Aeris Calderon had never broken into a biometric vault before—but that was before the Consortium erased her life.
The sublevel corridor beneath Vireloch's Ministry of Intelligence was colder than she expected. Her gloved fingers danced over the palm-lock interface, rerouting the synthetic nerve signal from her embedded wrist pad. A soft click echoed. The lock hissed open.
"Protocol breach registered," chimed her deck, monotone."Override in progress," she whispered, more to herself than the AI.
Inside, the vault pulsed with sterile light. A suspended core glowed—a transparent sphere spinning slowly, threads of coded memory orbiting within. The Echo Protocol archive. Not just a data file. It was a neural map of pre-censorship Vireloch. The truth before edits. Before erasures.
Her breath caught. This was Kael's last known mission site. The last place he hacked before the Grid devoured him.
She stepped inside.
"Welcome, Subject A-031," a digital voice intoned. It was the old security matrix. Before everything was facial scan and DNA locks. Before her name became a threat.
She wasn't Aeris Calderon here.She was Subject A-031—the architect of the city's hidden memory failsafes.
She didn't remember building this.
The memory orb flared—sensors detecting her presence. Her implant pulsed once. Then, twice.
Suddenly, the lights shifted. The room shimmered.
A projection flickered to life across the walls—moving images. Her childhood. Her training in the Grid. Kael, laughing as they learned to code their first quantum loop. And then—herself. But older. Wounded. Speaking directly to the camera.
"If you're watching this… then I failed. But maybe you won't."
Her own voice. Yet unfamiliar.
"Your mind has been rewritten 12 times. Each loop degraded the core memory. Echo Protocol is the final failsafe. A memory code embedded in your neural signature—one you buried yourself. Find it. Before they do."
Aeris stumbled back.
She did this to herself.
Why? What had been so dangerous it needed to be hidden in a recursive memory prison?
Her pulse thundered in her ears. She reached for the core.
Just as her hand touched it, the room roared to life with sirens.
"Unauthorized breach. Defense systems online."
Steel shutters dropped over the exit.
"No—NO—" Aeris slammed her fist against the door. The memory core shuddered, and from it, a small crystal data spike ejected—marked with her symbol. She grabbed it as heat began to rise.
She was out of time.
Behind her, the projection glitched once more. Kael's face appeared briefly.
"Trust no one. Not even Solara."
Aeris's blood ran cold.
She was still in the vault when the flame charges ignited.