Chapter 23: Whispers Beneath the Skin
Darkness hummed like a secret in the air.
The Resistance's underground base was unusually quiet. Even the lights seemed to flicker slower, as if the shadows themselves had weight.
Elira moved down the corridor alone, her boots echoing faintly against the steel floor. She hadn't slept. Not after what Nira had whispered.
> "Something else woke up inside me."
She couldn't forget the way Nira's eyes glowed in the dark… like they weren't hers anymore.
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Inside the Medical Wing
Captain Rhea stood beside the glass observation room, arms folded as she stared inside. Elira joined her silently.
Nira was in the room.
She sat cross-legged on the floor, eyes closed, as thin ice bloomed beneath her palms. Sensors flickered with erratic readings. Brainwaves oscillated in violent patterns. One screen simply said:
> UNRECOGNIZED SIGNAL DETECTED
"She's destabilizing," Rhea said softly. "Whatever Vira built into her… it's unraveling."
"She's still in there," Elira replied. "I can feel it."
Rhea looked over. "Can you save her?"
Elira's voice didn't waver. "Yes."
But deep down… she wasn't sure.
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Ares Brings News
In the war room, Ares slammed a file onto the table.
"They're moving," he said. "Vira's operatives just wiped out a Resistance cell in Berlin. No traces left. No footage. Only one survivor—and she said something... strange."
Noah frowned. "Stranger than mind-controlled clones and girls made of frost?"
Ares slid a photograph across the table.
It showed a creature.
Tall. Pale. Eyes sunken. Its body was thin like bone, its mouth stretched in an unnatural grin. Frost had spread in a perfect circle around where it stood—like a death radius.
"This isn't one of her soldiers," Ares said. "This is something else."
"Something born of her experiments," Soren added. "A test subject that survived."
"And now," Ares finished, "she's sending it to find Nira."
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The Fracture
Back in the observation room, Nira whispered to herself.
> "I see it. It crawls behind my eyes."
Her breath came in short gasps.
> "Elira… it's me but not me…"
Her reflection in the mirror shifted—eyes too wide, smile too sharp.
She reached out and touched the glass.
And her reflection smiled back without moving its hand.
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The Hunt Begins
Far away, in a ruined city north of Prague, the creature stood motionless beneath a shattered tower.
It didn't breathe. It didn't blink.
But it felt.
It felt her.
The frost that pulsed through its corrupted veins was calling to Nira.
With a twitch of its neck, it leapt into motion—running, sprinting, tearing through metal and stone, moving faster than a machine and more silent than death.
Vira's voice echoed in its head:
> "Find her. Bring her back whole. Or broken."
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The Warning
Suddenly, Nira sat up straight in her room. Her eyes snapped open.
"It's coming."
Elira ran to her side. "What is?"
Nira didn't answer. She gripped Elira's hand tight.
"You need to kill me before it gets here."
Elira froze.
"No."
"You don't understand. It's not just after me. It's me. It's the part of me she didn't finish. The one that wants to hurt you."
Elira looked into Nira's trembling silver eyes. "Then we'll face it. Together."
The alarms blared.
Soren's voice echoed over the speakers.
> "Perimeter breach. Target inbound. It's not human."
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