The desert of the Deadglass Wastes was a place people learned not to remember. The sky was gray with static ash, and the sand glittered faintly from the chemical residue of wars long past. Winds howled like mourning machines, never sleeping.
AGILA moved in low and silent.
Their hover transport settled between twisted bones of metal and forgotten vehicles. Mira stepped out first, hood up, eyes squinting at the wind. Enzo followed behind her, Cain clipped at his side. Kael, already scanning, shook his head at the corrupted signals pinging off his HUD.
"This place shouldn't exist anymore," he muttered.
"It doesn't," Mira answered. "That's why she hid it here."
She hadn't spoken much since the incident two days prior. Not since the memory bleed began—visions that weren't hers, names she didn't know, feelings that cut her from inside. Kael ran diagnostics but could only confirm one thing: someone else's memories were inside her now.
---
The entrance to the Harrow site was beneath the skeleton of a derailed mag-train. Hidden in plain sight. Mira approached it like instinct, pressing her hand to a rusted panel that blinked faintly back to life at her touch.
Kael arched a brow. "That's not standard biometrics."
"No," Mira said. "That's… familiarity."
The tunnel opened.
---
Inside, the lab was half-submerged in sand. Glass tanks cracked open long ago. Terminals blinked with broken code. Enzo moved carefully, Cain's hilt pulsing with tension.
Mira walked ahead until she reached the center—a raised platform surrounded by shattered memory cores. She dropped to her knees.
"This was where she worked," she whispered.
Enzo knelt beside her. "Solace?"
She nodded. "She built things here. Built me here."
Kael was at a console, fingers dancing. "I've found remnants of old Harrow blueprints, but it's fragmented. Someone scrubbed most of the data."
He tapped one key and a shattered interface buzzed to life. A flickering AI projection wavered in the air—a half-functional drone with a cracked lens.
> "Protocol HAR-6B… breach event… evacuate sector…"
Enzo stepped forward. "Who scrubbed this facility?"
> "Director Descovinio ordered abandonment after anomaly exceeded safe metrics. Solace override failed. Countdown sequence—"
The image began to distort.
Kael tapped again. "One name survived the deletion logs."
A single word appeared:
> Sanctum-13
Mira stood, her voice suddenly distant: "That's where she went."
---
A tremor rocked the lab.
Kael cursed. "Old defense triggers waking up. We've got maybe five minutes before this place eats itself."
As they sprinted out, Mira stumbled—visions flooding her again. She saw a field of white flowers. A child's hand. A scream in a corridor. None of it real—but all of it familiar.
Enzo grabbed her, pulling her out before the sand collapsed into the tunnel behind them.
---
Back at the safehouse, Mira sat silently.
Kael administered a sedative. "Memory overlap. Your neural imprint is fused with Solace's echo. Not dangerous yet—but it's growing."
Enzo leaned against the wall. "You think Sanctum-13 is real?"
Kael nodded. "If anyone survived Project Harrow's collapse, they'd have gone there. Blacksite. No records. Off-grid."
Enzo looked at Mira. "Can you lead us?"
She didn't answer. Her eyes were glassy.
Then, she spoke, but the voice wasn't hers:
> "If I fall… let the future break free. You were never meant to be their cage."
Kael's eyes widened. "That was… Solace."
The moment passed. Mira blinked. "What?"
Enzo stepped forward. "We follow the trail. Sanctum-13."
---
Far above them, in the core tower of the capital, Drago Descovinio reviewed the seismic data. His fingers traced the signal echo from the Harrow site.
"She's remembering," he said to himself.
Behind him, the masked man bowed. "Do we intervene?"
Drago shook his head. "No. We observe. Let the ghosts lead him."
He turned, the light from the tower's peak casting his shadow long across the floor.
> "Because when he sees what they buried… even Zero won't want to remember."