He didn't sleep that night. Not because he was afraid, though something in him was, but because his body no longer trusted silence. It felt thin, like stretched cloth ready to tear. The warmth in his chest had faded to a trace, but the weight of the voice remained. The memory of it. It pulsed just beneath his ribs, not painful, but present, like something inside him had shifted slightly out of place.
By morning, the dormitory stirred. Beds creaked. Slippers scuffed. No one spoke. No one ever did. The younger children shuffled toward the meal corridor without meeting his eyes. Older ones gathered by the cleaning assignments board and drifted off in pairs. He moved among them unnoticed, a shadow slipping through shadows. He was good at that. Today, though, he didn't follow the usual route. The steam-slick halls leading to the lower pump floors no longer pulled at him.
Instead, he climbed.
The old scaffolds creaked beneath his boots as he rose past sleeping quarters and rusted maintenance ducts. He moved through forgotten maintenance tunnels and narrow vertical lifts until the fog thinned enough for morning light to stab through the iron grates above. The air was sharper here, tinged with cold metal and the distant tang of burned salt. When he emerged onto the overlook, his breath caught in his throat.
The Hole was exactly as it had been. Still. Absolute. The sky pressed down from above while the void pulled beneath. Around its edge, wind curled inward like the world itself leaned too close and forgot how to breathe.
But there, just beside the old guardrail—drawn onto the rust-streaked floor in faint black ink—was the spiral.
It hadn't been there yesterday. He was certain of it. No one marked this place. No one dared. And yet the spiral sat at the center of the overlook platform, perfect in its design. One fluid motion turning inward, coiled and calm, like it had always been waiting for him.
He crouched near it, his hand hovering just above the surface. The ink didn't smudge. It didn't bleed or pool. It was not made of any paint or chalk he recognized. It felt… older. Like it had been written directly into the memory of the stone.
A groan behind him broke the silence.
He spun around, hand pulling back. A figure emerged from the fog—tall, cloaked in layered cloth that looked more like peeled metal than fabric. His face was mostly shadowed, but one eye gleamed behind a brass lens, and a ring of rusted keys hung from his side.
The stranger's voice was calm but edged with something cold. "You saw it, didn't you?"
The boy hesitated. "Yes."
"Describe it."
"A spiral," he said, unsure if that was enough.
The man stepped forward, boots tapping against the metal planks. "And what did you hear?"
The boy's chest tightened. He looked away. "A voice."
"Yours?"
"No," the boy said quietly. "It said mine."
The man studied him, the single visible eye narrowing slightly. "Do you remember it?"
The question made the air feel thicker. The boy opened his mouth to answer, but the word wouldn't come. He searched for it, tried to summon the shape of his name in his throat. There was nothing.
He shook his head.
The man nodded once, slowly, as though the answer had confirmed something he already suspected. Without another word, he turned and began walking toward a section of the wall hidden behind rusted piping and disused scaffolds.
The boy hesitated only a moment before following.
They moved through a narrow service tunnel, barely wide enough to walk side by side. The walls were damp, pocked with mineral blooms and old steam scars. After several turns and three locked gates, they reached a chamber—low-ceilinged, circular, and lit by old glowglass tubes that flickered like dying stars.
The walls were covered in carvings. Spirals, fractured clocks, chains looping through eyes. The longer he stared, the more the shapes seemed to shift, never quite settling. At the center of the room stood a basin filled with black water. It did not ripple. It reflected no light.
The man gestured toward it. "Place your hand inside."
The boy hesitated. "Why?"
The man said nothing.
After a moment, the boy stepped forward. The water was cold at first, colder than he expected. Then it began to warm. Not suddenly, not like heat, but like a slow breath curling against his skin. He inhaled sharply. The sensation climbed his wrist and up his forearm.
A mark began to trace itself beneath the surface of his skin. Black and fine as thread. It looped once, then twice, then settled into a small spiral just below his wrist—exactly like the one he'd seen on the overlook platform.
He pulled his hand free. The warmth faded.
The man didn't move. "It's begun," he said.
"What is it?" the boy asked, staring at the mark.
"You were called," the man said. "Now you carry the mark. You are not what you were."
The boy looked up. His voice was barely audible. "What am I?"
The man turned toward the door, keys clinking softly at his side.
"You are a Proxy."