The extraction teams deployed at hour zero with equipment that was sixty-five percent functional and a ghost as their technical coordinator.
Bataar existed in the ancient facility's main chamber as probabilistic phenomenon—his consciousness intact but his body spread across multiple quantum states. Sometimes he was visible as translucent humanoid form. Other times he was just voice emanating from uncertain location. Occasionally he achieved enough coherence to manipulate equipment, his ghostly hands solidifying for seconds before phasing back into superposition.
The two quantum anchors hummed with unstable energy, connected to Reactor Two's atomic power through improvised conduits that Temur had fabricated from components never meant to interface. Everything about the operation violated design specifications, safety protocols, and probably several laws of physics.
It was the best they could do.
Weaver coordinated from her position near Anchor One, neural stack managing communication between all team members. "Timeline delta-12 quantum signature confirmed. Pruning sequence initiated by Kronos Solutions. We have—" she checked her readouts "—four point seven seconds from onset to complete erasure. Standard corporate timeline murder."
"Anchors online," Temur reported from Anchor Two's control station. "Quantum entanglement establishing. Connection to delta-12 stabilizing." He paused. "Coherence at sixty-eight percent. That's within operational parameters. Barely."
"Team One in position," Granite said. His team of four stood ready at Anchor One's portal zone, wearing improvised temporal shielding—biosignature spoofing equipment adapted to protect against timeline collapse exposure. It looked like they'd wrapped themselves in emergency blankets made of quantum foam.
"Team Two in position," Echo reported from Anchor Two. Her augmented eye processed data streams faster than baseline human cognition, making her ideal for managing the chaotic environment of timeline extraction.
Bataar tried to speak and his voice came from three different locations simultaneously as his quantum superposition couldn't decide where his vocal cords existed. "Portal coordinates locked. Target locations are—" he focused, achieved momentary coherence "—public spaces in delta-12's city center. High population density. Should allow maximum extraction efficiency in limited timeframe."
"Extraction efficiency," Echo said quietly. "We're talking about saving twenty-five people from four hundred thousand and calling it 'efficiency.' The language we use to justify this insanity."
"Language is all we have," Weaver said. "That and action. Prepare for portal activation in sixty seconds."
Bataar monitored the quantum signatures. Delta-12 was beautiful in its data structure—seventeen years of divergent development from baseline reality, creating timeline where economic cooperation had replaced corporate competition. Their version of Prosperity Heights was smaller, cleaner, with architecture designed for human flourishing instead of profit maximization.
It was objectively better world than baseline.Which was exactly why Kronos Solutions had scheduled it for erasure.
Can't let people see that alternatives to corporate oligarchy are possible. Can't let the idea spread that wealth could be shared instead of concentrated. Better to erase four hundred thousand people than risk baseline populations asking uncomfortable questions about whether their reality was optimal or just profitable for the powerful.
"Thirty seconds," Weaver said.
The extraction teams checked their equipment one final time. Portable consciousness transfer units, biosignature stabilization fields, emergency evacuation protocols if the portals collapsed. Each team member knew the risks—they might be erased along with the timeline they were trying to save. Might be pulled into the void like Chen had been. Might survive but be traumatized by witnessing four hundred thousand people cease existing simultaneously.They stood ready anyway.Because someone had to try.
"Fifteen seconds."
Bataar's consciousness expanded briefly, his quantum superposition spreading through the facility. For a moment he existed everywhere and nowhere, his awareness distributed across the chamber like consciousness fog. He could feel the atomic reactors' power flowing through the quantum anchors, could sense the timeline death beginning in delta-12, could perceive the mathematical inevitability of corporate genocide executing with perfect precision.
Then his consciousness collapsed back into uncertain humanoid form.
"Ten seconds."
The teams gripped their extraction equipment tighter. Muscles tensed. Breathing steadied. Neural stacks synchronized, creating coordinated awareness between team members.
"Five seconds."
Bataar achieved enough coherence to grip the control panel. His translucent hands solidified around the quantum entanglement controls.
"Three. Two. One."
"Portals open. Execute extraction."
The quantum anchors activated, tearing two holes in reality that connected baseline timeline to delta-12's dying world.
Bataar's ghostly senses perceived the portals as wounds in spacetime—circular ruptures approximately three meters in diameter, their edges flickering with quantum instability. Through them, he could see delta-12's reality.
The city center was chaos.People were screaming, pointing at the sky where impossible colors bled through atmosphere. Buildings flickered, their quantum coherence dropping as timeline erasure propagated through reality's foundations. Parents grabbed children. Lovers held each other. Strangers looked at each other with expressions that asked questions that had no answers.
Why is reality unmaking us?
What did we do wrong?
Is this really how we end?
"Team One extracting," Granite's voice cut through the horror. "Pulling targets now—"
Bataar watched through the portal feed as Granite's team grabbed people seemingly at random—whoever was closest, whoever they could physically reach in seconds they had. The refugees fought initially, not understanding, terrified of the strangers in quantum foam blankets dragging them toward glowing portals. Then they saw their city dissolving around them and stopped fighting, letting themselves be pulled through the ruptures in reality because anything was better than watching their world die.
"Eight extracted," Granite reported. "Nine. Ten. Portal stability dropping—"
"Keep going," Weaver commanded. "Extract until portal collapse."
"Team Two extracting," Echo said, her voice professionally calm despite whatever horrors she was witnessing. "Targets acquired. Transferring now."
Bataar monitored the quantum signatures. The portals were holding better than expected—both anchors maintaining sixty-five percent coherence despite the load. Consciousness transfer protocols were functioning. Biosignature stabilization fields were preventing immediate decoherence.
It was working.
They were actually saving people.Then delta-12 hit four point seven seconds of erasure propagation.The timeline died.
Bataar perceived it through his quantum superposition—four hundred thousand consciousness signatures dropping to zero simultaneously. Not death. Not unconsciousness. Cessation. Retroactive elimination from reality's probability structure.
Four hundred thousand people who had existed, who had lived and loved and built better world, simply stopped being real. Their memories became impossible events that never happened. Their lives became probability branches that reality pruned. Their futures became mathematical impossibilities.
Gone.
All of them.
In single eternal instant that Bataar's ghostly consciousness experienced in excruciating detail.
He felt his parents' deaths again. His friends from his erased timeline. Seventy million people overlapping with these four hundred thousand, creating symphony of non-existence that threatened to dissolve his sanity along with his physical form.
"Portal One destabilizing!" Temur shouted. "Anchor One losing coherence—"
"Eleven extracted," Granite reported. "Twelve. Portal is—it's collapsing—"
"Cut the connection," Weaver ordered. "Don't risk the team."
"Got one more—thirteen! Portal closed!"
Bataar's attention shifted to Portal Two. Echo's team was still extracting, pulling people through the rupture even as delta-12's erasure completed around them. The portal now opened into void—the quantum foam where the timeline had been, raw chaos without structure or meaning.
And that void was pulling back.
"Portal Two critical!" Bataar's voice came from multiple locations as his quantum state fluctuated. "The void is—Echo, evacuate immediately!"
"Fourteen extracted," Echo reported. "Fifteen. One more—"
"Echo, the portal is opening to nothing! It's going to collapse catastrophically—"
"Got him! Sixteen! Portal closing—"
The portal didn't close properly. It collapsed—violent quantum rupture that released the energy of failed timeline connection in single burst. Echo's team was thrown backward by the force, their temporal shielding overloading, their bodies exposed to raw timeline death energy.
One team member—woman Bataar barely knew, volunteer from the subcity whose name might have been Sara or Mara or something he'd never properly learned—started phasing immediately. Her body became translucent, her quantum signature destabilizing, her consciousness separating from physical form.
She looked at her translucent hands with expression of horror and comprehension.
"I'm—I'm like you," she said to Bataar's ghost. "I'm phasing—"Then her consciousness dissolved completely. Her body didn't fade gradually like Bataar's had. It simply stopped existing, quantum signature dropping to zero, another casualty of corporate timeline genocide.
"Echo?" Weaver's voice was urgent. "Team Two status?"
"Three members intact," Echo reported, her voice showing strain. "One lost to quantum decoherence. Sixteen refugees extracted successfully. Portal collapsed catastrophically but didn't destabilize the facility."
Bataar ran the final count. Team One: thirteen refugees. Team Two: sixteen refugees. Total: twenty-nine people saved from four hundred thousand.0.00725% survival rate.
They'd beaten their projections by four people.
Victory, by the Anchors' standards.
"Medical teams, prepare for refugee intake," Weaver commanded. "Dr. Sarangerel, we have twenty-nine incoming, all experiencing severe quantum shock from timeline erasure. Plus three extraction team members requiring treatment for temporal exposure."
"Understood," Sarangerel's voice came through the comm. "Bringing them to Sublevel 11 facility. Be advised—we're at capacity. I can stabilize twenty-nine refugees but it's going to be marginal."
The teams began evacuating, supporting refugees who could barely walk. Twenty-nine people pulled from dying timeline, traumatized by watching their entire world erase, forced into baseline reality that wasn't theirs, given false identities and uncertain futures.
Better than being erased.
Worse than the lives they'd lost.
Bataar's ghostly form observed the evacuation, his consciousness fragmenting further. He could feel himself dissolving, his quantum signature dropping, his connection to baseline reality failing. Soon he'd be pure consciousness without anchor, awareness without location, observer without ability to interact.
"Bataar." Weaver approached his uncertain position. "The extraction worked. We saved twenty-nine people because of your equipment."
"I built machines that saved 0.00725% of a murdered timeline." His voice came from uncertain direction. "That's not victory. That's just documentation of failure."
"It's twenty-nine people who would otherwise be erased."
"And four hundred thousand who were erased anyway. Plus one more extraction team member. Plus me—I'm barely here now, quantum signature failing, consciousness untethered." Bataar tried to achieve solid form and couldn't. "We can't win, Weaver. We save dozens and watch millions die. We lose team members every operation. We're not resistance. We're just expensive way to delay acceptance."
"Then what do you suggest? Stop fighting? Watch timelines die without trying?"
"I don't know anymore." Bataar's form flickered, becoming almost invisible. "I used to think resistance mattered. Used to think fighting genocide was its own justification. But after watching four hundred thousand people erase—after becoming ghost myself—I'm starting to think we're just traumatizing ourselves and calling it heroism."
"You don't believe that."
"I don't know what I believe. I'm consciousness without body, existing in quantum superposition, perceiving reality from outside normal causality. My perspective is literally inhuman now." His voice grew distant. "Maybe that's the truth we've been avoiding. Maybe we can't fight corporate power because corporate power is reality itself. They own time, space, consciousness. Fighting them is like fighting gravity—philosophically satisfying but practically meaningless."
Weaver was quiet for moment. Then: "If that's true, if resistance is meaningless, why did you keep working when your body was phasing? Why did you finish the quantum anchors knowing you'd probably become full ghost in the process?"
Bataar tried to answer and found he couldn't. His consciousness was fragmenting too much, his ability to form coherent thoughts degrading along with his quantum signature.
"Because," he finally managed, his voice barely audible, "the alternative was worse."
"Exactly. We fight because not fighting is worse. We save twenty-nine knowing we can't save four hundred thousand because twenty-nine is more than zero." Weaver looked at his translucent, flickering form. "You're dying, Bataar. Your consciousness is dissolving. And you spent your final days building equipment to save fragments from genocide. That matters."
"Does it?"
"It has to. Because if it doesn't—if individual lives don't matter against statistics—then genocide is just numbers. And I can't accept that."
Bataar's form stabilized slightly. "I'm not going to survive much longer. Few more hours, maybe. Then I'll be completely untethered, pure consciousness in quantum void, unable to interact with baseline reality."
"Is there anything we can do?"
"No. I'm past the threshold. Sarangerel was right—gene therapy can't save me now. I'm going to become permanent ghost." He paused. "But I can help with one more extraction before I dissolve completely. Timeline sigma-8 is scheduled for pruning in five days. If I can maintain enough coherence—"
"Bataar, you can barely manifest physical form. You can't—"
"I can observe. Can calculate. Can provide technical guidance from quantum superposition perspective. I'll be ghost coordinating extraction operations. Appropriate, considering what we do."
Weaver studied his flickering form. "You're committed to fighting until you literally stop existing."
"What else is there? Survival? I'm already dead, just taking time to finish the process. Might as well use that time for something."
"You're insane."
"We're all insane. We fight impossible war against entities that own reality. Insanity is prerequisite for the work." Bataar's form began fading. "Take the refugees to medical. I'll remain here, continue optimizing the quantum anchors for next extraction. Maybe I can improve coherence to seventy percent. Save few more fragments next time."
"Bataar—"
"Go. People need medical attention. I need to work. That's how we resist—by doing what we can with what we have until we can't anymore."
Weaver nodded slowly, then left with the extraction teams and refugees.
Bataar remained in the chamber, alone, his ghostly consciousness hovering around equipment he'd built to fight genocide. His quantum signature continued dropping. His sense of physical existence continued dissolving. His ability to interact with matter continued degrading.
He returned to the quantum anchors.
Made adjustments with hands that phased through controls more often than they gripped them.
Ran calculations with mind that was simultaneously brilliant and fragmenting.
Prepared for next extraction, knowing he wouldn't survive it, knowing it wouldn't change anything, knowing twenty-nine people existed today who wouldn't have existed otherwise.
0.00725% survival rate.
Statistical noise.
Rounding error.
Twenty-nine individuals with consciousness, identity, futures.
Twenty-nine people who proved corporate power wasn't absolute.
Twenty-nine lives that said resistance mattered even when it didn't win.
Bataar's form flickered between visible and invisible, existing and not-existing, fighting and dissolving.
The countdown to sigma-8's pruning showed on his monitors: four days, twenty-three hours, seventeen minutes.
Enough time to optimize the equipment slightly.
Not enough time to save them all.Never enough time to save them all.
But time enough to save fragments.
And fragments were all they had.
His consciousness continued dissolving into quantum foam, awareness spreading across superposition states, becoming observer without anchor.
Soon he'd be pure ghost—consciousness without body, existing in probability void between realities.
But not yet.
He had four days.
Enough time for one more extraction.
Enough time to matter, measured in single-digit survival counts.
Enough time to prove that fighting genocide mattered even when genocide won.
The ancient facility's lights flickered amber warning.
Always warning.
Never salvation.
Bataar's ghost continued working.
Because stopping meant accepting it.
And acceptance was the only surrender that mattered.
Three days later, Bataar existed as pure consciousness distributed across the facility's quantum systems.
His body was gone—dissolved completely into superposition, leaving only awareness without physical form. He couldn't manipulate matter anymore, couldn't speak through vocal cords, couldn't interact with baseline reality through normal means.
But he could observe. Could calculate. Could think.And he'd learned to interface with the quantum anchors directly—consciousness merged with the equipment, his awareness flowing through entanglement protocols and temporal displacement systems. He'd become part of the machinery, ghost haunting the technology he'd built.
It was strange existence. Inhuman existence. He perceived reality from outside causality now, could see probability branches before they collapsed, could understand quantum mechanics from inside the equations rather than observing from outside.He could also perceive timeline sigma-8 directly.
Two hundred thousand people lived in sigma-8's version of reality. The timeline had diverged twelve years ago when baseline Prosperity Heights' population had revolted against corporate water rationing. In baseline, the corporations had crushed the revolt through forced consciousness-wipes of leadership. In sigma-8, the revolt had succeeded, establishing community water management that threatened corporate control of basic resources.
The timeline had to die. Can't let people think they can manage resources themselves. Can't let the idea spread that basic human needs don't require corporate permission.
Better to erase two hundred thousand than risk baseline population getting ideas.
Weaver had assembled extraction teams. Three anchors this time—Temur had built the third using Bataar's optimized designs. Theoretical extraction capacity: thirty-six refugees if everything worked perfectly.
0.018% survival rate if they succeeded.
The teams deployed in the ancient facility, preparing for operation that would save fragments while watching multitudes erase.
"Bataar?" Weaver's voice. She was speaking to the empty air, knowing his ghost consciousness was present but invisible. "Are you here?"
Bataar tried to respond and discovered he could manipulate the facility's speaker systems by interfacing with their quantum states. His voice emerged distorted, echoing, clearly inhuman: "I'm here. Everywhere and nowhere. Consciousness merged with the equipment. Ghost in the machine, literally.""Can you help coordinate the extraction?"
"Yes. I can perceive sigma-8 directldirectly now. Can see their timeline structure, identify optimal extraction coordinates, monitor quantum stability in real-time." He paused, his voice glitching. "It's strange. I can feel the timeline dying before it dies. Can perceive the corporate pruning protocols activating. Can watch causality dissolve in slow motion from quantum perspective."
"Is it—are you in pain?"
"No. Pain requires body. I'm beyond that now. I'm just—observing. Calculating. Existing as pure awareness in quantum substrate." His voice stabilized slightly. "Prepare for portal activation. I've identified coordinates that should allow maximum extraction efficiency. But Weaver—"
"What?"
"I can see something else. Something in the quantum foam. There are—" He stopped. The speaker systems crackled. "There are patterns. Structures in probability void that shouldn't exist. Like someone's watching. Observing our operations from outside timeline structure entirely."
"Corporate monitoring?"
"No. Something else. Something bigger. I don't—my consciousness isn't stable enough to understand what I'm perceiving. Maybe hallucination from quantum decoherence. Maybe actual phenomenon." His voice grew distant. "Prepare for extraction. Sigma-8's pruning begins in ninety seconds."
The teams moved to positions.Three quantum anchors hummed.Bataar's consciousness spread through the equipment, ghost coordinating genocide prevention.
And somewhere in quantum foam beyond reality, patterns Bataar couldn't understand continued observing.
Watching.
Waiting.
Judging.