure they weren't broken. Caroline landed a moment later, her breath ragged but alive. For several seconds, neither of them moved. The silence here wasn't empty—it was oppressive, heavy, as if something vast and unseen was listening.
When Ava finally pushed herself upright, she realized they were no longer in the Hollow Sky.
They stood in a circular chamber. Its walls curved upward into infinity, lined with veins of faintly glowing light that pulsed like a heartbeat. The floor beneath them was smooth obsidian, warm to the touch despite the chill in the air. At the center of the chamber stood a spire, crystalline and jagged, humming with the same unstable energy as the stabilizer core they had used to wound the shard.
Caroline forced herself to her knees, spitting blood. "Where… where are we?"
Ava stared at the spire. "Inside it," she whispered. "Inside the wound."
As if in answer, the chamber itself breathed. The lights along the walls pulsed faster. The air grew thick with static, lifting the hair on Ava's arms. Then came the voices.
Not one, but thousands. Whispering, sobbing, screaming—all layered over one another, all pouring out of the spire. Ava clamped her hands to her ears, but it did nothing. The sound was inside her head.
Caroline staggered upright, pressing close to her. "They're trapped here," she said, her voice trembling. "All of them. Every soul the veil ever took."
Ava could barely nod. Her stomach churned. The weight of so much grief pressed down on her chest until she could barely breathe. But buried in that chaos, she heard something else. A single thread of sound, distinct and familiar.
Her name.
"Ava."
She froze.
The whisper was Marin's.
Her throat closed. She spun, searching the chamber, half-expecting him to step from the shadows. Nothing. Only the spire, its fractured surface bleeding light.
"Ava…" The voice again. Closer this time, clearer. Pleading.
Caroline grabbed her arm. "Don't listen. It's the veil. It wants you to break."
Ava shook her head, tears burning at the corners of her eyes. "No. I know his voice."
The spire flared, and with it came a figure. At first only a silhouette—tall, broad-shouldered—but then it sharpened into Marin himself. Whole. Alive. His eyes caught hers, filled with a softness that cut her to the core.
Ava's knees nearly buckled. She reached out before she could stop herself. "Marin…"
Caroline yanked her back. "It's not him!" she snapped. "Ava, it's bait!"
But the figure spoke again, voice trembling. "You left me. Don't leave me again."
The chamber shuddered. The spire's glow intensified, tendrils of light stretching outward like chains. Ava realized too late that it was reaching for her, feeding on her weakness. The more she believed, the more it pulled.
She bit her lip until she tasted blood, forcing her shaking hand down. No. It wasn't him. It couldn't be.
And yet, when the figure smiled—sad, loving, forgiving—her chest cracked open with grief she thought she'd buried.
Caroline shouted over the roar of the chamber. "Ava! If you go to him, we're both done!"
The spire pulsed. The figure of Marin extended a hand. "Come back to me."
Ava's breath came ragged, torn between love and survival. Her legs moved one step forward, then stopped.
She clenched her fists.
"No," she whispered. "You're not him. You'll never be him."
With those words, the chamber screamed. The spire fractured, spiderweb cracks racing across its surface. The false Marin twisted, face distorting into something monstrous, before shattering into shards of light.
The chamber shook violently, dust raining down from the unseen ceiling. The whispers turned to shrieks of fury. Caroline grabbed Ava's arm again, pulling her toward the far wall where another faint line of light had appeared—a door, a way out, or maybe just another trap.
They didn't care.
Together, they ran.
---
The point is, if it doesn't connect, it's like that. I'm confused by real life, if it's off-track, digressing, doesn't connect, and so on, I apologize, that's all, wassalamualaikum wr.wb