[COLD OPEN — DREAM SEQUENCE / PAST MEMORY]
A field of white flowers sways under a bleeding red sky. A small girl, barefoot, runs across the hill. Her laughter is distant, echoing like a fading tape. Behind her… something massive and unseen is watching.
Voice (V.O.):
"What is your oath… if not a cage made of promises?"
The girl stops. Turns to the camera. Her eyes are made of amethyst.
[SMASH CUT TO: INT. VAN HQ – KAEL'S ROOM]
Kael jolts awake, drenched in sweat. His window reflects a fractured skyline and the faint pulse of the gem embedded in his neck.
Kael: (breathing hard) That dream again...
[INT. VAN HQ – COMM ROOM]
The team assembles. A hologram projects from Echo-7, showing crystallized tree formations appearing across the SkyVault Bioshell Garden — a public oxygen dome.
Echo-7: We're tracking rapid memory-loss cases near the dome. Victims forget their names... their families. Some even forget how to speak.
Yuna: (grim) They're hollowing people.
Tari: Then let's fill them with light.
Jax: Finally. I was getting bored of singing creeps.
Niko: This isn't a joke, Jax. Those flowers in the vision… they're from the Hollowfield. That zone was closed after the Edenfire Massacre.
Kael: Then why is it blooming again?
[SCENE SHIFT – BIOSHELL GARDEN]
A glowing glass dome filled with artificial forest. Inside, everything is silent. Birds hang midair — frozen in place. Trees half-turned to glass. A chilling breeze rustles the flowers.
Yuna: (touches a frozen leaf) These… aren't natural.
Echo-7: There's a signal beneath us. Subsurface.
Kael: Niko. Phase scan.
Niko vanishes through the ground. Seconds later, re-emerges, pale.
Niko: There's a girl down there.
[INT. UNDERGROUND ROOT VAULT]
A glass crypt. Inside lies a young woman in a flower-covered suit. Tubes connect to her arms. Her body pulses softly, as if in sleep. Yuna steps forward. Her expression shatters.
Yuna: …Her name is Mira.
Kael: Who is she?
Yuna: My sister.
[FLASHBACK — 10 YEARS AGO]
A younger Yuna and Mira, laughing in the old garden. Mira teaches Yuna how to grow a bloom-sphere. The sky above is golden. Peaceful.
Narrator (Yuna V.O.): They said she died in the Edenfire Massacre. That her body was never found. But they lied. They turned her into a core.
[BACK TO PRESENT]
Echo-7: Her brainwaves are active. She's dreaming… and projecting it into reality. That's what's causing the Hollow Bloom.
Jax: So what, we wake her up?
Yuna: If we disconnect her… she could die. But if we leave her... SkyVault falls.
Kael: What if we go in?
Tari: Into her mind?
Echo-7: I can create a Neural Sync. Link our minds. But only two can enter. Too much connection... and you'll forget who you are.
Kael: I'm going.
Yuna: So am I.
[NEURAL SYNC SEQUENCE — CINEMATIC, SURREAL]
Lights flicker. Their bodies go limp. Minds spiral through code and memory, forming into a crystalline dreamscape — a forest made of fractured reflections.
[INT. DREAMWORLD – MIRA'S MIND]
Yuna and Kael walk through a mirrored forest. Trees repeat endlessly. Voices whisper forgotten names. Floating in the air are fragments of memories: Yuna as a child, Mira crying, soldiers in gas masks.
Kael: This isn't a dream. It's a prison.
A scream pierces the air. The sky fractures. Mira appears — older, corrupted. Her eyes drip flowers. Her voice echoes multiple tones.
Mira: You left me. You let them take me.
Yuna: I thought you were dead!
Mira: No. I became their seed.
She raises her hands — vines explode from the ground, wrapping around them. A monster blossoms behind her: The Bloomwraith — a giant floral beast with a cracked human face.
[BATTLE IN MIRA'S MIND]
Kael's flame burns the dream vines, but they regenerate.
Yuna uses her bloom to connect to Mira's emotions, causing flickers of clarity.
Mira screams: "I can't remember who I was!"
Kael: Then remember us!
He stabs his own palm with his blade — blood falls onto a memory fragment. The scene flickers into the past: the sisters hugging.
Mira: (crying) Yuna...?
Yuna: Come home.
The Bloomwraith shrieks, begins to collapse. Vines turn to light. Mira stumbles forward and embraces Yuna.
[BACK TO REALITY — ROOT VAULT]
Mira wakes, coughing. The glass crypt shatters. The Hollow Bloom begins to recede from the dome. Birds start moving again.
Jax: (relieved) Whoa. Actual good ending?
Echo-7: For now.
[EPILOGUE SCENE – NIGHT SKY, VAN HQ ROOFTOP]
Kael and Yuna sit under the stars. Mira sleeps peacefully inside.
Kael: You okay?
Yuna: I thought I buried her a long time ago. But now... I get to fight for her.
Kael: We all do.
[CUT TO: ELSEWHERE – DARK DIMENSION]
Shard watches a floating projection of the event. Gravemind Vox sits beside him, silent. Dreiva walks circles, humming.
Shard: Their bond is stronger than predicted.
Dreiva: Good. Break them harder.
Shard: Let's see what they do… when it's Tari's turn.
[TO BE CONTINUED]