Chapter 22: Aftermath
The next twenty-four hours were a blur of preparation. Echo worked with Jaxon on controlling his new abilities, teaching him techniques she'd developed over three centuries of system mastery. The playback system was straightforward—touch blood, see memories. But the command system was something else entirely. "It doesn't work on demand," Echo explained. "It responds to intent. True intent. You can't fake it, you can't force it. When you genuinely, deeply want someone to die—when every fiber of your being demands it—the command activates. And then they die." "That's terrifying." "That's the point. The twelfth system was created as a failsafe. If the other eleven systems were ever collected by someone like Victoria, the twelfth could destroy them all—including the host. It's a suicide swi
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