A warmth, a direct, unbroken warmth. But then, a wave. Not a visual, but a feeling. The damp coolness of the earth. The heavy, sweet scent of history. And deep down, very deep down, a vibration sleeping within Derya... just like the hum at the excavation site. Her own Nexus.
Mert held his breath. Derya's eyes widened. She had felt it too.
"God," Derya whispered, not removing her hand. "Is this... is this what you were talking about? The connection?"
"Or," Mert murmured, threading his fingers through hers, "it's just us. Like we always are. Only... the channels are more open."
Derya's lips trembled slightly. Her eyes filled with tears. "I'm scared, Mert."
"Me too."
Those two words shattered the last defense between them. Mert brought his hand to Derya's cheek, his thumb caressing the skin beneath her wet eyelashes.
"You've changed," Derya said. "I wish I had noticed the change in you sooner. Maybe I wouldn't have drifted so far away."
"Maybe you needed to run," Mert replied, before getting up. "You weren't ready for this. Neither was I."
"Are we ready now?" Derya asked, her voice soft, velvety, but wounded. "Everything looks the same," - her voice fading in the wind - "But nothing is the same. There are a lot of strangers inside you now. And inside me... something is waking up."
Mert whispered, "Shall we go from here? Let's go inside. Let's keep talking inside." He got up from his place and approached her from behind, resting his chest against her back. He wrapped his arms around her waist. Derya resisted for a moment, then leaned back with her whole body, resting her head on Mert's shoulder. Their warmth mixed through the thin fabrics.
"Those symbols," Derya managed to say, feeling Mert's breath on her neck. "The drawings in my excavation notebook... not just on the edges. I scribbled them between the pages too. And every time, I felt that strange heat, that hum in my hand. But I ignored it. As an archaeologist, I thought I had to put subjective feelings aside."
"Data should speak. Not feelings..."
"Maybe data was exactly what you felt," Mert whispered, bringing his lips closer to the fine hairs on Derya's neck. Her skin smelled of a mixture of earth and sage. "In quantum physics, there's something called the observer effect. When you look at something, you change it. Maybe when you touched those symbols, they were observing you too; 'Triggering'."
Derya turned her head, her lips a hair's breadth from Mert's chin. "Just like your machine does? Like an observation device?"
"The machine was just a tool," Mert said, rubbing his nose against her temple. "I think... I was the channel. And I stayed open. You... I think you're a channel too, Derya. The earth is your tool. You feel the vibrations of the past. Nexus points may not only be spatial, but also temporal. And you, maybe you were standing on a crack in time."
"This is so terrifying," Derya whispered, but her body moved closer to Mert, her back pressed tightly against his chest.
"Yes. And also incredible." Mert clasped his hands on Derya's stomach, feeling her breath under his palms.
Derya was silent for a moment. "There's something," she said. "At the excavation site... At the center of the symbols, there's a small point carved deeper than the others. As if it had been opened with a sharp tool, repeatedly struck. A point where even the stone seems to have melted a little. Heat. There was a very intense heat."
In Mert's mind, the burning hive in Marcus's palm came to life. "Energy focus," he murmured. "Maybe a kind of... transmission point. Or an explosion."
Derya suddenly took Mert's hands, pulling them to her chest, over her heart. "Right there,"
At that moment, Mert's breath caught in his throat. She was in Derya's mind. In the past. At that moment. Right then... "This?" he said, surprised. "The symbol I saw in Marcus's mind, in my own hand."
Mert could feel the same symbol in the present moment. Under his palms, Derya's heart was beating fast. But deeper, behind her rib cage, there was a light, rhythmic vibration. Like the flapping of a bird's wings. No, like the buzzing of an insect's wings... or a low-frequency hum coming from very far away.
"God," Mert gasped. "Is this your... your Nexus? Do you feel it too?"
"I don't know," Derya moaned, throwing her head back and resting it on Mert's neck. "It wasn't there before. I mean... there was nothing I could notice. But when you touched it, it got stronger."
"It's like... your presence is feeding it. Or it's resonating with your presence."
This idea electrified them both. Mert pressed his lips to Derya's neck, to the point where her artery was beating. Derya took a sharp breath, her hands gripping Mert's arms tightly around her.
"Shall we go inside?" Mert asked again. This time his voice was hoarse and full of desire.
Derya didn't answer, she just turned away from his arms and turned her face to Mert's. Her eyes were dark, deep wells in the light spilling from the balcony. "Do you want to test the connection, Mert? Or just me?"
"Both," Mert confessed, resting his forehead against hers. "They're not separate anymore. You and this... you and *it*... are one. And I... I'm part of it all."
The first kiss was a surrender rather than an explosion. A slow, exploratory, painful discovery. Derya's lips moved on Mert's, tasting, sharing his breath. And with the contact, the wave came again. This time, stronger.
The dampness of the earth. The dust of history. A hum... and behind it, a heartbeat-like rhythmic vibration of another being. From afar, very far away. Was it Elena's? Kai's? Or someone they didn't know yet?
They moved inside, towards the living room, their kisses never breaking. Clothes were removed one by one. Tugging, in a hurry... Each new piece of skin exposed led to a new flow of emotion. When Mert kissed Derya's shoulder, a momentary metallic taste appeared in his mouth – the cold steel of Marcus's weapon. When Derya touched Mert's back, her fingertips suddenly became electrified, as if she had touched a screen – the ghostly vibration of Sofia's data streams.
"You're everywhere," Mert growled, laying Derya on the floor, on the rug, in the dim light that hit from the balcony. Derya's body was shining like marble in the moonlight, but it was a living, warm, trembling marble. "Are you still afraid?"
"Yes. But more... I desire." Derya brought her hands to Mert's face, pulling him down to her. "This connection... this Nexus... do we need to control it? Or let it flow?"
Mert placed his lips on her chest, over her heartbeat. He felt that slight vibration with his lips. "I don't know. But with you... maybe the two of us, for a while, can get carried away by its flow. We can create our own little nexus."
Then their conversation ended, replaced by the language of bodies. But the conversation was woven into the touches, the breaths, the whispers. When Mert entered Derya, it wasn't just a physical union. It shattered a mental dam.
Derya: (In her mind, to Mert) Excavation site... hot... stone melting...
Mert: (In response) My palm... burning... Marcus's pain...
Derya: Your pain is my pain. I feel it.
Mert: Symbols... map... Konya is a nexus point. You are a key.
Derya: And you are a lock. You are opening. God, Mert, you are opening so much...
As their bodies synchronized, the mental flow intensified. Images, emotions, memories... they all mixed, but not like a soup, but like a mosaic. Each piece remained in place, but became part of a larger picture. Derya felt Mert's loneliness in the lab. Mert tasted Derya's pure excitement at the moment she first struck the earth.
"Others," Derya sighed, her body clinging tightly to Mert's, her forehead covered in sweat. "Do you feel them too? Right now?"
Mert closed his eyes. He focused. Yes... from afar, like thin threads... different emotions. An artistic enthusiasm in Tokyo (Kai). An angry, disciplined tension in New York (Marcus). An electrified curiosity at CERN (Elena). A focused, cold concern in Berlin (Sofia).
"All in my mind," Mert whispered, moving deeper inside Derya, more slowly. "With me. I'm in the network. And the network is alive."
"More?" Derya asked, her eyes wide open, watching every twitch on Mert's face.
Mert forced something inside. Far away, like a cold, oily stain... greed. A control-freak ambition. Repulsively attractive and repulsive at the same time...
There's more. But it's very faint. "No," he moaned. When he felt Anton's dark ideas. "Someone... Anton... is looking for us. Even now..." Suddenly he tried to get up from Derya. "We're in danger! All of us. We have to follow the threads and find the others."
This idea added an urgency to their desires. Urgency, closeness. Derya wrapped her legs tighter around Mert's waist, pulling him to her. "Then, let's find them before him," she growled in his ear. "Both them and the truth. Both the past and the future. But first... the present. This moment. Fill me, Mert. With all those strangers, with all those voices. But stay mine."
This broke Mert's last resistance. He surrendered completely. Both physically, he was lost inside Derya, and mentally, he was united with her and those vibrations at the other ends of the network. The climax was not just a physical release. It was an explosion of energy, information, connection. Inside the room, physically, the lights flickered for a moment. The wind from the balcony stopped, then blew again. The faint, orange mark on Derya's palm, for a moment, shone, emitting a golden light, then faded.
Silence fell. Only the pounding heartbeats and deep breaths.
Mert lay down beside her, on the rug, pulling Derya to his chest. They were both sweaty, trembling, but burning inside.
"What happened?" Derya whispered, tracing the sweat on Mert's chest with her finger.
"I think we synchronized something," Mert replied, still breathless. "We... maybe balanced the connection."
"That melted point at the excavation," Derya said thoughtfully. "Maybe something like that happened there too. A union. An energy transfer. In a different way."
"Or an echo of something that will happen in the future," Mert added. "The explosion Valeria saw... the fragmented timelines..."
Derya half-rose, leaning on her elbow, looking at him. "We're going to Konya tomorrow. I'll show you that point. And then... we have to find the others. As Sofia said."
Mert nodded. His mind was clear. Fear was still there, but with it, an iron determination. Derya too. The physical bond between them had strengthened all the other bonds. They were no longer just former lovers. They were allies of the same secret, partners of the same mystery.
From the balcony, the first signs of dawn were coming. On the horizon, black was giving way to navy blue, and Istanbul was waking up to a new day. But what was waking up inside them was much more ancient, much deeper.
Mert hugged Derya tightly. "We'll learn together," he repeated his earlier words, as a promise. "All together."
And at that moment, they both felt the same thing: A small, warm wave emanating from their combined energy in the invisible network. Towards the other nodes, all over the world. A greeting. A call.
The adventure had begun with a personal discovery. Now, in the warmth of a shared destiny and a shared bedroom, it had gained a new dimension. And the first step would be taken in a few hours, towards the ancient lands of Konya, to the heart of history.