The door didn't creak.
It sighed.
As if exhaling after holding breath for centuries.
Inside was neither light nor darkness. Just static—a hum, vibrating in bone.
Amelia stepped in first. Her reflection in the glass walls lagged, as if trying to remember how to mimic her.
Alexis followed. Every step she took left behind a trail of leaves.
The room stretched far beyond physics—endless rows of glass tanks, each containing a figure in sleep.
Some were her. Some were Amelia. Others were... neither, yet familiar.
"We didn't wake up," Amelia whispered. "We were switched on."
On the central console, a cracked screen blinked:
> PROJECT: SHADOWBORN
STAGE: GERMINATION COMPLETE
AWAKE: SUBJECT 3, SUBJECT 5
BREACH DETECTED — SPIRAL CORE UNSTABLE
Alexis looked to the ceiling.
The spiral was not a symbol anymore.
It was a hole.
And something was crawling out of it.