Eira's fingers curled around Kael's, holding on a second longer than she meant to. Not out of affection—but necessity. Touch was rare in Aurelis. So was truth. Right now, he was the only piece of either she had.
But even that connection felt fragile. Too much silence between them. Too many unanswered questions.
She let go.
The faint hum of the city bled through the grating above—constant, inhuman. As if Aurelis was breathing without them, calculating their every deviation in the dark.
"I can't keep living like this," Eira whispered.
Kael nodded, jaw tight. "Then we stop running."
Her eyes snapped to his.
"You mean fight back?"
He didn't answer right away. He just pulled something from his coat—crumpled paper, creased a dozen times. It looked older than it should've been allowed to exist.
A map. Or part of one.
"The maintenance tunnels," he said. "There's a junction. Hidden. I found mention of it in an archived error log someone forgot to delete. It connects to power grids, command nodes... even internal storage hubs."
Eira stared at it, the lines blurring slightly. Her pulse quickened—not from fear, but possibility.
"How did you find this?"
Kael hesitated. "A girl from 7C. Ysel. She works in Diagnostics. I think she's... like us. Not completely wiped."
That name was unfamiliar. Unsystematized. It had a shape to it. A rhythm.
Eira shifted, wary. "Can we trust her?"
"I don't know," Kael admitted. "But she left this. Along with a note." He handed it over.
The handwriting was jagged, rushed:
They're editing memory timestamps. Some people are losing entire weeks. Check junction T-3B. It's where they root the cleaner codes. Keep your mind yours.
Eira stared at the words for a long time.
"Ysel," she said aloud, trying the name on her tongue. It felt strange. Like something blooming in a place too cold to grow.
She handed it back.
"We'll go. But... not yet."
Kael frowned. "Why?"
Eira turned her gaze upward, toward the vibrating grate.
"Because I haven't slept in four nights," she admitted. "And I forgot the word for 'orange' this morning."
Kael blinked. "What?"
"It just... vanished. I was looking at a sanitation bin and couldn't remember the word. I knew the color. I knew what it meant. But the sound of it—the shape—was gone." Her voice shook. "That's not a coincidence."
Kael was quiet for a long time.
Then, softly, "They're starting on you."
A brittle breath escaped her. "It's not just watching anymore. It's eroding."
They sat like that, the weight pressing down.
Outside, nothing had changed.
But inside, something had cracked open.
Finally, Kael broke the silence. "Then we do this before they finish the job. We gather what we need. Get to that junction. And we find out what's really running this place."
Eira nodded. She wanted to be strong. But her hands were still shaking.
Kael noticed. Didn't say anything.
Instead, he pulled a scrap of wiring from his sleeve and began folding it slowly, deliberately. A calming motion.
Eira watched him. Quietly mirrored the movement with her own fingers.
They didn't speak again that night. But something had shifted.
They weren't fugitives anymore.
They were searching.
And the city would feel it.
The meeting point wasn't chosen—it was inherited.
A forgotten corridor below the diagnostics annex, marked "Ventilation Access – Restricted." The kind of place no one noticed because no one was meant to. Light didn't fully reach the corners here. Even the walls looked tired, dusted in layers of untouched silence.
Kael stepped lightly, head low. Eira followed just behind, heart steady but strained. Her eyes scanned everything now—door seams, flickering lights, panel edges. Not for beauty. For proof that the system still made mistakes.
When they reached the final junction, she paused. Her body wouldn't move forward.
"What if she's a trap?" she whispered.
Kael didn't answer immediately. His hand hovered near the scanner that opened the final gate.
"Then we'll know soon."
The metal door slid open without alert. No beep. No hiss. Just an almost respectful silence, as though even the building knew this wasn't part of its plan.
Inside, the air smelled... different.
Not recycled. Not clean.
Human.
They stepped through together.
She was already waiting.
Leaning against a rusted support beam, arms crossed, hair cut unevenly just above the jaw. Her uniform was standard issue—but frayed at the seams in ways that weren't regulation. Inked lines—small, almost mathematical—ran along the inside of her forearm. Like she'd written on herself and never washed it off.
"You're late," Ysel said.
Her voice was low, direct. Not sharp, not cold. Just... unfiltered.
Eira studied her. The way her gaze flicked to the edges of the room first. The way her feet stayed angled toward the exit.
She didn't trust them. Good. That made three of them.
"We weren't sure if you were real," Eira said.
"I get that a lot."
Kael stepped forward. "You left us the note."
Ysel nodded once. "Because someone had to. You think you're the only ones asking questions?"
Eira crossed her arms. "How do we know you haven't been turned?"
Ysel met her eyes. "If I had, you wouldn't be standing."
The silence stretched again—different this time. Not suspicion. Calibration.
Then Ysel's shoulders relaxed slightly. "I've been cleaning memory inconsistencies for almost four years. I've seen what they do when someone questions too well. They don't kill you. They hollow you."
Eira flinched. Quietly.
Ysel noticed. Didn't comment.
Instead, she walked to a control panel, its outer casing half-peeled, revealing wiring and etched serials.
"They're hiding something beneath the junction node. I accessed a diagnostic shell and traced a pulse signature looping every 19 seconds. That's not power cycling. That's shielding something."
"Shielding what?" Kael asked.
Ysel tapped the metal. "No idea. Could be old data. Could be something worse."
She looked at them both. Not pleading. Just honest.
"I need someone else to see it. Because if I disappear, it has to matter."
The words echoed louder than they should've. Something cold crept into Eira's lungs.
This girl wasn't brave.
She was already resigned.
And somehow, that made it more terrifying.
Eira stepped forward.
"Then we see it."
No more hesitation. No more maybe.
If the city wanted silence, they'd dig until it screamed.