The scream died in Kaelen's throat, choked off by the void and a loss so profound it felt physical. The jump was over. He was elsewhere. Another patch of featureless black, another anonymous star.
He huddled in the nexus, the psychic interface feeling less like a conduit and more like a cage. The mech's hum was a taunt. Its power was a predator that had just taken its first bite out of him.
Psionic Integrity at 79%.
The number was a cold, clinical verdict. But the reality was a raw, bleeding wound in his psyche.
The memory of his mother's face.
He clawed at the emptiness where it should have been. He could remember the concept of her. A warm presence. A sense of safety. A melody she used to hum. But the face itself—the curve of her smile, the color of her eyes, the way she'd look at him with a mix of worry and pride—was gone. It had been severed, neatly and completely, as if it had never existed.
A sob racked his body. He hadn't just used a tool. He had offered a piece of his soul as fuel. The Axiom mech was a philosopher's stone of the worst kind, turning the lead of his memories into the gold of its power.
The mech inquired, its tone unchanged.
"Stop asking me that!" he yelled into the silent nexus, his voice cracking. The machine had no response. It simply waited. It would always wait. It was a hunger that would never be sated.
Despair threatened to swallow him whole. He was a ghost piloting a tomb, destined to fade into nothingness, replaced by the echoes of the dead. He was erasing himself, line by line, memory by memory.
A new alert, different from the others, chimed softly. It wasn't an alarm or a detection warning. It was a... notification. A gentle pull on his consciousness.
Passive Resonance Detected. Faint Echo Signature. Bearing 241 by 19. Distance: 3.4 Light Years. Designation: [UNKNOWN].
Kaelen froze, his panic momentarily stunned. Another Echo? Another piece of Precursor wreckage?
It was a lure. It had to be. A trap set by the Federation, or worse, the Chimerans, mimicking the energy signature to draw him out.
But as he focused on the signal, a strange calm settled over him. This pull felt different from the violent, screaming memory of the Oblivion's Span. This was quieter. A whisper. A sigh. It wasn't a memory of war. It felt like... a memory of sanctuary.
The mech's systems automatically began plotting a short, precise jump. The path was clear, the energy cost negligible. All it required was his consent.
His Command.
This was insanity. To jump toward another signal, to potentially use the Axiom again, was to risk another piece of himself. It was the action of a addict reaching for the very thing that was destroying him.
But what was the alternative? To drift until his air ran out? To wait for the Federation or the Chimerans to eventually find him? To slowly go mad in the silence, a hollowed-out man in a metal god?
The memory of his mother's face was gone, sacrificed for a moment of panic. The thought of it ignited a new emotion, cutting through the despair: a sharp, defiant anger.
He would not let that be for nothing. He would not vanish without a fight. If this machine wanted to consume him, he would make the meal worth its while. He would find answers. He would learn the truth about the Precursors, about the Silent War, about the cost of this power. He would find a way to control it, to stop it, or die trying.
The unknown signal was the only thread he had to pull.
He took a shuddering breath, his hands clenching into fists. He wasn't a soldier. He wasn't a hero. He was an archaeologist. And an archaeologist followed the evidence.
"Take us there," he whispered, the words feeling inadequate for the command. "Slowly. Carefully."
The mech needed no further encouragement. Space folded once more, but this time the transition was smoother, less violent. A short hop.
The new system was a binary pair: a white dwarf and a gas giant locked in a lazy dance. And there, in the high orbit of the gas giant, was the source of the signal.
It wasn't a battleship. It wasn't a weapon.
It was a temple.
A Precursor structure, impossibly ancient, crafted from the same living metal as the Axiom mech. It was a series of graceful, interlocking rings that spun slowly around a central core, catching the light of the distant suns. It was pristine, untouched by war or scavengers. It hummed with the same low, resonant frequency as his mech, a song of welcome.
The signal wasn't a trap. It was an invitation. A homing beacon for a lost technology.
Echo Signature Intensified. Designation: [ECHO OF THE ARCHIVIST].
An Archivist. Not a warrior. Hope, fragile and terrifying, blossomed in Kaelen's chest. An archivist wouldn't hold memories of battle. An archivist would hold... knowledge. Records. The truth.
He guided the Axiom mech closer. As he neared the structure, a section of the rotating rings aligned, and a bay door, seamless and invisible moments before, irised open. A soft, golden light spilled out.
It was an airlock. A hangar. A sanctuary.
For the first time since climbing into the mech, Kaelen felt a sensation other than dread or loss. He felt awe.
He guided the mech into the hangar. The interior was vast and empty, clearly designed to house a machine of his size. The bay door closed behind him silently. Atmosphere hissed back into the chamber. The environment was stable. Breathable.
The mech's question was the same, but the context was entirely new. He was no longer in immediate danger. He had a choice.
With a thought that felt like lifting a mountain, he willed the nexus to disengage.
The crystalline matrix released him. The expansive sensation of being the mech vanished, collapsing back into the limited, fragile perception of his own body. He was just Kaelen Vance again, sitting in a strange chair inside a god, his head pounding, his soul bruised.
He climbed out of the cockpit, his legs shaky, and dropped onto the hangar floor. The air was cool and carried a faint, metallic scent, like old coins and ozone.
Before him, a doorway slid open in the otherwise seamless wall, revealing a corridor that led deeper into the structure.
The Echo was here. The Archivist was waiting.
He took a step forward, then another. Each one was an act of defiance against the machine that had hollowed him. It had taken his memories to power its war. He would now use its power to find a different way.
He walked into the corridor, leaving the hungry god-mech behind, following the whisper of a ghost that promised not destruction, but answers.
The hunger followed him, a silent, patient shadow in his mind.