I woke up to a harsh, sterile light beaming directly into my eyes.
The cold hit me next—icy metal against my back, my wrists and ankles bound tightly to a surgical slab. My skin prickled from contact with the chilled surface, and I felt the weight of thick leather straps pinning me down. I struggled, twisting my limbs, but the restraints didn't budge. Panic surged through me, fast and suffocating.
The room was white—blinding, clinical. Every surface was spotless, scrubbed of humanity. Machines lined the walls, blinking quietly, humming with faint life. Steel trays held gleaming surgical tools that looked more suited for dissection than healing. The air smelled of antiseptic, cold and metallic.
A shadow moved across the room.
I craned my neck, wincing as the muscles protested. A man in a long white coat stepped into view, his figure perfectly still. He looked calm—too calm. His eyes were unreadable behind round glasses that reflected the ceiling lights.
Dr. Mira Lang.
The same man from the corridor. The one who said nothing when Subject 9 died.
"Why am I here?" I shouted, throat raw. "Who are you? Who am I? Why am I here? What do you want from me?"
My words echoed sharply off the sterile walls.
He didn't move. Didn't blink. Just stared at me like I was a patient on a slide.
I thrashed. "SAY SOMETHING!"
At last, he spoke—his voice quiet, deliberate. "You're a clone."
The silence afterward was louder than my shouting.
"What?" I whispered, the word catching in my throat.
"You," he repeated, "are a clone."
The words hit me like a thunderclap.
I didn't believe it. Couldn't. I wanted to laugh. Scream. Deny it. But something in his voice—something cold and certain—made me pause.
A clone.
I stared at the ceiling, then back at him, trying to process. "Of who?"
Lang took a deep breath, as if dragging an ancient memory to the surface.
"There was a time when the world stood at the brink of extinction. The skies were scorched. Oceans swallowed cities. AI rebellions broke the spine of civilization. It was the year 2355, and humanity was losing."
I blinked, heart pounding. "And?"
"Then, from nowhere, a man appeared."
"Appeared?"
"No records. No DNA in any global database. No history. It was as if he stepped out of myth. He fought, led, and rebuilt. He faced machines, mutants, and men. Alone at first, then with armies that followed him blindly. He never aged. He never stopped."Lang's eyes darkened. "Some called him a ghost. Others, a messiah. We called him... Kalkin."
As soon as the name escaped Lang's lips, a sharp pain stabbed behind my eyes. For a split second, I wasn't in the room—I was in a warzone. Fire lit the sky. My hand gripped a strange weapon. People chanted my name. I felt invincible—and utterly alone. Then, just as quickly, it was gone.
"Kalkin?" I asked, shaken.
He nodded. "He was more than a man. He was a force. The final hope in humanity's darkest hour. He turned the tide. He didn't just survive the collapse—he reversed it."
"And I'm…?" I asked, my voice trembling.
"You," Lang said slowly, "are one of many clones created from his DNA. Project Echo was our attempt to resurrect his genius. His strength. His will."
I stared at the ceiling, the bright lights spinning in my vision.
"I'm not real," I murmured. "I'm someone's… experiment."
"You are more than that," Lang said. "You are the only subject to survive Phase III maturity. The others failed. But you—Subject 7—you are awake. Aware."
A heavy silence fell again.
Lang stood, walked over to the panel, and typed something in. A screen behind him lit up.
Dozens of profiles appeared—Subjects 1 through 30.
Only mine was blinking green.
"You're not just a clone, Subject 7," Lang said, turning to me. "You are Kalkin's legacy."
Another flash hit me—Kalkin again. Kneeling in a battlefield soaked in ash. A child's body in his arms. His voice, broken. "This world doesn't deserve saving. But I'll save it anyway."
I gasped. "Why am I seeing this?"
Lang's face tightened. "You weren't supposed to. The memory imprints were degraded. They must be reactivating. Or maybe... you're remembering on your own."
A crackling hum vibrated in the air. I could feel it, like static under my skin.
Suddenly, Lang's tone shifted—more guarded, uncertain. "We knew Kalkin was different. We just never knew how different. His blood carries... anomalies. Sequences we've never seen in human biology. It's like a language inside your cells, one we still don't understand."
A sudden beep interrupted him. Lang turned sharply to the monitor. His face went pale.
"Subject 9's vitals... they're active again."
My breath caught. "But... he's dead."
"No. He evolved," Lang whispered. "Too fast. Too wild. He couldn't be controlled. That's why we tried to contain him. But if he's alive... and out..."
Suddenly, the surgical tools on the tray trembled. One scalpel rolled off and clattered to the ground.
The restraints around my arms hissed. I flinched as the locks unlatched themselves.
Lang stared at me in disbelief. "That wasn't me."
The lights above flickered once... then again. A high-pitched hum began to rise, like distant feedback from an old radio.
And then I heard it.
A voice.
Inside my head.
"You're not alone."
I froze. "What was that?"
Lang stepped back, his face no longer calm but laced with fear. "You're activating. Just like Kalkin did. Faster than any of the simulations predicted."
The restraints fully released. I sat up slowly, my muscles stiff, my heart thundering.
"What am I becoming?" I asked.
Lang didn't answer.
He looked at me like I was no longer his creation.
Like I was something... beyond him.
The lights surged and exploded in a shower of sparks. Alarms blared in the distance. Emergency lockdown protocol initiated.
And beneath the chaos, something inside me was awakening.
Not just memory.
Power.
And for the first time since this nightmare began, I wasn't afraid.
I was ready.
Lang gave me one last look and silently turned away, vanishing behind a steel door that sealed shut with a hiss.
Moments later, a team of doctors rushed into the room, dressed in heavy containment suits. Without a word, they surrounded me and began their work—strapping me back down, inserting syringes into my veins, pumping strange glowing fluids into my body. Their hands were rough, their movements mechanical, like I was nothing more than a test subject.
The liquid burned as it entered me, not painfully, but... transforming. I felt something shifting beneath my skin. Every second, my body felt heavier—stronger. Like new muscles were forming, new wires connecting within me.
My pulse pounded like a war drum. My breathing deepened.
Then it happened.
A surge. A jolt of raw energy, like lightning inside my bones.
I felt the straps bend.
I looked down at my arms—veins glowing faintly green beneath my skin. My fingers clenched. My arms strained.
And with a guttural cry, I snapped the restraints like they were made of paper.
The doctors stumbled back in horror, yelling into their comms.
I sat upright, panting, my vision swimming. My skin shimmered for a moment—just a flicker—and then settled.
Something was different now.
I wasn't just awake.
I was changing.
I swung my legs off the slab and stood, the floor cold beneath my feet. My senses felt sharper—like I could hear the heartbeat of the man nearest to me. Smell the metallic sweat under his suit. Sense the tension in the air.
Then... the room trembled. Not from me. From something coming.
A deep rumble echoed from beyond the corridor.
And in that moment, I knew: Subject 9 wasn't the only one who evolved.
I had become something else. Something more. And the war Kalkin once fought... wasn't over.