The city has learned a new trick: how to be quiet without being empty.
It's the kind of terrifying.
Ryo feels it the second they step outside Command. The usual low buzz of the grid (traffic lights talking to each other, drones gossiping, a million tiny voices that never shut up) is still there, but it's… polite now. Like everyone agreed to whisper so they don't wake something.
Mara walks half a step in front of him, shoulders squared, jaw locked so tight he can almost hear the enamel squeak. She's still mad he almost touched the shadow. She's madder at herself for letting him get close enough to almost.
Sato trails behind, spinning his baton in lazy circles like it's a fidget spinner and not a weapon that's cracked skulls.
The other resonant (the unfinished one) walks last, barefoot on cold concrete, eyes darting at shadows that aren't shadows.
Seven whole minutes of nobody talking.
Ryo breaks first.
"It's in the lower topology."
The resonant nods like that's the worst news they've heard all week.
"Learning the seams," they whisper.
"Like a rat in the walls," Sato mutters.
"No," Ryo says, quieter. "Like me… learning how to come home."
Mara stops so fast he almost walks into her.
She turns.
"Ryo." Her voice is soft, dangerous. "You are not that thing."
He wants to believe her.
He really does.
Almost.
—
The old service elevator smells like rust and forgotten lunches. Frost crawls up the cables even though it's not that cold. When the doors open on sub-level 7, the temperature drops like someone opened a freezer.
Mara stares at Ryo's reflection in the steel wall.
The reflection stares back half a second late.
Ryo looks away first.
The resonant hugs their arms. "Parts of the lower topology only exist when someone believes in them."
"Fantastic," Sato says. "We're chasing a ghost through a placebo."
The doors open on darkness that smells like wet pennies.
Mara's lamp cuts a white tunnel.
"Stay tight. No heroics."
Ryo steps out.
His hollow gives one hard thump.
Something wearing his exact weight has been here.
Recently.
—
Eight minutes later Sato raises a fist.
Everyone freezes.
Bare footprints in the dust.
Ryo's size.
Ryo's stride.
But perfect.
Too perfect.
Like someone read the manual on walking but never actually felt pavement under their soles.
Mara crouches. "Ryo."
He's already kneeling.
His fingers hover over the print.
The hollow flares.
Memory that isn't his: standing here, watching his own back disappear deeper.
He jerks his hand away.
The resonant whispers, "Less than an hour old."
Sato whistles. "Fast learner."
Mara's voice is ice. "Direction?"
"Node 12-β," Ryo says. "The dead one."
Sato groans. "Of course it is."
—
They drop down a maintenance ladder into air that suddenly feels tropical. Sweat beads instantly.
The shaft opens onto a catwalk above an ocean of coffin-sized server racks, all dead for decades.
Except one.
Red LEDs pulse in perfect time with Ryo's heart.
Mara sweeps her lamp.
The awake rack is gutted, cables spilling out like intestines, reconnecting to nothing and everything.
In the middle sits a shape.
Human.
Bare feet.
Head bowed.
Exactly Ryo's height.
Exactly Ryo's posture; only perfect. No slouch. No doubt.
Mara's rifle is up before her brain finishes the order.
The shape lifts its head.
Eyes soft red.
It smiles with Ryo's mouth.
Gentle.
Kind.
Wrong.
Ryo's voice cracks. "Who are you?"
The shadow tilts its head, curious child discovering a mirror.
Its voice is Ryo's voice run through honey and broken glass.
"…still… deciding…"
Mara's finger tightens. "Step back, Ryo."
The shadow ignores her. Places a hand over its own chest.
Presses.
Hard.
The red LEDs flare.
Ryo gasps. Pain spears through his real chest, like the hand is inside him.
Sato swears. "It's wired directly into his hollow!"
The shadow speaks softer, almost tender.
"…you… left… pieces…"
Memory slams into Ryo:
Rooftop. City burning. Mara bleeding out in his arms.
"Choose," she whispers.
He can save her or the city.
Every cycle he chose the city.
Except one.
In that cycle he chose her.
And the city died.
And he lived with it for three days before guilt erased him.
The memory ends.
Ryo is back on the catwalk, tears freezing on his cheeks.
The shadow is still smiling.
It kept that memory too.
It speaks two words directly into their skulls:
NOT YET.
The server rack explodes in white fire.
The catwalk drops.
They fall into darkness—
and the chapter ends.