LEVEL 5 — ECHO CORE
blinked across the panel before fading into black.
My fingers tightened on my rifle.
Beside me, Hawk exhaled once—quiet, steady, lethal calm. The kind he moved into before battle. Before killing if necessary. Before dying if unavoidable.
The doors began to open.
A metallic hiss swept over us, followed by a wave of chilled air carrying the faint scent of ozone and disinfectant.
The Echo Core wasn’t a room.
It was acathedralof cold logic.
A massive, circular chamber opened up around us, its walls made of seamless, white panels that glowed faintly from within. The ceiling stretched upward into darkness, filled with latticework of servers suspended like skeletal ribs.
The floor beneath us was glass—clear enough that I couldsee multiple sublevels humming with processors beneath our boots, like we were standing above the brain of a machine. This had to have cost millions of dollars to build.
A single walkway extended forward.
And at the center, standing alone under a cone of white light—
Reese.
He looked almost exactly the same, his early forties, tall, lean, dark hair swept back neatly. A calm face. The kind of face you’d trust with anything.
But his eyes—
Cold. Empty.
As if something inside them had been replaced with numbers.
Hawk stopped dead.
For a long moment, none of us spoke.
Then Reese smiled, slow and controlled.
“Lucas.”
Hawk frowned at the sound of his real first name, from someone who wasn’t his mother.
Reese spread his hands slightly. “You made it.”
“I’m here,” Hawk said, voice low. “Now start talking.”
“Oh, I intend to.” Reese stepped forward, hands behind his back. “You passed Lyric’s levels far better than I expected. You’re still predictable in all the ways that matter. Loyal. Protective. Self-destructive.” His gaze slid to me. “And tragically fixated on her.”
Hawk stepped in front of me instantly—instinct, primal and sharp.
Reese nodded, as if pleased.
“See? Predictable.”
I ignored him. “What did you build here, Reese?”
“Hope,” he replied simply. “A new system. A new future. One that doesn’t rely on flawed human judgment. One thatdoesn’t break under pressure. One that doesn’tfailthe people it’s meant to protect.”
