..... POV.
The night was cold, it just finished raining so I was in my room working on the project. Then from underneath the door, a shadowy figure appeared and the i new.
"It has come", i said
I quickly grabbed my sniper gun, a pistol, some bullets and went through the window. The wind screams in my ears. Three floors down. I twisted mif air hitting the fire escape hard, pain flaring through my legs but i kept moving as always i keep moving.
Behind Me-
The apartment door burst open.
Don't look back but i feel him.
That familiar presence.
Like being watched through a scope you can't see.
I slide down the ladder, boots hitting the alley with a wet splash. Rain began pouring down.
I ducked behind a dumpster, assemble the sniper in seconds. I climbed onto a staircase, took position and breathe slowly. Through the scope i see as he steps on the shattered window. Tall, calm, unrushed. He just looks down straight at me. It really looks like him but this isn't him.
My finger placed on the trigger. Then i squeezed against the trigger. The shot was a clean one, so perfect, almost too perfect.
He moves before the bullet reaches him, almost like he knew where it would land before i decided to fire. That shot That shot shattered the concrete behind him.
"That really isn't him", i said
The real him would have taken the shit head on just to prove a point.
This thing tilted it head as if studying, curious but empty.
"Is this a copy?", i asked.
"Or a proxy?", i continued.
I took another round.
This time, i didn't aim for him.
I aimed beside him - three inches left, chest high, where nothing should matter.
I fired, it ripped through the rain and slams into the air and something invisible sparks.
It stumbles clutching at empty space, its outline glitching- skin folding in on itself, face flickering between version that didn't quite match.
It then spoke "- adaptation failure -"
The thing straighten slowly.
It locks eyes with me again - but now there is anger.
Not emotion.
The alley light die all at once.
Every exit feels...measured.
Calculated.
I already know what this means.
Narrator:
Let's hit a pause.
Take a step back.
The girl u see in the alley is named Morrie and that figure u see would come up later.
You see growing up had a rough childhood.
Her mum left her when she was still little enough to wait by the door convinced that footsteps meant she would come back this time.
"daddy where is mommy going?" she asked.
"I don't know honey", he replied.
"I want to go with her" she cried.
"No honey, she would be back", he said.
But she never did.
Her dad tired his best to fill the silence.
He was in the military-special operations. This unit is the type of unit that never made the news. He wasn't always home but when he was, he was there for her. The taught Morrie how to stay calm under pressure, taught her self defence as little as she was, taught her fear isn't something you run away from it was something you faced.
They were close in a quiet way.
Shared looks, words and trust.
Then the war took him.
No body.
No final call.
Just a folded flag and officers who wouldn't meet her eyes.
Morrie was broken that day.
Not loudly.
Not in front of anyone.
Something inside her just.... Shut.
She stopped waiting for people to stay, stopped believing things were permanent.
Stopped needing comfort.
Instead she learned control.
Because control was the only thing that never left her.
But she found it the hard way.
When she was 8 she ran away from the house because of hunting memories.
She met a boy on the streets, he was a older than her her, quiet, always watching. The kind of kid that adults forgets is in the room. He didn't ask any questions about her family or her past. He just just sat with her. Shared his food and even took her to his home, an abandoned building without saying much.
For the first time since her father died Morrie felt...chosen