The sky above the shattered realm was a roiling maelstrom of light and shadow, waves of raw energy pulsing in time with Echo’s transformed heartbeat. Beneath it, the ndscape had twisted into impossible geometry—floating obsidian spires, rivers of liquid starlight, and corridors of splintered reality that led nowhere and everywhere at once.

  And yet, through that chaos, a single squad moved with purpose.

  Kei led the Squad of the Dead—Mira and Rhan—down a fractured bridge of living crystal. Her night-vision goggles flickered, mapping out the unstable terrain. “Stay tight,” she hissed. “One wrong step and we fall into the void.”

  Mira’s gauntlet glowed as she scanned ahead. “Life signs close,” she reported. “Multiple—Gideon’s biometrics are faint but there.”

  Rhan checked his ammo. “And Echo?” he asked, voice low. “Still feeding that Core?”

  Kei shook her head. “He’s… integrated. We’re here for Gideon first. Then we figure out how to drag him back from whatever abyss he’s fallen into.”

  A pulse of crimson light rippled through the air, and the squad fanned out. At the center of the rift’s eye stood a figure in gleaming armor—sleek, impossibly smooth, with Gideon’s unmistakable profile. This was Gideon Zero: the echo of Gideon’s will, forged by the Core’s chaotic power.

  Gideon Zero turned, her face half-hidden behind a visor of living circuitry. “You’re te,” her voice rang—electronic, yet unmistakably Gideon’s. “The fine print called, and you didn’t RSVP.”

  Kei raised her weapon. “Step away from her, Zero. You’re not Gideon.”

  Gideon Zero ughed, a crystalline sound that shattered the bridge’s crystal shards. “Not Gideon? I am her. The version she wanted: unbound by fear, unburdened by doubt.” She flexed a gloved hand and fractured the bridge, sending Mira skidding back.

  Mira recovered, firing an EM pulse that crackled around Zero’s armor. Sparks danced across the surface—yet the armor reformed instantly, glowing brighter. “That’s new tech,” Mira muttered. “Never seen anything self-heal that fast.”

  Rhan sprinted forward, bde drawn. “Gideon, if you can hear me—fight it!” He sshed at the glowing circuitry, but Zero’s form blurred and phased around the attack.

  Gideon Zero raised her hand. The air itself coalesced into a bde of pure light, and she swept it toward Rhan. He dove aside, the edge cutting through the bridge with a scream of dispced reality.

  Kei fired a series of explosive charges, bombing the ground around Zero. The shockwave knocked her off bance, and for the first time, the visor flickered—just a fraction—revealing Gideon’s terrified eyes.

  “Gideon!” Kei shouted. “We’re here! Snap out of it!”

  For a heartbeat, Gideon Zero wavered. The world slowed—the Core’s pulsing light dimmed as if uncertain. Then, the armor’s circuits fred, and Zero advanced, each step warping the air into fractal patterns.

  Gideon’s voice, weak but genuine, echoed through the Visor-Link: “Echo… please… end this.”

  Kei’s heart clenched. “Gideon’s still in there!”

  Rhan sshed again, this time embedding his bde in a circuit cluster on Zero’s forearm. The armor hissed and cracked, steam and sparks erupting. Zero staggered, and the light-bde faltered.

  Mira dropped to one knee, fingers flying over her wrist pad. “I can sever her link to the Core—give Gideon back control. But I’ll need cover.”

  “On it,” Kei said, and with a roar, she charged, hurling a gravity grenade at Zero’s feet.

  The explosion warped space—Zero was thrown against a shard of crystal reality, frozen for a beat. Rhan leapt atop the shard, knife pressed to the visor. “Gideon, if you can hear me, fight!” he yelled.

  The battle-hum stuttered as Gideon Zero’s form flickered violently. The Core’s light pulsed, then dimmed in mercy. The circuitry around the visor cracked, and with a final, shattering sound, it blew outward. Gideon colpsed forward—but Rhan caught her, softening her fall.

  Silence.

  Kei rushed over. “Gideon!”

  Gideon’s eyes fluttered open. They were hers—soft, full of confusion and relief. The crystalline armor y in smoking fragments at their feet.

  Behind them, the rift quivered, as if unsettled by the sudden calm. And then, from its depths, came Echo’s voice—distant, like a memory carried on the wind.

  “Well done, Squad of the Dead. Now come find me.”

  Gideon struggled to her feet, supported by Rhan. “He’s out there… waiting.”

  Kei holstered her weapon. “We’ll get him, Gideon. Together.”

  Mira activated her scanner. “Core signature’s shifting—he’s moving deeper.”

  Gideon gnced at the widening breach. “Then let’s move. The fate of everything depends on stopping him before the next colpse.”

  Rhan gave a grim nod. “Echo’s our brother—our creation. We’ll bring him home or die trying.”

  They advanced as one, stepping from the broken bridge onto the path that led beyond the shattered Veil—into the heart of the Core itself. The Squad of the Dead, bound by loyalty and purpose, ready to face the ultimate cost of creation.