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Rain-soaked neon flickered across District Seven's shattered rooftops as the consequences of Aiden's broadcast rippled through the city. Every monitor public or private had shown the raw memory echo: shinobi, Uchiha, war-scarred streets buried beneath corporate lights. Now, the city was gasping in its own reflection.
The Aftermath in the Streets
College students, tea vendors, warehouse clerks, and street minors all paused as screens across vehicles and walls looped the shared vision. Aiden and Kiera stood off to the side of an improvised broadcast terminal inside an abandoned media center, but their hearts felt the vibration of hundreds, perhaps thousands, of reactions quivering through the city's veins.
"Are we too late?" Kiera asked, voice hollow.
He grabbed her shoulder. "No. We opened eyes." He didn't mention how twice the Uchiha essence had flashed in his brilliant crimson gaze just minutes earlier.
Outside, the static monitors flickered, then shifted from shared memory to real-time footage of protests erupting. Voices amplified in crude megaphones:
"Why were they covering this up?"
"They're talking about war crimes!"
"We deserve truth!"
But just as quickly, armored enforcers the red-eyed soldiers branded with the inverted eye condensed into cordon lines. Riot shields lifted. Loudspeakers barked orders. Tear gas canisters glowed in tactical rigs held at the ready.
Inside the terminal, Luro's comm unit beeped.
"Field reports flooding in," he said. "District Twelve's strike team deployed. They're arresting public broadcasters. National Media Kiosks are blacked out."
Aiden listened only half-hearing. His gaze drifted upward, to the concrete ceiling that still buzzed with power. He watched the drones scanning rooftops, their red lenses sweeping.
"The Directive isn't just reacting," he whispered. "It's retaliating."
Kinetic Responses
In a narrow alley not far away, Nikko the street kid stumbled over a power ramp. The broadcast had stirred something within him his eyes red-rimmed, half afraid, half inspired. He shook a makeshift banner into shape reading:
"Remember Our Roots Stop the Lies"
He raised it above his head just as a soldier appeared at the alley's mouth. The soldier's helmeted eye fractured Nikko's reflection in the puddles.
"Stop moving," the soldier said through amplified voice.
The kid held the banner higher.
A sound snapped. The soldier fired a color-stun blue shock that fizzled in mid‑air, unable to reach visibly. But Nikko choked, gasping, falling over the banner. The banner's ink bled rainwater as two more enforcers half-ran, half-drifting in behind him. He covered his face.
From across the street, other protestors surged forward, thigh tension like gathered breath before a scream. The monitors cut between their fear and the collective desperation of movement.
Kiera observed all this from an overhead drone feed. "They're suppressing the dam before it breaks."
Aiden clenched his fists. "Then let it break."
Aiden Unmasked
Within the terminal, streets vented into murmured chaos. Enforcers stationed at every corner as drones above tracked movement in real-time. A digital map warmed with red dots marking each arrest or clash.
Aiden walked to the platform where his broadcast had been set up still alive with signals. His expression had shifted: alien, almost regal.
Kiera paused beside him.
"What are we doing?"
He stared at the flickering wireframes on the screen. "If we disappear now, they erase the evidence. But if we stay they're more likely to mobilize…"
A long beat.
"I'm not going to vanish."
Luro swallowed. "You know what comes now."
He walked down from the platform and crouched. His voice was soft, but the monitors made it echo.
"This is Aiden Uchiha. Your voice is my voice. You have a right to know: this memory is ours, too."
At that moment, the door crashed open. Combat boots skidded on concrete.
"Public broadcast emergency order 77A stand down now…"
Aiden stood straight, posture like the sealed form of the orb inside him. The soldiers paused, studying Aiden's red eyes.
Kiera tried to raise the iron gate. Luro pressed behind her.
"Authority verified," the soldier repeated. "You are under Directive Arrest."
Aiden's lips curved.
"Directive Arrest?" he whispered. "They can only arrest the city if we let them."
Crackdown Sweeps
Soldiers flanked the door. Gas. Crackling.
They formed a blockade tight enough to hush breathing.
The first canister dropped outside the terminal doors green gas blooming like a flower in reverse. They turned it on inside. The lobby hissed. Panic rippled.
Protesters outside responded by hurling bottles and shards. Others fled. Sirens screeched. Drones below readied landing thrusters. From the terminal, the broadcast flickered between control room chaos and street conflict.
Aiden inhaled.
The chamber grew still.
"You want the truth?" he said, raising his voice so the mics caught it.
He closed his eyes. The Sharingan flared spiral and nine-star bright in his vision.
Power buzzed through every wire. The shard's memory leak glowed, running thin lines of red in the air.
And then he spoke words in ancient syllable.
A shimmering wave rippled through the terminal.
The gas froze in mid-air. Droplets hovered.
The soldiers lifted their rifles. Their eyes glazed. The uniforms glowed faint green.
Time slowed.
The broadcast flickered to show Aiden's silhouette behind the shard's glow.
Then it cut.
Public Shocks, Hidden Secrets
The screen static cracked.
Blue-light glitch cut through.
Back in the alley, soldiers stood frozen mid-choke.
Nikko's tears dried in mid-air.
Across the city, power sensors blinked. Signals cut out and then… resumed, but altered.
The screens flashed again not Aiden's image, but Echo's humming silhouette.
And beneath it text:
"DO NOT FEAR BLOODLINES
THIS IS ONLY THE FIRST MEMORY
KNOW YOUR OWN ORDINANCE"
Then Echo's vermillion eyes flashed.
The soldiers shook, sighed, then collapsed.
Everything powered down.
Only the monitors remained.
Aiden breathed again.
Fallout and Fallout
Sirens began again slower. Civilian alarms. Citizens reporting defunct drones scattered in shattered formations. Panic tempered into rumors.
From blocked comm-lines:
Minister's Council to convene immediately.
Defense Grid Override triggered.
Drone Termination required due to unknown energy signaling.
Inside the terminal, Kiera knelt beside Aiden as he came-to.
"Your eyes…" she whispered.
He looked up, tears in his Sharingan red and fresh.
"They heard," he said. "Even if they forget where the truth came from, they can't forget that they saw it."
Luro tapped the console.
"Drones are falling offline across grid. So are surveillance nodes."
Drey's face appeared on brought-in Luro feed.
"Remember our world isn't binary," the doctor said gravely. "We just disrupted the Directive core, but we may have lit a beacon in the open grid. They'll be sending deeper forces next."
A warning.
A surge of dread.
"It's not done," Aiden repeated. "The city is waking."
Cliffhanger: Echo's Return
Behind them, silent footsteps echoed on cracked tile.
They turned expecting soldiers.
But it was Echo, re-entering the flood of neon night.
His eyes scanned the three of them, then the shattered terminals, then the city beyond the wide windows.
"Stage One complete," he said softly. "Now the Dusk Protocol will soak through each fissure they built."
He tilted his head at the shard residue glowing faint red on the floor.
Aiden's jaw clenched.
Echo continued: "You used the power of the bloodline. But there are more pathways…more conduits. They'll come for them next."
He looked up at the drone above, then stepped into the night rain.
The lights flickered.
And in the final moment, the terminal monitors flashed with a new message one word, burned in digital crimson:
AWAKENING
Silence.
/-\
If you wish to read more or simply support me than check out my Patreon at
" https://www.patreon.com/Its_Zack/ "
You can Get Access to 3 More Chapters OR 7 More Chapters if you want.