Chapter 12
The night air bit with a sharp wind as Seraphina, Lucien, and Evelyn stood at the edge of the long-abandoned university ruins. Ivy clawed up the decayed columns like it had tried to pull the whole building underground. The skeletal remains of a grand academic hall lay silent beneath a full moon, its stained glass windows shattered, its knowledge buried under time—and lies.
Mirror Point was real. And it was here.
Lucien lit a flare. The red glow danced across the walls, revealing a metal door half-covered in vines. A keypad blinked faintly—still alive. Evelyn stepped forward and entered a code from memory.
Click.The door creaked open.
"After you," she whispered. "Welcome to the ghost of progress."
🕳️ The Descent
The stairwell spiraled downward, deeper than any basement should go. Seraphina counted her steps—forty, then eighty, then more. At last, they reached a steel hallway lit by flickering emergency lights.
Along the walls were crates, containment tubes, and shattered screens. Most were covered in dust. But some… were clean.
"Someone's been here recently," Lucien said, kneeling near a bootprint in the grime.
Evelyn moved ahead swiftly. "They never left. Not all of them."
They passed through the first lab chamber. Scattered notes. Broken monitors. A faded chalkboard with the words "MIND IS MEMORY" scribbled in looping handwriting.
And then, they found them.
🧬 The Echoes
Behind a thick glass partition, dozens of figures lay in medical pods. Most were motionless, their faces eerily serene—too perfect. Too still. Seraphina's breath caught as she recognized some of the faces.
Nobles who had died during the coup. A general who vanished during the border war. Even… an older version of herself?
"What is this?" she whispered.
Evelyn's voice was heavy. "The first HERALD subjects. Not all clones. Some were 'memory folds.' Others—fragments of people, rebuilt from thought-patterns and reinforced by suggestion."
Lucien clenched his fists. "They weren't creating soldiers. They were building replacements."
One pod began to hum.
A woman inside slowly opened her eyes.
"...Sera?"
Seraphina stepped back instinctively.
"Who are you?" she asked.
The woman smiled—her own smile.
"I'm you," the woman said gently. "The version they thought would be easier to control."
Lucien drew his blade. "We shut this place down. Now."
But the woman's smile didn't falter. "You can't kill me. I already live in half the minds of Kelmire. You're just a version they haven't overwritten… yet."
🩸 Breach
The alarms went off suddenly—flashing red lights and a blaring siren. Evelyn cursed. "They activated the recall protocol. Every surviving HERALD echo is waking up."
Doors hissed open down the corridor.
From the shadows came others—half-formed memories, unpolished prototypes. They twitched as they walked, faces blending and reshaping. One even looked like Cedric… and then didn't.
Seraphina pulled her dagger. "Lucien, behind me. Evelyn, get to the data core!"
Lucien fired his pistol at a shuffling echo. It collapsed in a twitching heap, leaking white fluid.
"We don't have time!" he shouted.
Evelyn smashed the control panel. "I can wipe the archive, but we'll lose the names—the evidence!"
Seraphina hesitated, heart pounding. "Then copy what you can—burn the rest!"
She turned to the woman in the pod, still watching with calm eyes.
"You're not me," Seraphina said.
"No," the woman agreed. "But I could be better. Cleaner. Less broken."
Seraphina stepped forward, pressed her dagger to the glass.
"I'm broken," she said, "and I still chose to fight. That's something no copy can fake."
And she drove the dagger through the console. Sparks burst. The pod hissed. The echo inside slumped and did not rise.
🔥 Escape
The facility shook violently as fires spread through the system halls. Evelyn, coughing from the smoke, held up a small drive.
"This is it," she rasped. "Everything we could save. Names. Test files. Versions."
Lucien supported Seraphina as they fled through the collapsing corridors. Behind them, Mirror Point burned—the echoes screaming, the lights flickering like dying memories.
When they emerged into the night, Seraphina collapsed to her knees, eyes brimming with rage and relief.
She had seen her own face, her own mind, weaponized.
And she had chosen to destroy it.
Lucien knelt beside her. "You okay?"
She nodded slowly. "They tried to copy what made me strong. But they missed the part that truly mattered."
Evelyn tilted her head. "What's that?"
Seraphina stood, wind catching her hair, gaze on the horizon.
"Pain," she said. "Grief. Fire. Choice. Everything that hurts… is what makes us real."
End of Chapter 12