The space hummed with a gentle, primeval beat—less code and more pulse, slow and measured. The arcing walls around them appeared to breathe, striations of light coursing through the stone as if recalling memories not quite ready to release.
Dust hung heavy in the air, disturbed by a stillness that weighed as much as gravity.
It wasn't silence of deficiency—but anticipation.
Kaito stood before the console, its face still but warm to the touch, as if it recognized him. But his gaze was not on it. It was on the woman standing before him.
Eyla.
The First Architect.
She was human, but not quite. Her body too orchestrated, her presence too fixed. As if she was part of the room itself—a slice of artifacts uncovered by their collapse.
Her eyes, twin slivers of pale blue light, looked at him with a combination of curiosity and defeat. They were not eyes that saw the world as it was. They were eyes that remembered all the ways it had been.
