Forbidden Love - Fragments of Forgotten Love

Chapter 9

"They're gaining," Costa warned, glancing back at the shimmering distortions.

I clutched my anchor stone tighter, feeling its warmth pulse through my palm. "The echowisps are leading us somewhere specific."

Indeed, the glowing orbs converged on a specific point ahead—a jagged opening in the riverbed wall that looked like a natural cave but hummed with artificial energy.

"Emergency shelter," Costa breathed, recognising the design. "From the old evacuation network."

We dove through the opening just as the temperature around us plummeted. Ice crystals began forming on the cave walls—a sign that the Void Walkers were attempting to phase into our location.

The shelter extended deeper than expected, its walls lined with dormant equipment that flickered to life as we passed. Emergency lighting cast eerie shadows; somewhere in the distance, we could hear the hum of still-functioning systems.

"Motion detected," a mechanical voice announced. "Initiating preservation protocol."

"No!" I shouted, panic flooding through me at the word 'preservation.' "Override! Emergency override!"

The lights shifted from amber to blue, and the voice changed tone. "Override accepted. Switching to refugee assistance mode."

Costa pulled me deeper into the shelter as the entrance behind us filled with writhing distortions. The Void Walkers were trying to phase through the barrier, but something was preventing them from fully manifesting.

"Psychic dampeners," Costa realised, pointing to devices mounted along the walls. "They can't maintain coherence in here."

The echowisps swirled around us, their whispers more urgent now.

"Deeper... safe... others wait..."

"Others?" I looked at Costa. "What others?"

We followed the luminous guides through a maze of corridors that seemed to extend far beyond what should have been possible for an emergency shelter. The architecture changed as we walked—older, more organic, with walls that curved like living tissue.

Finally, we emerged into a vast chamber that took my breath away. Dozens of people moved through the space—some in resistance clothing, others in the simple garments of refugees. But what caught my attention were the familiar faces scattered throughout the crowd.

"Impossible," Costa whispered.

A woman turned toward us, her features unmistakably similar to mine but aged by decades of natural living. Her eyes widened as she saw me.

"Shantali?" she said, her voice trembling. "My God, it's really you."

"Who are you?" I asked, though something deep in my memory was stirring.

"I'm Elena Jackson," she replied, tears streaming down her face. "Elliot's granddaughter. Your niece."

“Niece, but how has it been 600 years? And when I last saw Elliot, he was only a teenager, assuming that your grandfather was my only half-sibling,” I said, rubbing the bridge of my nose.

Elena's smile was sad but proud. "Elliot lived to be ninety-three. It was a natural lifespan and natural death. He married and had children, and they had children. The Jackson line survived, Aunt Shantali, even when the Council tried to erase it from the records."

"But how are you here?" Costa asked, his voice filled with wonder. "This place, all these people..."

"The resistance isn't just about opposing the Council," Elena explained, gesturing to the bustling chamber around us. "It's about preserving what they tried to destroy—families, memories, the right to live and die on our own terms."

An older man approached, his bearing regal despite his simple clothes. When he smiled, I saw Costa's eyes reflected in his weathered face.

"Hello, son," he said quietly.

Costa stumbled backward, his face pale. "Father? But you're... you were part of the preservation committee. Marcus said—"

"Marcus told you what the official records state," the man replied. "King Aldric Blackthorne died officially three hundred years ago, executed for treason against the Council." He spread his hands. "Unofficially, I've been working to undo the damage I helped create."

The echowisps swirled more frantically now, their whispers overlapping in excitement.

"Reunions... families... the circle closes..."

"I don't understand," I said, my head spinning. "The Council, the preservation program—if you're both alive, if the resistance has been operating for centuries—"

"The program was always doomed to fail," Elena explained gently. "You can't build a future by imprisoning the past. The Council has been playing out the same script for six hundred years, never realising that life finds a way to resist control."

A commotion near the chamber's entrance drew our attention. Marcus stumbled through, supported by Dex, both looking battered but alive.

"The vehicle made it to the ridge," Marcus reported, breathing heavily. "Kira's coordinating with the sanctuary scouts. But the Void Walkers—they're regrouping for another assault."

"Let them come," King Aldric said, his voice carrying the authority I remembered from Costa's fragmented memories. "This place has been waiting six hundred years for this moment."

"What do you mean?" Costa asked.

Elena smiled, the expression transforming her careworn features. "This isn't just a shelter, Costa. It's a preservation facility—the real one. Built to protect what actually matters."

She gestured to the walls around us, and I noticed for the first time that they were covered in intricate carvings, paintings, and what looked like memory crystals similar to our anchor stones.

"Stories," I breathed. "You've been preserving stories."

"Every person who refused the Council's program, every family torn apart, every choice denied—it's all here," King Aldric confirmed. "The true history of humanity's survival from the fallout, something I should have stopped, and in the end, I was left to watch it all fall apart. I never ordered your arrest, or either of you been taken. I know what you must be both thinking. Shortly after you came to me and my Queen, you were taken, but not by who you might think.”

Costa's hand tightened in mine as his father's words sank in. "Then who?"

"The Emergency Preservation Committee acted without royal consent," King Aldric said, his voice heavy with old guilt. "By the time I discovered what they'd done, you were already in stasis. Your mother and I tried to intervene, but they had backing from the industrial families—including yours, Shantali."

Elena stepped closer, her eyes filled with compassion. "Your father, Thomas Jackson, was one of the Committee's founding members. He saw the Collapse coming and wanted to secure his genetic legacy, even if it meant sacrificing his own daughter."