Fractured Echo

The station groaned around them as Kieran and Prime pushed forward, weaving through flickering corridors that warped and unraveled with each passing second. The Vanguard figures watched in eerie silence, never advancing, never retreating—just waiting.

The air felt thick with something unseen, something pressing against Kieran's mind. It wasn't fear. It was a question. A doubt.

Why weren't they stopping him?

Kieran clenched his fists as he and Prime rounded a final corner, coming face-to-face with the core chamber.

The door was already open.

Inside, the core pulsed like a living heart—a massive sphere of shifting energy, threads of light twisting around its surface. A paradox made manifest.

Prime strode toward the control panel, fingers already moving. "Once we activate the failsafe, the reset will begin. We'll have a small window to control what stays and what goes."

Kieran hesitated. Something wasn't right.

He turned back toward the open corridor. The Vanguard still hadn't followed. They stood at a distance, watching.

No weapons raised. No resistance.

It was as if they were letting this happen.

His pulse spiked. "Prime, stop."

Prime didn't look up. "We don't have time—"

"Exactly," Kieran snapped. "If this is what they wanted to stop, why aren't they stopping us?"

That made Prime freeze.

The silence stretched.

And then—

The truth hit Kieran all at once.

His breath caught, realization striking like a blade.

This isn't a battle.

It's a test.

The Vanguard wasn't here to erase him.

They were here to see if he would erase himself.

The simulation. The resets. The Firewall.

Everything had been leading him here—to this moment.

A moment where he would choose to wipe the past away.

Or finally accept it.

Kieran turned to Prime. "You said the Firewall was holding together the last fragments of a dying world." His voice was tight. "But what if it's not dying?"

Prime's expression darkened.

Kieran pressed on. "What if it's evolving? What if the simulation wasn't meant to keep us trapped, but to prepare us?"

Prime's fingers hovered over the controls. His hesitation was brief—but it was there.

Kieran knew he was right.

The Vanguard wasn't trying to erase the last remnants of a lost world.

They were waiting to see if humanity could survive beyond it.

And if Kieran activated the reset—

He wouldn't just destroy the past.

He would destroy the future.

His gaze locked onto Prime.

"Step away," he said. "Now."

The core pulsed. The station shook.

And Prime had a choice to make.