MEMORY PROTOCOL

Handler's proof

Jake’s pulse hammered in his ears. The world stank of rust, mold and blood, his own, dripping slowly from his shoulder. He hadn’t stopped moving since the mimic. No rest, no breath wasted. Just the pull in his chest dragging him forward, the name he hadn’t spoken aloud in two years.

Sammy.

The tunnels spat him into a hollow chamber, the ceiling cracked open in the rain. Water bled down the walls like veins. He paused only long enough to check the edges: no drones, no sensor hum.

But there,movement.

A silhouette. Small, hunched, framed by the ruin-light.

Jake’s weapon was up before thought caught him.

“Don’t move.” His voice was flint.

The figure lifted both hands. Slowly. Deliberately.

“I’m not armed.”

The voice, a woman’s. Younger than Jake. Rough but steady.

Jake narrowed his eyes, closing the distance in three measured steps. Rain carved shadows over her face—short hair plastered to her skull, collar torn, the faint outline of an implant scar fading down her neck.

Ex-Order.

Jake’s gut clenched.

“Name” he barked.

The woman didn’t flinch. “Rin.”

Jake’s grip tightened. “And why the hell are you still breathing in my airspace, Rin?”

Her mouth twitched like she’d expected that question. Like she’d already rehearsed this moment.

“Because” Rin said evenly, “I’m the one who cut Theta-7 out of the core.”

Jake’s heart stuttered. His weapon pressed harder into Rin’s forehead.

“You’re lying.”

Fear flickered in her eyes, but not enough to drown the conviction beneath. “No. I was his handler. I’ve seen what he sees. I’ve seen you.”

Jake froze. His pulse stumbled against his ribs.

“Try again” he said, his voice as low as a blade’s edge. “Ten seconds before, I paint this wall with your head.”

Rin swallowed but held his gaze.

“It was the gala” she said. “The Order’s winter masquerade, three years ago. You wore black formal, no mask. Everyone else was glitter and champagne. You stood out like fire in glass. Theta was assigned to kill you that night.”

Jake’s throat went dry. The memory punched him in the ribs.

“You’ll have to do better than that,” he hissed.

“I watched through his feed,” Rin pressed, voice sharpening with urgency. ''I saw what he saw. You didn’t play in the room like the others. You didn’t even sip your drink. When he raised his hand to strike, he hesitated. His vitals spiked. His pupils blew wide. The script fractured in real time.” She leaned forward a fraction.

No one else could have known. Not a mimic. Not a plant. Not a handler briefed after the fact. Only Sammy and the one wired into his head.

Jake’s weapon trembled, unsteady for the first time in years.

“You watched him” he said slowly, dangerously. “You used him.”

Rin didn’t deny it. Her jaw clenched. “I handled him. Conditioned him. Broke him when they told me to. I won’t pretend otherwise. But when the loop cracked, when he began to fight the programming , he didn’t cry for freedom. He said your name. Over and over.”

Jake stepped back, lowering the gun half an inch but not holstering it. Trust was poison, but every cell in his body knew better.

“Where is he?”

Rin exhaled, as if she’d been waiting to be asked. “Safe. For now. I pulled him out before they burned his cortex. He’s weak, disoriented but alive. I can take you to him.”

Jake studied her in silence, rain ticking against metal, blood soaking his sleeve. His mind was knives and fire.

If she was lying, she’d be dead in a breath. But she wasn’t lying. Not about the gala. Not about the words.

Finally, Jake lowered the weapon.

“You lead” he said flatly. “One wrong move and I put you down.”

Rin nodded once. “Fair.”

The world narrowed into the echo of boots and rain. Rin moved ahead, cautious but sure, weaving through half-collapsed corridors that stank of mildew and chemical rot.

Jake shadowed her, weapon never lowered more than a fraction. Every sound screamed ambush. Every turn begged betrayal.

A door.

Rusted, sealed with scavenged locks. A faint pulse of light bled out beneath it.

Rin stopped, shoulders taut, breath uneven. “He’s inside.”

Jake’s chest constricted. He hadn’t realized he’d been holding his breath until it burned.

He shoved Rin aside, weapon raised, and slammed the door open.

The room was small. Crude. Reinforced with mesh walls and patched insulation. A scav-lamp flickered low on the floor.

And there,

On a cot stripped to the frame

Sammy.

Jake froze.

Sammy’s hair was shorter now, his frame skeletal, scars webbed across his arms. His skin was gray in the lamp-light, but his chest rose. Fell.

Alive.

Jake’s throat closed. He took a step. Then another.

Sammy stirred. His eyes blinked open hazy, unfocused. Until they landed on Jake. Recognition tore through the haze.

His lips parted. And for the first time in two years, Jake heard his voice.

“Jake…”

Jake’s weapon clattered forgotten to the floor. He dropped to his knees at the cot, his hand hovering, terrified to touch.

Sammy reached first. Trembling fingers caught Jake’s wrist. Real. Warm.

“Thought I… lost you” Sammy whispered.

Jake swallowed hard, pressing Sammy’s hand against his cheek.

“You didn’t” he rasped. “I’ve been chasing you every damn day. I told you I’d come.”

Sammy’s broken smile cracked the ruin-light.

Behind them, Rin stood silent. Watching. She didn’t move. Didn’t interrupt. Because this moment wasn’t hers.

It was theirs.

The room stank of damp concrete and old power cables. Jake’s knees ached against the broken floor, but he didn’t move. Couldn’t. His hand stayed locked around Sammy’s, afraid that if he let go even for a second, the world would rip him away again.

Sammy’s lips trembled with something halfway between a smile and a sob. “I thought you were a dream.”

Jake shook his head, his thumb brushing over the jut of Sammy’s knuckles. “Not a dream. Never a dream. You’re real. You’re here.” His voice cracked on the last word.

Sammy’s breathing was shallow, his body thin from deprivation, but his eyes were alive. They burned with something fierce, even through exhaustion. “They told me you’d given up. That you didn’t even remember my name.”

Jake swallowed hard, fury lancing through him, but he kept his voice steady. “I bled for your name. I killed for it. Don’t you ever think I forgot.”

Sammy’s fingers tightened around his. Weak, shaking but insistent. “Then don’t let me go now.”

Jake bent, forehead pressing against Sammy’s temple, and for one stolen second the world shrank to skin, breath, the steady thump of a pulse he’d feared was long gone.

But the silence didn’t last.

From the hall outside came the faint, unmistakable hiss of hydraulics. The crackle of distant comms. A sound Jake knew too well ,scanners.

His muscles went iron-hard. He pulled back just enough to look Sammy in the eyes. “They’re close.”

Sammy flinched, fear flashing across his face but beneath it, resolve. “Then we run.”

Behind them, Rin’s voice cut through, sharp and urgent. “I told you, they’ll trace the breach within an hour. We have minutes at best. We need to move.”

Jake helped Sammy to his feet, steadying him when his legs buckled. Every instinct screamed to keep holding him, keep memorizing the heat of him, but he forced himself to focus. This wasn’t a sanctuary. This was a battlefield.

Sammy leaned against him, breathing hard, but his chin lifted. “I didn’t survive two years in their cage to die in this hole. Take me with you, Jake. Whatever’s out there, I’d rather face it with you than rot here.”

Jake’s chest twisted. He nodded once, fiercely. “Then we move together.”

Weapons raised, hearts pounding, the three of them slipped back into the ruined corridors reunion blazing like fire in their veins, but danger pressing close with every step.

And as the first drone-light swept across the walls behind them, Jake realized the reunion wasn’t the end. It was only the beginning.