CHAPTER 15 — “THE ORIGIN LEVEL”Untitled Episode
913 Words
The stairwell dropped them into darkness thick enough to feel. It wasn’t the absence of light—more like the presence of something deeper, heavier, pressed between the layers of the station itself. Every step down tightened the air, as if they were descending into a memory that did not want to be disturbed.
When they reached the bottom, the floor hummed.
A low, resonant vibration.
Riven drew a slow breath. “This is where the memory begins.”
Calyx swept his wristband. “No distortion. No reconstruction. This is real-space.”
Idris shivered. “Then why does it feel like something remembers us already?”
The hallway they stepped into was unlike any part of Asterion-3.
The walls curved into a perfect cylinder, lined with dark alloy threaded with faint purple iridescence. No labels, no safety stripes, none of the usual engineering signatures. It felt more like a sealed artery than a corridor.
“Phase 2 architecture,” Riven murmured. “Untouched by the redaction.”
Calyx’s gaze hardened. “Meaning we’re walking into the part they erased on purpose.”
A soft click echoed behind them.
Idris gasped. “Did someone just… walk past me?”
“No one’s there,” Riven said.
“Yes,” Idris whispered. “That’s the problem.”
THE PROTOCOL THAT KNOWS HIS NAME
A rectangular terminal lit up beside them—dustless, flawless, as if waiting decades for this specific moment.
Letters formed slowly:
ENTRY PROTOCOL — HALE
IDENTITY VERIFYING…
Riven didn’t move.
Calyx placed a steady hand on his shoulder. “You don’t have to touch it.”
Riven exhaled, then pressed his palm to the surface.
The panel brightened instantly.
IDENTITY CONFIRMED: HALE
PROTOCOL RELEASED
Idris made a small sound. “It shouldn’t be able to confirm that. It should know the difference between two people—”
“It doesn’t,” Riven said.
“Or it doesn’t care.”
The screen flickered, revealing a log window:
LOOM PHASE 2 — MEMORY ENGINE CORE
OBJECTIVE: PRESERVE FINAL MOMENT BEFORE COLLAPSE
NOTE: EVENT CANNOT COMPLETE WITHOUT HUMAN WITNESS
Calyx’s jaw tightened. “So that’s why the anomaly grabs Idris. It’s not feeding on him—it’s using him.”
Riven tapped the glowing text. “And if the witness died… the system keeps searching for a substitute.”
A cold realization slid down Idris’s spine.
“Is that why it keeps calling my name?”
No one answered.
THE DOOR WITH THE CURVED SHADOW
They moved deeper.
A door appeared at the end of the corridor—semi-transparent, made of reinforced glass-like alloy with a faint shimmering arc etched across it.
The same shape as the half-ring entity.
Beyond the glass, a pale, pulsing light illuminated the outline of a chamber.
Riven stepped closer, breath catching.
“It’s the origin room.”
Calyx keyed the manual release.
The door slid open, revealing a circular chamber with a single object at its center: a large crystalline core, suspended by magnetic rings, glowing white-blue with each pulse.
The Loom Phase 2 Origin Core.
Still active.
Still alive.
THE UNFILTERED MEMORY
As they entered, the core reacted.
Light spread across the chamber floor, forming a holographic playback—not reconstruction, not guesswork, but raw memory.
A man stood in the projection.
Dark hair. Tired eyes.
The name “Hale” on his suit.
Riven’s breath faltered.
Hale stared into a wall-mounted camera, speaking clearly:
“It’s not hostile. It’s reflecting us.”
Calyx frowned. “Reflecting?”
Riven whispered, “The entity doesn’t attack. It mirrors. It reproduces threat only when we create threat.”
The playback shifted.
Hale reached toward the core—but instead of fear, there was determination.
He whispered:
“If we anchor it… the moment can hold.”
Idris stumbled forward. “He wasn’t trying to stop the event… he was trying to save it.”
The core pulsed, brighter.
A new line of text scrolled across its surface:
HUMAN ANCHOR MISSING
SEEKING REPLACEMENT
Idris gasped.
“It’s me. It keeps using me to fill the role Hale left behind.”
“No,” Riven said sharply, “it’s trying to fit someone—anyone—into a memory that can't stand on its own.”
The room vibrated.
THE ENTITY RETURNS
A shadow curved across the back wall.
Slow. Smooth.
A perfect arc of metal and light.
The half-ring.
Not a memory.
Not reconstruction.
The real thing moving inside origin space.
Calyx lifted his weapon, voice low. “It’s forming. And it recognizes us.”
The entity extended a segmented limb, stretching in a motion that ignored gravity, as if unfolding from the memory itself.
Idris stepped toward it—unbidden, drawn like a magnet.
“Idris!” Riven grabbed him.
The entity swept past, missing Idris by centimeters, leaving a trail of shimmering distortion.
The origin core flared.
A countdown appeared:
EVENT RECONSTRUCTION:
RESTARTING IN 43 SECONDS
Calyx cursed. “Forty-three—just like the timestamp.”
“It’s not counting down to the event,” Riven said, eyes widening.
“It’s counting down to the moment the memory becomes real again.”
The floor shook.
The lights shrieked.
Idris clung to Riven’s arm. “I can hear him… Hale… he’s saying something—”
The core flickered one last warning:
THE EVENT WILL RESTART
PREPARE ANCHOR
Riven’s heartbeat roared in his ears.
The origin sequence began.
A wall of white-blue light surged upward—
And everything vanished.
- Writer
