Tian shot to his feet so suddenly the crowd flinched back. His hands clawed at his hair, eyes blazing with desperation.
"Why did it fail?!" His voice cracked like glass. "I was this close!"
He pressed two trembling fingers together, the gap barely visible.
"Zero point three percent!" he shouted. "Ninety-nine point seven percent!"
He paced in frantic circles, scribbling equations in the air only he could see.
"The tunnel was stable! The entanglement was perfect! Coherence held—IT HELD!"
The residents pressed against the walls, whispering in fear. This wasn't their calm, brilliant leader. This was a man unraveling before their eyes—a genius crushed beneath the weight of his own obsession.
Elena's heart sank. She knew this sight all too well. She had seen physicists break before—minds so sharp they cut themselves apart, trapped in their own brilliance.
"Stop it, Tian!" Her voice cut through his madness like a blade.
"You broke every protocol! You endangered all of us! You'll be held accountable!"
Her words fell like a verdict. In this place, they carried the force of law.
"Your research privileges are revoked. Your leadership is over." Elena's tone was cold, final.
"We can't trust you with human lives."
Kai and Amara stood beside her. Three years of partnership ended in a single, merciless moment.
The crowd's voices rose like a storm.
"He's dangerous!"
"Send him to the surface!"
"He's lost it!"
Tian stood in the center of their judgment, alone. One hundred eighty-eight voices, united against him. A death sentence—not of flesh, but of purpose.
But while humans screamed of betrayal and punishment, the facility whispered of something else.
Error codes flickered across hidden displays. Magnetic sensors trembled with impossible readings. Residual quantum patterns twisted in the walls, vibrating like faint heartbeats of another reality.
The failed experiment had left scars. Spacetime rifts. Energy signatures unknown to science. The system recorded them quietly, unnoticed.
Something was awakening.
Tian slumped into the sofa, fury drained, only despair left behind.
"Elena…" His voice cracked. "The calculations were perfect. It should have worked."
Her gaze softened, but only with pity.
"Calculations aren't everything. We're not solving math, Tian—we're protecting people."
"But we were so close…" His voice trembled.
"Close to what? To killing us all?" Her words cut deeper than any equation. "This is why protocols exist."
Marcus Torres stepped forward, his broad frame blocking the emergency lights.
"Security will escort you. Until the Authority decides your fate, you're confined to quarters."
The guards moved in. Tian didn't fight. He rose slowly, shoulders heavy with the weight of failure. His eyes swept over the faces once filled with admiration. Now, they held only fear and disappointment.
"You'll understand one day," he whispered. "When someone else breaks through… you'll know how close we were."
Elena turned away, voice like ice.
"Maybe. But whoever does… will do it the right way."
The lift doors closed. For a moment, Tian caught Elena's gaze—sorrow and loss flickering in her eyes. Not forgiveness. Just grief.
And then he was gone.
The lobby buzzed again. Engineers muttered about repairs. Medics tended to the injured. Slowly, their underground city began stitching itself back together.
But deep below, in the wounded heart of the PEC1R… the resonance remained.
Reality remembered.
And reality had begun to move.
The universe had heard their defiance.
And its answer was coming.