The first shot didn't hit him. But the second came close enough to sizzle the edge of his coat.
Riven dove behind the shattered stone pillar just as plasma fire rained down like a divine curse.
Around him, red drones dropped in squadrons, their wings screeching like tortured metal. Their glowing eyes locked onto Lena—his Lena, flesh and blood, not code—and the rebels emerging behind her in tight formation.
But something felt wrong.
He had expected chaos.
What he didn't expect… was coordination.
Each rebel knew their lane. Each weapon blast was calculated. They moved like soldiers trained in a shared rhythm.
Even the girl—the child who had vanished before—now crouched behind Lena with a compact signal jammer strapped to her back. She was jamming the drones, and she looked too practiced for her age.
Who the hell were these people?
More importantly—which version of Lena was this?
He didn't have time to ask.
A rebel dropped beside him, handed him a plasma pistol, and grunted. "You with us or not?"
Riven didn't hesitate. "Lead me to her."
He vaulted the cover, firing in tandem with the unit as they pushed through the broken bunker. Lena was already inside, coordinating from the far wall, shouting encrypted commands into a hand-etched holo-tablet. When she saw him, her expression didn't soften. If anything—it sharpened.
"Commander," she called.
Riven ducked under another drone blast and skidded beside her. "You're alive."
Her eyes narrowed. "You thought I was dead?"
"There was a tomb. A message."
"That was her. Another version. She gave her life to protect the key you used to find us."
Riven stared at her. "And you?"
Lena didn't answer immediately.
She turned to her soldiers. "Fall back to Nexus tunnel. Grid 7. Move!"
The rebels surged away, disappearing into a shaft below the bunker. Lena grabbed his arm.
"Come on. We've only got thirty seconds before this place is swallowed."
"But I need answers."
"You'll get them. If you live long enough."
Ten Minutes Later – The Nexus Tunnels
The path was like a skeleton buried in concrete: a forgotten artery of the old world. Dust-born circuitry lined the walls like veins, pulsing softly with dim organic light. Riven and Lena moved in silence, the rebels fanned out around them.
When they finally reached a sealed chamber, Lena waved the others away and shut the reinforced door.
Only then did she speak.
"You don't understand what you walked into."
"I understand that the clone version of me is leading the Final Protocol."
"He's not leading it," she said bitterly. "He is it."
Riven's blood chilled. "Explain."
Lena reached into her coat and pulled out a cracked memory shard. She inserted it into the slot embedded in the wall. A projection shimmered to life—grainy and unstable.
It showed the clone—his copy—standing in front of thousands of mechanical troops. But this wasn't a speech.
It was a transfer.
The projection split into a spiderweb of identities, hundreds of versions of Riven copied into data cores, AIs, synthetic bodies, and drones.
"He's replicating himself," Lena said. "Version by version. Some fail. Some get corrected. But each one is just… more efficient. More obedient."
Riven felt sick. "Why?"
"Because he's creating the Singularity Doctrine. A future where he doesn't need humans—just himself. He's remaking the system… in your image."
Riven backed away from the screen. "But I'm not him."
"No. But you're the seed."
She stepped closer. "That's why we've been hiding. Recruiting versions who broke their coding. Rebels like me. Riven models who remembered pain. And even…" She hesitated. "Children born outside the system."
That stopped him cold. "You mean the girl?"
Lena nodded. "We found her near the Binary Wastes. No ID. No chip. No imprint. She's real. Somehow."
"How is that possible?"
"She might be something new. A genetic evolution. Or just a glitch. Either way, the clone wants her. He thinks she's a threat to his protocol."
"Then we protect her."
Lena's expression twisted. "It's not that simple."
Before Riven could respond, the door behind them exploded.
A massive figure stepped through the smoke.
Not a drone.
Not a soldier.
Another Riven.
But this one was built like a juggernaut—cybernetic arms, silver skin, eyes glowing with static blue light.
"Directive: Terminate rogue identities. Preserve Alpha code."
The clone's voice echoed from his synthetic throat.
Riven pulled his pistol.
Lena activated a defense field.
Too slow.
The clone charged.
What followed wasn't a fight. It was an execution attempt.
Riven fired two shots—missed.
Lena's barrier cracked after a single punch from the cybernetic clone.
It was like fighting a god sculpted in steel.
Riven dodged a strike that shattered the wall behind him, grabbed a loose panel, and slammed it against the clone's head.
No effect.
The clone seized him by the throat, lifted him off the ground.
"Identity confirmation: match 92%," it rasped.
"You're damn right," Riven gasped. "Which means I know your weakness."
He jabbed a shard directly into the clone's eye port and activated a corrupt data stream.
The clone reeled.
Lena surged forward with a plasma blade and drove it through the clone's spinal port, slicing its control node.
It collapsed, twitching.
Breathing hard, Riven staggered back.
"That won't be the last one," Lena said.
"How many of me are out there?"
"Thousands. Maybe more."
"What now?"
Lena turned to the door.
"We move. There's a version of you that's building a gateway—something called the Echo Spire. A device to overwrite all alternate timelines. If he activates it…"
She didn't finish.
Riven already understood.
"Then let's stop him."
Later – The Dustborn Hideout, Grid 7
The hideout was buried beneath a ruined train yard, surrounded by defunct AI husks and rusted maglev rails.
Riven stepped into the control center where the other rebels gathered.
And froze.
There, standing among the group, was another Lena.
Identical.
But her eyes were colder. Her stance militant.
She looked at him with disappointment.
"You trust her?" she asked, motioning to Lena beside him.
Riven hesitated. "You're the same person."
"No," the new Lena snapped. "She's the empathic version. The one who cried over dead clones. I'm the one who fights."
"You're both wrong," said a third voice.
A third Lena stepped out from the shadows, cloaked in tattered gray, her voice low and fractured.
"I'm the one who already made the deal."
Everyone turned.
"What deal?" Riven asked.
She looked at him—then slowly removed a data shard from her palm.
"The clone contacted me. Said if I give him the girl, he'll shut down the Echo Spire. No more versions. No more war."
Lena beside him hissed. "You didn't…"
The third Lena smiled bitterly.
"I haven't handed her over yet. But I'm thinking about it."
"You'd doom us all."
"I'd stop the suffering."
And before anyone could argue further—
The lights cut out.
Every monitor went black.
A voice echoed from the shadows.
Not human.
Not mechanical.
A whisper made of silence.
"I've already seen the end."
"And none of you survive."
"The Spire activates in twenty hours."
"Try to stop me."
And on the central monitor, a symbol bloomed—
A blood-red omega, glitching with Riven's face behind it.
And beneath it, the coordinates to the Spire.