The corridor breathed around them... slow, uneven, like lungs that had forgotten how to function. Every step Ray took made the metal grates hum beneath his boots, reverberating up the walls in a hollow rattle that felt intentional. Lyra's weight on his back shifted with each movement; she kept her arms around his shoulders, her cheek resting weakly near his neck. Her breathing came in thin, threaded pulls, sometimes steady, sometimes clipped by pain.
Lysandra followed close behind, pistol raised, eyes scanning every shadow that moved even half a millimeter. Sweat clung to her jawline, catching flashes of red emergency light. She kept glancing at Ray's back... at the way he carried Lyra with such silent focus... and then quickly snapped her gaze forward each time, jaw tight.
The corridor tightened, ceiling lowering until even Ray was forced to dip his head. Broken panels scraped lightly against his shoulder as he passed. Loose wiring hung down like vines, twitching occasionally with faint static. A low hum traveled along the metal, a vibration that felt less like machinery and more like a warning.
Up ahead, faint light glowed from a half-open blast door.
Ray slowed.
Lyra stirred. "Ray… where are we…?"
"Somewhere safer than the last room," he said. "Temporarily."
Behind them, Lysandra muttered, "Define safe."
One look at the door answered her.
Thick steel. Bent at the hinges. Black scorch marks around the frame. Something had forced its way out, not in.
Ray stepped through.
The Biomedical Core opened like the interior of a wounded machine. Rows of shattered consoles formed crooked lines across the floor. Broken monitors flickered in dying pulses, each frame glitching between static, black, and brief fragments of data that refused to form anything readable. A long table in the center had been overturned, glass vials shattered beneath it.
The walls were lined with observation pods... cylindrical chambers, most broken, a few still fogged from the inside as if something had only recently left. The air smelled of preservative chemicals, scorched circuits, and something faintly organic... like living tissue sealed too long.
Lyra's breath tightened.
Lysandra's frown deepened. "This… is not a place we should be standing in."
Ray didn't answer. His attention was fixed on the far corner of the room, where a cluster of consoles remained intact, powered by a backup system that pulsed a quiet, steady blue. The screens there were cracked, but not dead.
He lowered Lyra carefully onto a padded medical bench, one that had somehow survived the collapse. Her hand slid weakly to his sleeve before he stepped back.
"Don't go far…" she whispered.
"I won't."
Lysandra watched the exchange with a mixture she couldn't mask. She holstered her pistol only for a moment before drawing it again, restless.
Lyra winced and pressed a hand to her bandaged leg. Ray crouched and checked the bandage, fingers moving with quiet efficiency.
"You need rest," he murmured.
She managed a small, tired laugh. "Rest… isn't exactly an option here."
"I'll make it one."
Lysandra's eyebrow twitched. "And what about the three dozen things crawling in the vents?"
Ray responded without looking at her, "They'll come either way. Rest now."
Lyra exhaled, fragile but trusting.
For a moment, the room was still.
Then... A soft click sounded from one of the consoles.
A recording flickered onto the largest surviving screen... grainy, distorted, but intact enough to show a silhouette wearing a white coat. A man. Shoulders tense. Movements hurried.
Lyra's eyes widened. "That… that looks like..."
Her father.
The image sharpened briefly, resolving into a face exhausted yet fierce, eyes darting off-screen as though he was speaking under a countdown.
Lysandra stepped forward, breath catching. "This is restricted data. Level Omega. Nobody was supposed to..."
The recording cut through her.
"...to whoever finds this… if she's alive… protect my daughter. Protect Lyra Veridine. They will come for her. They will..."
Static consumed the frame. The audio spiked, screeched, then stabilized again.
"...and Subject Zero. If he escapes containment… if the entity fully integrates… God help the world."
Lyra's blood ran cold.
Lysandra slowly turned toward Ray. "Subject Zero… that's..."
She didn't finish.
Ray's face didn't change, but something deeper inside him shifted... like a wire pulled too tight beneath the surface.
The recording continued:
"...I found proof that the project was altered. That the Board replaced core protocols. They wanted fusion. They wanted a weapon with autonomous instinct. They wanted something no human could kill. If you're hearing this… I failed to stop it."
Lyra clutched Ray's sleeve, trembling. "He's alive… he was alive... until everything collapsed. Ray… he knew you."
Ray didn't respond immediately.
Lysandra's voice softened, the tsundere edge slipping for once. "Aaron… Ray… what did they do to you?"
Ray straightened. "Enough."
He scanned the ceiling.
Something had changed.
Noise.. soft, faint... like the rustle of many limbs brushing against metal. The vents along the upper walls rattled. A hairline crack split across the rightmost panel.
"Ray…" Lyra whispered.
He stepped in front of her.
Lysandra raised her gun. "Movement. Multiple."
The vent above her bulged slightly, metal stretching.
She backed up. "Okay, no... no no no..."
The vent burst in absolute silence, metal bending outward without sound.
This silence was wrong. Silence meant the creature had learned.
Two shadows descended... fast and precise. One angled toward Lyra's back, the other toward Lysandra's shoulder.
Ray had one second.
〈Two death points. Again.〉 The entity whispered, calm and cold.
Ray didn't think.
He grabbed a steel tray from the floor and hurled it with a force that cracked the air.
It sliced the first creature mid-descent, tearing straight through its chest. Black fluid sprayed the console. The tray ricocheted, spinning upward, and clipped the second creature's jaw... just enough to divert its trajectory.
Lysandra flinched as it grazed past her, clipping a strand of hair again.
Her scream was not fear.
"MY HAIR... THIS AGAIN?!"
She shot it point-blank five times.
Ray crushed the first creature's skull under his heel, then turned just in time to catch the second one by the spine and slam it into a table until it stopped moving.
Silence again.
Lysandra touched her hair... then froze.
"Aaron." Voice trembling. "How. Many. Strands. This time."
"Two," Ray said.
"GOD..." She kicked the corpse. "Do you have ANY idea how long... never mind... JUST never mind..."
Lyra covered her mouth, shoulders shaking. A half-laugh, half-sob escaped her.
Ray checked both of them for wounds. Lysandra batted his hand away but went red. Lyra held onto his sleeve, grounding herself.
"Stay close," he said.
As if cued, the floor vibrated under their feet.
Not from the vents. Not from the hallway. From below.
A deep, resonant rumble rolled like a heartbeat behind the walls.
Lysandra tightened her grip on her pistol. "That's not a scrapling. That's something bigger."
Ray scanned the room.
"Find cover. Now."
Lyra's voice trembled. "Ray… what's coming?"
He didn't answer.
Because he didn't need to.
The temperature dropped sharply; condensation gathered on the broken monitors. Frost formed in jagged lines across the floor tiles.
Then...
From behind the glass observation wall, a silhouette moved.
Not crawling. Not skittering.
Walking.
Slow. Heavy. A shape too human at first glance, until the proportions betrayed itarms too long, torso too narrow, neck stretched like a pulled tendon. Its eyes glowed faintly through the frost.
The observation wall cracked.
Lyra swallowed. "Ray… that thing… it's looking at us."
Lysandra whispered, stunned, "No. Not at us. At you."
The glass shattered.
The creature stepped through.
Ray pushed Lyra behind him. Lysandra moved to the flank.
The creature stopped five meters away.
It lifted its head.
And then... in a voice torn, broken, but unmistakably shaped for speech...
It rasped:
"…Aaron…?"
Lyra froze. Lysandra's eyes widened. Ray's heartbeat finally shifted... by a fraction.
The creature took one step forward.
"Aa… ron…"
A name dragged out of something that should not possess a voice.
Lysandra whispered harshly, "Ray... what is that? It knows you."
Lyra clutched Ray's sleeve tighter. "Ray… don't… please don't go near it."
The creature extended one trembling hand.
"…brother…"
And Ray understood.
Not with memory.
But with instinct.
Subject One.
The experiment created after him.
The backup.
The failure.
The reflection.
Lyra whispered, tearful, "Ray… what does it want with you?"
Ray's voice came low, calm, dangerous.
"It wants what all failed subjects want."
Lysandra swallowed. "Which is…?"
Ray stepped forward once, shielding the girls completely.
"A reason I deserved to survive more than they did."
The creature lunged.
The floor split under its weight.
Ray moved.
Lysandra fired.
Lyra screamed his name.
And the Biomedical Core erupted into chaos.