The tunnel stank of iron and rot. Water dripped from somewhere overhead, echoing through the silence like a ticking clock. Lyra knelt beside Damien, her hands slick with his blood.
His face was pale, his breathing shallow but steady. "You need a doctor," she whispered, her voice trembling.
"No hospitals," he rasped. "They'll find us."
Lyra clenched her jaw. "Then we'll find someone else."
She looked down the dim corridor. The subway tracks stretched into darkness, broken only by faint emergency lights. There was no sign of Sable. No footsteps. No rescue. Just the two of them, hidden beneath a city that wanted them dead.
"Damien," she said, her voice breaking, "stay awake, please."
He managed a weak smirk. "I've taken worse."
"Yeah?" She pressed harder on his wound. "From who, exactly? Vega? Or the people you used to guard while they tortured me?"
His eyes flickered open — guilt, pain, and something else she couldn't name. "You believe her."
"I don't know what to believe," she said. "But I saw your signature on those files. You worked for them."
"I didn't know they used you," he said, voice hoarse. "I didn't even know your name back then."
"Would it have mattered?"
He didn't answer. And somehow, that silence hurt more than any truth could have.
---
Lyra tore a strip from her shirt and tied it around his shoulder. The bleeding slowed, but he was losing too much too fast.
She stood, scanning the tunnels. There had to be something — some exit, some forgotten path out of here. Then she saw it: an old maintenance hatch half-buried in grime and rust.
She gripped Damien's arm. "Come on. We're moving."
He tried to protest, but she was already pulling him up. Step by step, they stumbled down the tunnel, his weight heavy against her.
"You're stubborn," he muttered, teeth gritted in pain.
"Guess that makes two of us."
He gave a soft, humorless laugh — and then winced.
They finally reached the hatch. Lyra shoved it open and helped him through. On the other side was a narrow staircase leading up to what looked like an old storage room — shelves of cleaning supplies, cracked tiles, and a faint hum of power above.
They were somewhere near the industrial district. She could hear the faint whir of trucks and machinery beyond the walls.
She eased Damien onto an overturned crate. "You're not dying here. Got it?"
He smiled weakly. "I'll do my best."
---
She searched the room, found a first-aid kit with supplies old but usable. As she cleaned the wound, Damien watched her in silence.
Finally, he said, "You shouldn't have come back for me."
Lyra shot him a glare. "You really need to stop saying that."
"I'm serious. If Vega's right — if you're part of Project Helix — then the Syndicate won't stop until they have you."
"Then let them come," she said fiercely. "I'm done running."
He studied her, and she saw it again — that flicker of something dangerous and beautiful in his eyes.
"You really don't scare easy, do you?"
"Not anymore," she said softly. "I think they took that from me."
---
For a while, neither spoke. The sound of the city above was muffled, distant — like they were trapped in another world.
Then, quietly, Damien asked, "Do you remember anything? About what they did?"
Lyra hesitated. "Flashes. Pain. Needles. Fire." Her voice dropped. "And a name."
He looked up. "What name?"
"Dr. Keane." She swallowed hard. "He was there. I remember his voice — calm, clinical. He said I was a 'viable candidate.'"
Damien stiffened. "Keane's dead. He died in the fire that destroyed the facility."
"Are you sure?"
"Positive."
"Then how do I still hear him in my head?" she whispered.
He didn't answer.
---
Hours passed. Lyra managed to get Damien stable enough to move. They found an exit behind a stack of old boxes — a rusted door that opened into an alleyway.
Night had fallen again, thick and cold. Chicago's skyline glittered in the distance like a thousand watching eyes.
Lyra supported Damien as they moved down the alley. "Where can we go?"
He winced. "There's an old contact — someone who owes me a favor. A doctor. Off the grid."
Lyra narrowed her eyes. "Another one of your old Syndicate friends?"
"Something like that."
They reached an unmarked building tucked between two warehouses. Damien knocked three times, paused, then twice more.
After a long moment, the door opened — revealing an older man with silver hair and wary eyes.
"Cole," he said. "You look like hell."
"Good to see you too, Ren."
Ren's gaze shifted to Lyra. "And this is?"
"Trouble," Damien said.
Lyra crossed her arms. "You have no idea."
---
Ren led them inside. The place looked half like a clinic, half like a machine shop — tools scattered across tables, surgical lights hanging from the ceiling, wires running across the floor.
"Put him here," Ren said, motioning to a metal table.
Lyra helped Damien onto it. Ren peeled back the blood-soaked bandage and examined the wound. "Clean shot. Missed the artery. You're lucky."
"Never am," Damien muttered.
Ren worked quickly, stitching and dressing the wound with practiced precision. When he finished, he turned to Lyra. "You should get some rest."
"I'm fine."
"You look like you haven't slept in days."
She ignored him. "What do you know about Project Helix?"
Ren froze.
Damien's head turned sharply. "Lyra—"
"No," she said, voice rising. "I'm done with secrets. You said he used to work with you. So he knows."
Ren sighed heavily, removing his gloves. "You're one of them."
Lyra's stomach dropped. "One of what?"
He hesitated, then looked at Damien. "You didn't tell her?"
"She's not ready."
Lyra's eyes flashed. "Don't talk about me like I'm not here."
Ren's voice softened. "Lyra… Project Helix wasn't just genetic experimentation. It was memory reconstruction. They were trying to create perfect soldiers — people whose minds could be rewritten. They took trauma, wiped it, and rebuilt it into obedience."
Lyra's hands trembled. "So what am I? A weapon?"
"No," Ren said. "You're a mistake. You were never supposed to survive the process."
The room spun.
She grabbed the edge of the table, trying to breathe. "You're lying."
Ren shook his head. "You escaped when the lab burned. The fire triggered a neural shock that erased most of the conditioning. You're the only one who ever broke free."
Damien looked at her, guilt etched into every line of his face. "I was there that night. I saw the explosion. I thought no one made it out."
Lyra backed away. "You knew. All this time, you knew."
"I didn't know it was you," he said quickly. "Lyra, I swear—"
"Don't." Her voice cracked. "Just… don't."
---
She turned and walked out before either man could stop her.
Outside, the city air hit her like ice. The streetlights painted her shadow across the concrete, long and broken.
Her mind replayed Ren's words over and over: You're a mistake.
She wanted to scream. To run. To disappear. But deep down, something else stirred — not fear, but fury.
If what they said was true, then the Syndicate hadn't just created her. They'd tried to own her.
And they'd failed.
---
She didn't know how long she stood there before Damien found her. He stepped up beside her, his arm in a sling now, face pale but steady.
"You shouldn't be out here alone," he said quietly.
She didn't look at him. "You knew I was one of them."
"I suspected," he admitted. "But I didn't want to believe it."
She turned to him, eyes burning. "You didn't want to believe it, or you didn't want to face what you did?"
His jaw tightened. "Both."
The wind carried the faint sound of sirens from somewhere far off. For a long time, neither spoke.
Then Lyra said, "If they built me, then I want to know how. I want to know why."
Damien studied her face — the fire behind her eyes, the defiance. "That's dangerous."
"So is breathing."
He exhaled slowly. "Then we do it together."
Lyra met his gaze, the city lights reflecting in his dark eyes. "Why are you helping me?"
"Because I helped destroy you once," he said quietly. "And I'm not doing it again."
---
Later that night, while Damien rested, Lyra sat by the window, staring at her reflection in the glass. She barely recognized herself anymore — same eyes, same skin, but something beneath the surface felt different now.
She pressed her hand against her chest, feeling her heart hammering beneath her ribs.
What if that wasn't even real?
What if they'd built everything — her memories, her feelings, her pain?
And yet… when Damien looked at her, she felt real. That had to mean something.
Didn't it?
---
Her thoughts were interrupted by the faint buzz of Ren's phone on the counter. A new message flashed on the screen:
"Target location confirmed. Prepare extraction."
Lyra's stomach dropped.
She grabbed the phone, reading the rest of the message — coordinates, timestamps, Syndicate tags. Ren wasn't helping them. He was delivering them.
Footsteps echoed from the hall. Ren's voice. "Lyra?"
She didn't hesitate. She grabbed the nearest weapon — a wrench from the table — and stepped back into the shadows.
When he entered, she was already behind him.
"Who are you sending that message to?" she demanded.
Ren froze. "You don't understand—"
"Try me."
He turned slowly, hands raised. "They're watching everything. If I don't report in, they'll kill me."
"So you'll hand us over instead?"
"Lyra, please—"
"Don't say my name like you know me!" she shouted.
Her pulse thundered. Her vision blurred at the edges. For a second, she felt it — something hot and electric crawling beneath her skin, like fire in her veins.
Ren stepped back, fear flickering across his face. "Your vitals are spiking—"
"I said don't move!"
The lights flickered. The air seemed to hum. Then, with a sharp crack, the glass beaker on the counter shattered into dust.
Ren's eyes widened. "My God… they did it."
Lyra dropped the wrench, staring at her hands. The air around her still buzzed faintly, charged.
"What did they do to me?" she whispered.
Ren swallowed hard. "They made you more than human."