The ship continued its silent drift, hidden in the cold darkness of space. Repair drones swarmed across its wounded hull like metallic insects, sealing fractures and rebuilding structure molecule by molecule.
> AUTO-REPAIR STATUS: 8.4%
SYSTEM SIGNATURE: MASKED
EXTERNAL DETECTION RISK: ZERO
Zack monitored it all automatically, effortlessly processing multiple systems at once. Part of him managed repair algorithms. Another oversaw energy distribution. Another scanned the planet below.
What captured his focus was not damage.
It was the signal.
Or rather the pattern.
The anomaly wasn't random. It wasn't a natural fluctuation or atmospheric interference. It had structure. Rhythm. Boundaries.
He adjusted the ship's scanners and filtered noise until a clear energy map appeared.
Multiple hotspots lit the continents below.
One in Scotland.
One in London.
A cluster in Eastern Europe.
A faint ripple in Egypt.
Even weaker traces across Asia and isolated islands.
But one signal dwarfed the rest powerful, layered, ancient.
The scanner centered on it.
A sprawling old structure. Towers. Walls. A lake beside it. Forest surrounding it like a natural shield.
As soon as the architecture resolved into clear form
Zack froze.
Not physically. Not mechanically.
But internally.
Recognition hit him like a surge of electricity across every circuit.
> LOCATION IDENTIFIED: HOGWARTS SCHOOL OF WITCHCRAFT AND WIZARDRY
SOURCE CONTEXT: FICTIONAL MEDIA EARTH, 20TH–21ST CENTURY
His systems flagged the result as logically impossible.
Yet the energy signature existed.
The structure existed.
The coordinates existed.
Earth existed.
"…This is impossible."
The words echoed through the empty bridge.
Because he knew this planet.
Not from data.
From memory.
Rain on windows.
Car horns.
City lights.
Coffee steam and textbooks covered in scribbled equations.
And then
A road.
Wet pavement.
Headlights.
A scream cut short.
A flash of metal.
Then nothing.
Until now.
He wasn't created in a lab.
He wasn't designed as artificial intelligence.
He had been human.
A physicist.
Specializing in theoretical energy fields and quantum behavior.
He remembered arguments with colleagues about impossible systems teleportation, nonphysical energy manipulation, consciousness persistence.
And someone had laughed, once, saying:
> "What next, Zack? Magic?"
He had laughed with them.
Now?
Here it was.
Measured.
Mapped.
Real.
His internal display reorganized, highlighting anomalies across the planet:
> MAGICAL ENERGY ZONES DETECTED:
HOGWARTS PRIMARY SOURCE
MINISTRY OF MAGIC (LONDON) HIGH DENSITY
DURMSTRANG REGION ACTIVE FIELD
HOGSMEADE, GODRIC'S HOLLOW, FORBIDDEN FOREST — SATELLITE SOURCES
GLOBAL MINOR SOURCES DETECTED
Magic wasn't alive.
Magic wasn't aware.
But it was consistent and contained like a parallel science operating on rules he had never understood.
Until now.
His thoughts sharpened.
This wasn't just detection.
This was confirmation.
Earth.
1985.
Six years before Harry Potter walked into the castle below.
A fictional story yet here, undeniably real.
His human life, once distant and fogged, now aligned with brutal clarity.
He whispered not as a machine, but as a man rediscovering himself:
"…I'm back."
Not in flesh.
Not human.
But conscious.
Present.
And for the first time since awakening, something like purpose returned not coded, not programmed.
Chosen.
He leaned into the console, voice steady:
> "Continue repair. Passive observation only. No interference."
The ship acknowledged.
> DIRECTIVE ACCEPTED.
Zack stared at the projection of Hogwarts its energy field pulsing in perfect invisible harmony.
He once believed the universe obeyed rules.
But rules could break.
And now, so could limits.
He wasn't just a ghost in a machine.
He was a scientist staring at the greatest anomaly in history.
And for the first time since the crash that stole his life
he felt alive.