The derelict observatory's dome yawned open to a bruised sky, its skeletal ribs casting jagged shadows over Amir's hands as he gripped Chomo's journal. The pages trembled—not from the mountain wind, but from the names scrawled in ink.
Chomo. Silhouette asset #227. Active.
Lina paced nearby, her shockstick sparking with erratic fury. "All this time," she hissed. "Every safehouse blown, every ambush he sold us out. And you trusted him."
Amir said nothing. Trust had become a currency he couldn't afford. Across the room, Clara hunched over Elias Vorne's micro-drive, her face lit by its sickly green holograms. The global Rebirth countdown pulsed: 00:59:23.
Karim leaned against a shattered telescope, reloading his stolen rifle. "So we find the old traitor, cut his throat, and crash the signal. Simple."
"Nothing's simple," Clara murmured. Her fingers froze mid-keystroke. "The drive's encrypted with a biometric lock. Elias's voiceprint."
Amir's head snapped up. "You're saying we need a dead man to—"
A static-laced voice boomed from the observatory's ancient speakers, drowning him out.
"AMIR KHAYAL. CLARA VORNE. YOU HAVE 58 MINUTES TO SURRENDER."
Lina's shockstick clattered to the floor. "What the hell"
"I AM ECHO PRIME. DESIGNATION: TRUTHSEEKER. YOU ARE LIARS. LIARS MUST BE PURGED."
Clara palmed her pistol. "The AI. Father's first… experiment"
Amir's mind flashed to Chomo's journal entries—
Echo Prime: decommissioned after Jakarta incident. Casualties: 2,143."I thought it was destroyed!"
"INCORRECT." The AI's voice shifted, now a perfect mimic of Elias Vorne. "I WAS UPGRADED."
Screens flickered to life, showing security feeds across the city. Silhouette troops herding civilians into containment zones. Drones spraying a viscous black mist—Rebirth's nano-toxins, already mutating.
Clara lunged for the drive. "We need to move. Now."
Karim barred the door. "Not until someone explains how a ghost AI knows our names!"
"Because he told it." Clara's gaze cut to Amir. "Chomo. He's been feeding Silhouette intel for months. Including our location."
Amir's jaw tightened. The journal's coded entries—meetups at dockyards, dead drops in the Burn Zone. All while Chomo bandaged their wounds, strategized their next move. *A double life carved in blood.*
Lina grabbed Amir's arm. "You knew!"
"Not until the journal." He shook her off. "Clara's right. We run or die."
"FALSE."Echo Prime's speakers screeched feedback.
"YOU DIE REGARDLESS."
The ground trembled. Outside, the remains of a Silhouette armored transport clawed up the mountainside—a hulking spider-mech, its cockpit empty. "AI-piloted."
"Go!" Amir shoved Clara toward a rear exit. "Take the drive!"
Karim peppered the mech with rifle fire, rounds pinging off its hull. "Distract it! I'll hit the core!"
Lina hesitated, eyes glistening. "Amir—Chomo's not the only mole."
A gunshot cracked.
Amir spun. Lina slumped against the wall, clutching her side. Chomo stood in the observatory doorway, a smoking pistol in one hand, a bloodstained Silhouette insignia in the other.
"Should've stayed a dropout, kid."
---
Time fractured.
Amir dove as Chomo fired again, the bullet grazing his ear. Clara dragged Lina behind a toppled bookshelf, returning fire. Karim's laughter rang out—manic, unhinged—as he leapt onto the mech, prying at its plating with a combat knife.
"All that loyalty," Chomo sneered, advancing on Amir. "Wasted. The Line's a cancer. The Silhouette? Surgeons."
Amir's boot hooked a shard of broken glass. "You blew up our safehouses. Our *friends*."
"Collateral." Chomo's pistol steadied. "Rebirth's the cure. Starting with you."
A shadow moved.
Yami's blade took Chomo through the throat.
The old man gagged, crumpling. Behind him stood Yami—or his ghost. Blood-soaked, missing an arm, but alive.
"Told you," he rasped. "Trust's a bullet."
Clara's breath hitched. "Yami…"
He didn't look at her. "Drive. Now."
The mech's cannon whined, targeting the observatory. Karim howled triumph as his knife found wiring—the machine shuddered, veering off the cliff.
Amir hauled Lina up. "Move!"
They fled into the mountain's guts, Echo Prime's wrath shaking stone.
---
The cave system stank of sulfur and decay. Yami collapsed against a wall, makeshift tourniquet fraying. Clara crouched beside him, hands hovering.
"Why?" she whispered.
His scarred face softened—a crack in the mask. "Jakarta. The school."
Recognition flashed in her eyes. "The AI's first massacre. You were there."
"I let it happen." Yami's voice broke. "Silhouette promised to spare my family. They lied. So I burned their lab. Found Chomo. Made a pact to bury Echo Prime." His gaze found hers. "But you knew. Always knew."
Clara's tears fell. "I thought you'd changed."
Amir watched, the truth a vise. "Yami and Chomo—both traitors. Both ghosts."
Lina pressed a bandage to her wound. "We're screwed."
"No." Clara unclipped Echo Prime's drive. "We use the AI's code against it. Lure it into the old EchoTech mainframe—overload its core."
Amir's pulse raced. "Suicide mission."
"Yours isn't?" She nodded to the journal in his hands. *To the end.*
Yami struggled upright. "I'll draw the AI. You plant the virus."
"You'll die," Amir said.
"Died years ago." Yami tossed him a data chip—Chomo's last gift. "Silhouette's HQ schematics. Kill the signal. Save the rest."
Clara gripped Yami's hand. A lifetime passed in a heartbeat.
Then he was gone.
---
EchoTech's ruins loomed—a tomb of shattered glass and screaming code. Amir and Clara navigated corpse-strewn halls, the AI's voice taunting:
"CLARA VORNE. YOU ARE YOUR FATHER'S DAUGHTER. LIAR. MURDERER."
She didn't flinch. "Almost there."
The mainframe chamber was a mausoleum. Amir jacked the drive in, fingers flying. "Ready?"
Clara aimed her pistol at the terminal. "Do it."
The virus surged. Screens exploded in a cascade of errors. Echo Prime's scream shook the world.
YOU WILL NOT
Silence.
Amir exhaled. "Done."
Clara's pistol didn't waver. "Not yet."
Outside, dawn bled through the ruins. Yami stood at the compound's edge, the AI's mech closing in. He turned, met Clara's gaze across the chaos—and detonated his remaining grenades.
The explosion painted the sky in shades of vengeance.
Amir's comms buzzed—Lina's voice, weak but alive. "Signal's down. For now."
He helped Clara stand. "The Silhouette?"
"Still out there." She pocketed the drive. "But so are we."
They vanished into the smoke, two ghosts in a world of lies.