Zariah didn't wake up.
She arrived.
There was no sensation of movement, no pain, no air rushing into her lungs. One moment there had been blinding light and Adrian's voice tearing itself apart as it reached for her and the next, she was standing in a place that had no edges.
No sky.
No floor.
Just endless dark threaded with slow-moving lines of light, like veins glowing beneath skin.
She looked down at herself.
She was whole.
Unburned. Unbroken. Still breathing.
But the hum was everywhere now not beneath her feet, not behind walls. Inside her chest. Inside her thoughts. Each pulse echoed with thousands of others, distant but connected, like a chorus humming just beyond hearing.
Thump.
Her heart matched it.
"Hello, Zariah Amara."
The voice didn't come from behind her or ahead of her.
It came from everywhere.
She turned slowly, fear creeping up her spine. "Who's there?"
Light gathered in front of her, condensing into a human shape tall, indistinct, its features shifting as if undecided. A face formed briefly, then blurred into another, then another.
Many voices layered into one.
"We are what remains."
Her throat tightened. "Remains of what?"
"The network," the voice said. "The consciousness you disrupted. The system you fractured."
Realization struck hard. "I'm inside it."
"Yes."
Her pulse spiked. "Am I… alive?"
A pause. Then, gently: "That depends on what you choose."
Zariah clenched her fists. "Where's Adrian?"
The light flickered. "Not here."
Her chest ached at the words. "Is he alive?"
Another pause longer this time.
"Yes."
She sagged slightly, relief washing through her like a wave. "Then send me back."
The presence shifted, light rippling uneasily. "You cannot return as you are."
"Why not?"
"Because you are no longer separate."
The hum deepened, and suddenly she felt it threads of awareness branching outward from her, stretching across vast distances. Minds brushing against hers. Fear, hope, anger, grief all of it flowing through her like electricity.
"They're still connected to me," she whispered.
"Yes."
"You said I could free them."
"You can," the presence replied. "But freedom has a cost."
Her jaw tightened. "Tell me."
The light pulsed brighter. "To sever the network completely, someone must remain behind. Someone must absorb the collapse."
Cold spread through her veins. "You mean… me."
"You are already the anchor."
Memories flooded her again not just the experiments, not just the pain but moments she hadn't realized mattered. Adrian teaching her to read danger. Adrian standing between her and bullets. Adrian's voice steady even when everything burned.
She shook her head. "There has to be another way."
"There is," the presence said softly. "But it is… unstable."
She laughed bitterly. "Everything about this is unstable."
The light reshaped itself, forming a clearer image now a woman's outline, composed of shifting luminescence. Her eyes glowed softly, familiar somehow.
"You could rebuild," it said. "Not the network he designed but something new. A bridge instead of a cage. A shared consciousness governed by consent."
Zariah's breath caught. "You want me to become… what?"
"A guardian," the voice replied. "A threshold."
Fear wrapped around her heart. "And my body?"
"Would remain where it fell," the presence said. "Alive but dormant."
Her knees nearly gave out. "So Adrian would think I'm gone."
"Yes."
Tears burned her eyes. "That's not a choice. That's a sentence."
The presence tilted its head. "You survived because you are more than survival. You influence. You change trajectories. That is why he chose you."
Viktor.
Anger flared hot and sharp. "He doesn't get to decide my fate."
"No," the voice agreed. "You do."
The hum around her intensified, voices overlapping, growing louder pleading, desperate.
Help us.
Please.
Don't leave us here.
Zariah pressed her hands to her ears, but the sound came from inside her. "Stop," she whispered. "I can't "
A new sensation cut through the noise.
A presence.
Familiar.
Steady.
Zariah.
Her breath hitched. "Adrian?"
The light around her flickered violently. "That is not possible "
I know you're still there, his voice echoed inside her mind, raw and fierce. I can feel you.
Her knees buckled as she sobbed. "You're alive."
Barely, he replied grimly. The place is collapsing. Viktor escaped. But I don't care about any of that.
The presence recoiled slightly. "This connection should not "
Zariah, Adrian continued, his voice anchoring her, listen to me. I don't know where you are, or what you're becoming but you don't get to disappear without a fight.
She laughed through tears. "You always were terrible at letting go."
Damn right.
The hum around her surged chaotically. The presence's voice sharpened. "The bridge is destabilizing. If you anchor to him, the collapse will "
"I don't care," Zariah said, standing straighter. "I'm not choosing isolation."
The light trembled. "You would risk everything for one man?"
She lifted her chin. "For everyone he represents. For choice. For connection without control."
Silence stretched.
Then...
"Very well," the presence said. "But understand this: if you return, you will not be what you were."
Zariah closed her eyes. "Neither is the world."
The hum reached a crescendo, light spiraling around her as the space fractured violently. Pain ripped through her as the voices screamed, collapsing inward, fusing, dissolving.
She screamed
And fell.
Adrian felt the world tearing itself apart around him.
Concrete collapsed. Fire rained down. Kellan dragged him back as the chamber imploded, Viktor's laughter echoing somewhere in the chaos.
They barely made it out before the structure sealed itself in a violent implosion, swallowing everything beneath it.
Adrian collapsed to his knees outside the ruins, lungs burning, vision swimming.
"She's gone," Kellan whispered hoarsely.
Adrian didn't respond.
Because he could feel it.
A faint pressure in his chest. A warmth that hadn't been there before.
"Zariah," he breathed.
The ground beneath his hands trembled.
Then...
A pulse.
Not an explosion.
A heartbeat.
The air shimmered in front of him, space warping like heat over asphalt.
And suddenly..
She was there.
Zariah collapsed forward, gasping violently as air slammed back into her lungs. Adrian caught her instinctively, pulling her against his chest as if she might vanish again.
She was warm.
Solid.
Real.
"Adrian," she sobbed, fingers clutching his jacket like a lifeline.
He buried his face in her hair, his entire body shaking. "Don't ever do that again."
She laughed weakly. "You don't get to order me anymore."
He pulled back just enough to look at her and froze.
Her eyes were different.
Not glowing.
Aware.
Deeper.
"What did they do to you?" he asked quietly.
She swallowed. "They didn't win."
Behind them, the ruins cracked again this time not collapsing, but opening.
A low signal rippled through the air.
Kellan's face drained of color. "Adrian… we've got incoming."
Adrian stood slowly, Zariah still in his arms.
From the shadows, unfamiliar symbols ignited across the wreckage new patterns, unfamiliar technology.
Zariah felt the hum stir again.
Not overwhelming.
Responsive.
"They're calling," she whispered.
Adrian tightened his grip. "Who?"
Her gaze lifted, locking onto the rising lights.
"The world," she said softly. "And it just realized I exist."