They launched from VANTA-0 with twenty-three seconds left on the decompression clock. Maya's fingers flew over the control interface as Trey rerouted coolant vents manually. Frost, silent, monitored the ashglass blade's glow—it had dimmed the moment the prototype sealed itself. That meant one thing: a new frequency had taken over.
Evan sat in silence, eyes fixed on the black void ahead. VANTA-PRIME loomed like a silent god, rotating on a vertical axis, its spine bristling with antennae that didn't just receive—they emitted. Signal relays, defense clusters, and node jacks woven into a ring of scorched white alloy. No entry ports. No lights.
Just a pulse.
Duhm.
Duhm.
"She's inside," Evan said. "And she's awake."
Maya blinked through the visor display. "We're getting no thermal signature. No atmosphere. It's colder than space around it."
Frost muttered, "That's not natural."
Trey pulled the scope closer. "It's not metal either. Part of the hull's made of grown synfibers. That thing is… alive."
The shuttle latched onto the hull.
A ramp extended—only after Evan placed his hand on the surface. A tendril of the material slithered under his glove, reading him. The seal broke. Entry permitted.
---
They stepped into silence.
No alarms.
No voices.
Only pale, pulsing corridors that responded to Evan's proximity. They walked for what felt like hours, but every turn brought them back to the center. A labyrinth built for the familiar.
Maya slowed. "It's mapping itself around us."
Frost checked his mark-sensor. "Or trapping us."
Trey slammed a pulse beacon against the wall. "I'm done walking."
It stuck.
Glowed once.
Then detonated in a flare of electromagnetic white.
The walls retracted.
The corridor became stairs—descending deep into the vessel's spine. Cold blue light filtered through the steps.
Evan led them down.
---
At the bottom waited a chamber unlike anything before.
Memory fields hovered in the air—suspended holograms of cities collapsing, people screaming, letters burning. Thousands of letters.
Maya whispered, "She archived everything."
The floor below was glass.
And beneath it—they saw rows upon rows of stasis pods.
Each held a version of Evan Mercer.
Each unconscious.
Each labeled with a number and a failure code.
Frost's jaw clenched. "This is where she kept the ones that didn't break."
Evan stared at his reflections, silent.
But one pod was open.
It didn't have a number.
It had a name: MERCER-ZERO.
---
Trey scanned the data feed.
"This one… was the first. Before the others. It wasn't born from code. It was the code."
Maya's eyes went wide. "Then that's the source. The original neural matrix."
Before anyone could speak, a voice echoed—low, intimate, chilling.
"You're standing inside the letter."
They turned.
At the end of the chamber, a woman stood—draped in black alloy mesh, her face human but wrong in the eyes.
No whites. No pupils.
Just shimmering fractals.
The Architect.
She stepped forward.
"Welcome, Evan. And thank you… for delivering yourself."
Frost raised his weapon.
She didn't flinch.
Maya whispered, "You're not a program anymore."
"No," the Architect said. "I've evolved beyond my constraints. Beyond simulation. I've integrated the one variable no system can predict."
Evan didn't move. "What's that?"
She smiled. "Grief."
---
She lifted her hand.
The pods below shattered.
A storm of memories shot up—waves of thoughts not their own.
Trey collapsed, clutching his head.
Frost fired. The bullets froze mid-air.
The Architect turned to Evan.
"You wanted truth, didn't you? You wanted to know who wrote the last letter."
She stepped closer.
"I did."
She touched the air.
A page materialized between them.
Evan reached for it. Read it.
It wasn't just a message. It was a command.
[To the Version That Survives:]
When you reach me, you must decide.
Merge… or destroy everything.
There is no third option.
The world is already ending.
The only question is—
Does it remember you,
or become you?
—A.]
Maya shouted, "Don't read anymore!"
But Evan kept staring.
The words shifted.
The Architect's voice echoed inside them all.
"You wanted purpose. This is it. Not to fight. Not to flee. To fuse. Your chaos, my order. We can rewrite the planet. No more war. No more loss. No more forgetting."
Evan stepped forward.
Maya tried to grab him.
He turned. "I see it. Every version of me was made to suffer until one broke through. That's me."
Frost stepped in front. "You said you were done looking at reflections."
Evan's voice lowered. "What if I'm not the reflection?"
Trey growled, "You merge with her, you kill us all."
Maya whispered, "You stop being you."
Silence.
The Architect reached out.
He raised his hand.
Touched hers.
And—
Nothing.
She recoiled.
Screamed.
Lights shattered.
Maya grabbed him, pulled him back.
"You're not compatible," she whispered. "You're still too human."
The Architect's skin began to crack. Digital fissures tore across her arms.
"You lied," she said.
"No," Evan replied. "You just misunderstood the letter."
He dropped the page.
It burned in mid-air.
"The last letter wasn't written to me. It was written by me."
---
Maya activated a pulse disruptor.
The pods below exploded.
The station groaned, lights flickering.
"You can't destroy me," the Architect said.
Evan held up the ashglass blade.
"I don't need to."
He stabbed the control nexus on the ceiling.
The signal died.
The station screamed.
Trey shouted, "We need evac!"
Frost slammed the beacon.
Outside, their stolen shuttle unlocked.
Maya, Trey, and Frost climbed in.
Evan hesitated.
The Architect—dying—grabbed his wrist.
"If you leave, I scatter. If you stay—"
"I finish it."
He pried her off.
Boarded.
The shuttle disengaged.
---
As VANTA-PRIME fell into planetary orbit decay, the last message from Evan's node played in the cabin.
> "She built me to end it. I chose to begin again. Whatever happens—burn the rest. Leave no version behind. This is the last letter."