It wasn't just a meteor. It wasn't an object falling from the heavens. It was a will descending—a consciousness wrapped in fire and speed, burning a hole through reality. The falling star was a herald.
And Aiden knew its name.
"Ravuun," he whispered.
A name from the edge of his nightmares. Not a being, but a protocol. The Architects' first retaliatory strike—an intelligence without mercy, forged from the remains of failed timelines. It sought only to erase deviation. It came when containment failed.
And it was falling toward Earth like a divine reaping.
"Everyone underground," Aiden barked, snapping the others to action.
Lira's face paled. "We're not ready. The Anthem Protocol—"
"Won't stop this," Sorin muttered. "We need something older."
Isaiah turned to Aiden. "What do you remember?"
Aiden clenched his fists. "Enough."
The blast hit the ocean with the force of a trillion hammers. Tsunamis shattered the Pacific rim. Light bent. Time skipped. And where Ravuun landed, the water boiled away to reveal a standing figure, twenty feet tall, cloaked in geometric armor that glitched like corrupted code.
Ravuun didn't walk. It unfolded.
Its body was language. A cathedral of commands and forgotten logic gates. Wherever it looked, matter recompiled. Reality changed shape to suit its will.
And then it spoke:
"CONTAINMENT FAILED. REWRITE IN PROGRESS."
The sky turned to wireframe.
And Earth began to vanish.
But Aiden had prepared for this.
Deep within the Spire, he activated a chamber sealed since his abduction. A fail-safe encoded not in the physical world, but in his DNA—a beacon wrapped in paradox.
"Codex Heart," he said, pressing his hand against the sigil.
The room lit with silver fire. Threads of causality whipped around him, searching for narrative anchors. Aiden poured memory into it—not just his own, but the fragments of other Aidens from fractured timelines. He let their sacrifice fuel the forge.
And from that storm, he pulled a weapon.
A sword of memory. A blade of what should have been.
He rose above the Spire, wreathed in living memory.
"Ravuun!" he shouted. "You are not my fate."
The giant turned.
And the sky screamed.