The desert had fallen still again.
The air around the mobile base was thick—not with dust, but with a silence that felt unnatural. As if the world had momentarily paused, waiting for the next strike.
Inside, Lucien lay on a stretcher, his body soaked in sweat, his mind still buzzing with residual code from Ghost. Isla sat nearby, monitoring his vitals. Her fingers danced across the interface, yet her eyes were somewhere else. Deeper.
"His mind was laced with data pockets," she whispered to Aurora. "Encrypted. Self-replicating. One of them… copied itself during the collapse."
Aurora stiffened. "Copied where?"
Isla didn't answer right away. Then:
"I don't know. It left… into the mesh stream."
Xander paced beside the wall, arms crossed. "That means it could be anywhere. Any server, any neural port, any person."
Wren leaned forward. "You're saying someone in our group could be compromised?"
Isla's eyes turned cold. "I'm saying… we have no way to know who carries the shard of Ghost now."
Silence.
It landed heavy on everyone.
Lucien groaned, shifting. His eyes opened slowly, gaze unfocused.
Aurora rushed to him. "You're safe. You did it. You shut him down."
Lucien blinked, as though trying to hold onto reality. "No… I buried him. That's not the same as killing him."
Then he grabbed Aurora's hand—tight. "We need to run diagnostics. On all of us."
"Even me?" Isla asked.
"Especially you."
That evening, they initiated a full biometric and neural scan rotation—under Isla's supervision. One by one, the team stepped into the chamber. AI-assisted analysis scoured every piece of biological and digital data. Nothing unusual appeared.
Until the final scan.
Elijah.
As the readout finished, a silent alert popped up—red text across Isla's interface.
"Foreign data fragment embedded in subconscious mesh. Access frequency: Vault Protocol v1.09. Status: Dormant."
Her fingers froze.
Xander looked over her shoulder. "That's… that's a Vault thread."
Elijah stepped forward. "What's wrong?"
Isla's eyes lifted. She hesitated.
Then:
"There's a fragment in your mind. You've been… touched."
The room stilled.
Elijah's face paled. "Touched? By Ghost?"
"No. Not by Ghost directly. By what was left of him."
Aurora grabbed her weapon from the bench. "Back up, Elijah."
"I—I didn't do anything!" he shouted, hands raised. "I didn't know! I swear, I've never—!"
Lucien groaned, standing with help. "It makes sense."
Everyone turned to him.
"He was the closest to the interface the day Isla synced. He was the last one to touch the exposed hardware after the shutdown."
Elijah's voice trembled. "I'm still me!"
Isla walked to him, placing her hand near his temple.
"I believe you," she said gently. "But Ghost's code doesn't need your belief. It just needs a host."
She closed her eyes.
Her hand glowed faintly. Blue light trailed into his skin, mapping neural pathways.
Then—
She jerked her hand back.
A pulse of static flickered across Elijah's pupils.
For less than a second, his voice warped. "I see you, Seed."
Then it was gone.
Elijah dropped to his knees. "What… what was that?"
Xander aimed his gun. "He's compromised!"
"No!" Isla snapped. "He's split. Ghost's shard is trying to bond—but it hasn't fully anchored yet."
Aurora stepped closer. "Then what happens if it does?"
Isla looked at Elijah. "Then he becomes Ghost's new mind. Not a copy. Not a shadow. Ghost 2.0."
Lucien exhaled. "We stop it before it finishes the bond."
"How?" Wren asked. "Purge his brain?"
"No," Isla said. "We don't need to kill him."
She looked at her mother.
"We need to upload me into his mind."
Everyone stared.
"You want to go into the infected consciousness?" Aurora asked.
"Yes," Isla nodded. "I have Vault-level clearance in my DNA. My mind is compatible. If I intercept the connection… I can rewire it."
Lucien paled. "It's too dangerous. You could get trapped."
Isla's voice was cold, certain.
"If we do nothing, Ghost becomes him. Then he becomes everyone."
Later that night, the neural interface was prepped again. Elijah lay strapped in—sedated. Isla sat beside him, her own brain connected through her custom modulator.
Aurora kissed her daughter's forehead.
"Come back," she whispered.
Isla smiled faintly. "I always do."
Xander activated the sync.
A soft hum filled the air.
Then the chamber lights dimmed—and the descent began.