CHAPTER 3 — The Girl With Too Many Futures
Lyra Kaine stood framed in the doorway as though the shadows themselves leaned toward her.
Her silver hair lay plastered against her skin, dripping water onto the hospital floor.
Her eyes—icy blue, too bright, too focused—locked onto mine like she'd known me for years.
Rook tensed immediately, weapon raised.
"Step away from the subject," he ordered.
Subject.
Of course that's what I was to him.
Lyra didn't move.
Didn't blink.
The lights flickered around her—not from power fluctuation, but because her Echoes overlapped with reality, creating momentary glitches in the air.
Millions of possible Lyra Kaine's layered over the real one:
—one with a knife
—one smiling gently
—one crying
—one bleeding out
—one holding my hand
—one killing me
—one dying in my arms
It was overwhelming.
I narrowed my eyes.
Her Echoes were the strongest I'd ever seen.
More than a dozen future branches per person was normal.
Dozens was rare.
Hundreds was unheard of.
Lyra had thousands.
An impossible anomaly.
"You're breaking the system," I muttered.
She smiled faintly.
"You see them, too. I knew it."
Rook stepped between us.
"Last warning. Identify your affiliation."
Lyra's eyes never left mine.
"I'm not with Neuroforge," she said softly. "And not with the Veiled Network."
She took one step forward.
"I'm here because you're collapsing."
I frowned. "Collapsing?"
"You're absorbing too many timelines at once. Your Echo perception is unstable."
Her voice lowered.
"You'll lose your sense of self soon."
Rook didn't wait.
He surged forward with superhuman speed, aiming to subdue her.
Lyra didn't move.
But her Echo did.
An Echo-version of Lyra stepped out of her body—just a half inch—and Rook's punch passed through empty air, missing entirely.
His eyes widened.
"What—"
Lyra pressed a single finger to his forehead.
A pulse of light rippled out in a perfect circle.
Rook flew backward, slamming into the wall so hard the impact cracked the plaster.
He slid down, groaning but alive.
I raised an eyebrow.
"You can manipulate probabilities."
She shook her head gently.
"Not probabilities."
She pointed at her temple.
"Futures."
A chill crawled across my spine.
Manipulating probability was one thing.
But manipulating future trajectories—forcing reality to pick a different branch—that was far beyond any normal awakened ability.
"What do you want with me?" I asked.
"Your mind is fracturing," she said.
"If you don't leave this place, you'll die. Or worse—your mind will split into the Echoes you're seeing."
I didn't respond.
My restraints were still locked around my wrists.
Lyra glanced at them—and the leather buckles unfastened themselves without being touched.
Rook forced himself up.
"She's dangerous, Alexian. You leave with her, and you're gone. Off-grid. No protection, no data, no treatment."
Lyra didn't deny it.
"That's exactly what he needs," she said.
Rook pushed off the wall, staggering.
"You have no idea what's happening to you. You need stabilization, controlled environment—"
"I need freedom," I cut in.
Rook's Echoes flickered—
him shooting me
him letting me go
him calling reinforcements
him dying because of me
him saving me later
I looked back at Lyra.
"Why help me?"
She paused. Something flickered in her expression—something almost human.
"Because you're like me," she said.
"And because they'll kill you once they realize what you really are."
The words hung heavy.
A hybrid.
Progenitor signal.
Anomaly.
Whatever I was, it wasn't human in the way everyone else was.
Rook staggered forward and grabbed my shoulder.
"Alexian… if you walk out with her, there's no coming back."
I looked at him—really looked.
Rook was the type who followed orders because without them, he'd collapse.
A soldier defined only by the mission.
But one of his Echoes showed something different:
—him defying his orders for me
—him becoming an ally I didn't expect
That version… felt real.
I placed my hand over his and gently pushed it away.
"I'm not going back to being a lab rat," I said.
"You'd do the same."
He didn't argue.
He didn't need to.
The silence was enough.
Lyra extended her hand.
"Come with me."
I stepped toward her.
But before our fingers touched—
the hallway lights snapped back on in a violent burst.
A deafening alarm blared.
LOCKDOWN INITIATED. CONTAINMENT BREACH.
ALL PERSONNEL TO STATIONS.
Dozens of footsteps thundered down the stairwell.
Armed operatives.
Neuroforge black-ops.
Rook swore under his breath.
"They're here. They're going to capture all of us."
Lyra grabbed my wrist.
Time around her warped—space bending like a lens underwater.
"Alexian," she whispered.
"This is your last choice while you still know who you are."
The Echoes surged violently. The world fractured.
I made my decision.
I ran with her.
As the first wave of operatives flooded the hallway, Lyra snapped her fingers.
Reality tilted.
And the world disappeared.