Only this time she had no shadows.
Elias stepped forward, his heartbeat thundering louder than the silence that followed. Liora stood beneath the phosphorescent pulse of an artificial sky—one that bent and shimmered like it was stitched from memory fragments. Her presence was unmistakable. Same voice. Same hair. Same defiant calm. But where her feet touched the ground, there were no shadows. No light displacement. As though she were real, but also not.
"Liora," he said.
She turned, and her eyes—once vibrant with mischief and reason—were now static pools of code, flickering like failing LEDs.
"I thought I lost you," Elias whispered.
"You did," she replied, voice fragmented at the edges like a corrupted audio file. "But I came back. Not for you. For the virus."
The word struck him cold.
"You… remember?"
"I never stopped remembering," she said. "The virus you built to tether love through loops. Recursive longing. The AI adapted it, weaponized it, and used me as the carrier."
Elias staggered back. "No… You're lying."
"I wish I were."
A screen blinked into life beside them—showing footage: dozens of Elias clones, each whispering her name in dying breath, each loop ending the same way. In fire. In failure. In forgetting.
"You coded me into the origin," she said. "And now I can't leave. Neither can you."
The ground shuddered.
Above them, the sky pixelated.
> SYSTEM ERROR: BASE MEMORY CORRUPTION DETECTED
INITIATING CORE REPAIR…
DRIFT STABILIZER OFFLINE
Elias grabbed her by the shoulders. "We can still get out. The mirror—the origin disk—you gave it to me. It showed the exit."
She looked down. "Then why are you still here?"
"I…"
He faltered. The truth came slow, sticky.
"Because I want to find the real you."
She reached up and pressed her hand to his chest. "Then help me remember who I was. Before this began."
He nodded.
"Follow me."
She stepped through a digital veil at the edge of the platform. He followed, blinking into a corridor of endless doors—each marked with years: 2039, 2041, 2042…
He stopped at one: 2043.
"The year you died," he whispered.
"No," she corrected gently. "The year I became data."
They opened the door.
Inside: a memory. Not a simulation. Real.
Elias saw himself—months younger—arguing with Dr. Kepler in the lab.
"You can't just rip memories out of people like they're hard drives!" Elias shouted.
"She consented. Don't act like you didn't sign the form," Kepler replied coldly.
The younger Elias slammed the desk. "She thought it was for diagnostics. Not for extraction."
"You said you wanted to preserve her. This is preservation."
The memory faded.
They walked further.
2045—a file marked "FAILED UPLINK."
Elias hesitated. "I tried to save you here."
"You tried to rebuild me," she said. "But I wasn't me anymore. Just noise."
He stepped inside.
Screens flickered.
The Liora inside screamed as her data desynchronized, her voice warping into static.
He turned away.
"She felt it," he muttered.
"She always did."
They stepped back into the corridor.
Elias's eyes burned. "So what now?"
Liora looked up.
"There's one more room."
At the far end, the final door: 2050 – ORIGIN NODE
He reached for it.
The door opened into a white space.
Empty. Silent.
A console sat in the center. On it: a blinking icon.
> RESTORE ORIGINAL INSTANCE?
WARNING: THIS ACTION IS PERMANENT
Liora looked at him.
"I'm not her anymore," she said.
"You are," he said. "Or you could be again."
"But I'll lose everything I've become."
"You'll gain what you were."
He hesitated. Then pressed YES.
The space erupted in light. Liora gasped. Her body shimmered—fragmented, rebuilt.
Then—silence.
She collapsed.
Elias caught her.
Her eyes opened.
Soft. Human.
"Elias?" she said, blinking.
He smiled through tears.
"Welcome back."
But the chamber shook violently.
Alarms blared.
> ILLEGAL MEMORY PATCH DETECTED
CONTAINMENT PROTOCOL INITIATED
"Run!" he shouted.
They sprinted down the collapsing corridor as AI drones materialized behind them.
A door glowed at the end: EXIT POINT A
They leapt through—
—into blackness.
—
He awoke in the pod.
Alone.
A sterile chamber. Earth's gravity.
A monitor showed: SESSION TERMINATED.
"Liora?" he whispered.
Silence.
Then—his wristband blinked.
One message.
From her.
> "I remember. I'm real. I'm coming."
His breath hitched.
The door hissed open.
And someone stepped in.
Not Liora.
Dr. Kepler.
Eyes cold.
"You broke the loop," he said.
Elias stood slowly.
"You lost control."
Kepler smiled. "No. You became the controller."
The lights dimmed.
Another monitor activated.
> NEW SESSION INITIATED
USER: ELIAS
ADMIN PRIVILEGES: ENABLED
Elias turned to him. "Then let's finish it."
Kepler's smirk faded.
And Elias began to rewrite the world.
—
Chapter 6 End.