The moment Marin vanished, the world followed her.
A deep rumble shook the floor beneath us—
not machinery,
not an earthquake,
but something alive groaning through the concrete,
as if the tunnels themselves were reacting to her absence.
Lira grabbed my arm.
"Elias—MOVE."
But I couldn't.
I stared at the empty space where Marin had been seconds ago.
Silver dust still drifted in the air like falling ash.
I whispered her name.
"Marin…"
The room warped.
The walls bowed inward,
bendable as wet paper.
The lights spasmed between blinding white and suffocating dark.
The shadow's voice seeped through the cracks:
"You were warned."
Lira yanked at me again.
"Elias. Listen to me. She isn't gone. Not completely. But if we stay here, we will be."
The shadow laughed—low, scraping, bone-deep.
"She is nothing without the memory I hold."
I snapped.
I didn't feel anger—
I became it.
"You killed her!"
My voice tore out of me raw and breaking.
"You killed my sister!"
The shadow whispered:
"I saved you from her."
The floor split under our feet.
A fissure raced across the room,
opening like a hungry mouth.
Lira pushed me toward the door.
"No time. Elias—RUN!"
I stumbled out of the collapsing room, concrete raining down behind us.
Tunnels twisted violently—
corridors folding into themselves like wrinkling metal.
Pipes burst, spraying sparks.
Memory static flickered in the air, stinging my skin like fireflies made of pain.
Lira shouted over the roar:
"The rupture is destabilizing the whole layer! Whatever you saw—whatever memory broke free—it pissed off Mnemosyne's whole system."
A ladder overhead led to another maintenance corridor.
Lira climbed first, pulling me up with sheer force and adrenaline.
As I reached the top platform, the floor below us crumbled into a swirling pit of corrupted memory.
A scream echoed from inside the pit.
Marin's voice.
"Eli—! Don't—let—me—"
Her cry cut off.
I lurched forward.
"MARIN!"
Lira grabbed the back of my shirt and slammed me against the wall.
"Elias—STOP—IT ISN'T REAL."
My chest heaved.
"But that was her—"
"No," she said firmly, gripping my shoulders.
"That was him mimicking her. Using your missing memory against you. He knows exactly where to cut."
I squeezed my eyes shut.
The missing space inside me throbbed like an open wound.
A memory that made Marin real to me.
Made her family.
A memory that was the foundation of her existence.
The memory he took.
The tunnels shuddered again—
this time with a loud, metallic groan.
Lira cursed.
"We need to get deeper or higher. Either direction is better than here."
I shook my head slowly.
"No. He wants us lost. This place is folding because I saw the first piece."
Lira narrowed her eyes.
"And what was it?"
I opened my mouth—
but the words refused to form.
Something unseen clamped down on my throat.
I choked.
Lira stepped closer.
"Elias—what did you see?"
I whispered through clenched teeth:
"I can't say it."
A flicker of fear crossed her face.
"Something is blocking you?"
"Yes."
"Is it Mnemosyne?"
"No."
"Then—"
"The shadow," I said.
"It's his."
She swore softly.
The metal walkway we stood on began to tilt.
Rivets snapped free like gunshots.
We ran.
Lira's boots pounded the steel; my legs moved on instinct.
But the missing part of me made everything unstable—
my steps off-rhythm,
my balance uneven,
my senses half a beat behind reality.
A pipe above us ruptured.
Steam blasted downward.
Lira shoved me aside, taking the burn across her arm instead.
She bit back a scream.
"Keep—moving—!"
We burst into a wider chamber.
It was filled with old server racks—
dead machines
humming with faint, dying pulses.
The entire room groaned like an ancient beast.
Lira grabbed my hand again.
"Elias—don't fade on me. Stay here. Stay now."
But the world began to double,
then triple,
as if my mind was splitting into three overlapping frames.
The stolen memory burned behind my eyes.
My vision blurred—
A child's hand holding another.
A whispered promise.
A little girl sobbing in a white hallway.
And the shadow speaking over it:
"She was never yours."
I staggered.
Lira caught me as my knees buckled.
"Elias!"
"I'm—slipping," I gasped.
"He took… too much."
The wall in front of us cracked open like an egg.
Darkness spilled through.
Not lightless dark—
but alive dark.
The shadow stepped through it.
Not fully formed.
Half of his body was Elias.
Half was monstrous.
Both wrong.
Both terrifying.
He spread his arms as though welcoming us.
"Come home, Elias."
Lira aimed her disruptor.
"Stay back!"
He tilted his head.
"You cannot kill what lives in him."
The floor rumbled again—
a final warning before total collapse.
Lira pulled me behind a server rack.
"We need to find—"
I cut her off.
"My memories."
She blinked.
"What?"
"Not all of them. Just the missing ones. The ones tied to Marin."
She grabbed my face, forcing me to focus on her.
"Elias—if you try to retrieve the memory he stole, he'll tear your mind apart."
I met her eyes.
"I'd rather break than let her fade."
Lira stared at me for a long second.
Then nodded once.
"Then we find the memory. Fast."
The shadow's footsteps echoed slowly through the chamber.
"You cannot hide from yourself."
The servers around us sparked.
Screens flickered.
The digital hum twisted into a low, mournful wail.
Lira took a breath.
"Elias… listen carefully."
Her voice dropped lower.
"We're going to run straight through him."
I stared at her.
"What?"
She tightened her grip on my wrist.
"You trust me?"
My heartbeat hammered.
"…With everything."
She smirked despite the terror.
"Good. Because this is going to hurt."
She pulled me to my feet.
The shadow spread its arms.
"Come to me."
Lira whispered:
"Three… two… one—GO."
And we ran.
Straight toward the monster wearing my face.
Straight into the dark.
Straight into the memory that could save Marin—
or kill me.