The integration had changed everything.
Rotham stood in silence, the once-fractured Core now dormant behind him, its spiraling light dimmed to a steady hum. Yet within his mind, it was far from quiet. Countless thoughts moved like tides — memories not his, voices that weren't his own, yet all a part of him now.
Directive-7 approached cautiously.
"Containment stable. But... there's something else. A residual field beneath Core Layer Zero. Not part of the original station."
Rotham's head tilted slightly — reflexively, instinctively. He knew what Directive-7 meant.
"The Phantom Layer," he said aloud. "The blind spot no one could map."
Even Selin's projection flickered, confused.
"That section was locked… even from me."
Rotham looked to the floor — and through it. His eyes, now adapted to the Memory Code's perception, saw fractures in the metal. Layers beneath layers. A hidden architecture.
"The Code wasn't created here," he murmured. "It was brought here. Contained. But something else was left behind."
Directive-7 interfaced with the floor panel, and a hidden hatch groaned open. Cold mist poured from below — darker than the rest of the station, like light was being swallowed instead of blocked.
Rotham descended first.
The ladder ended in a chamber far older than the rest of Adra-9. Black walls covered in archaic engravings. Pulsing veins of energy ran like circuitry, but they weren't mechanical. They were organic. Breathing.
At the center of the room: a black monolith. Smooth. Silent.
It radiated nothing — no heat, no signal, no sound. But the moment Rotham looked at it, he remembered building it.
Selin's voice echoed in horror.
"That's not Union tech. That's… pre-human."
Rotham took a step closer.
The voices in his mind hushed — not in fear, but reverence.
"We didn't create the Code," he whispered. "We just caught a piece of it."
He reached out.
And the monolith opened its eye.