"Brother."
The word struck Kael harder than any Hollowborn's claws.
The boy who said it stepped into the cold bunker light with calm confidence. His armor was polished, reinforced with obsidian bands. The Mark burned across his neck—not the cracked eclipse Kael bore, but a perfect circle, pulsing blue.
He looked like Kael.
Too much like him.
Same jawline. Same storm-gray eyes. But refined. Balanced.
Unbroken.
Kael took a step forward."You're lying."
The boy smiled faintly. "Am I?"
"Who are you?" Veyra demanded, blade half-raised.
"Project Aegis-2. Codename: Nyth." He looked at her calmly. "But Kael and I? We were born in the same cradle. Same pod. We're what happens when the Rift doesn't destroy the host—just divides it."
Kael's fingers curled into fists. "No one told me I had a twin."
"That's because you weren't meant to survive."
The room went still.
Lyss stepped beside Kael, her expression unreadable.
"You're Duskbound," she said slowly. "So what—this is some twisted reunion? You tracked us to deliver exposition?"
Nyth laughed. It was low, rich, and practiced.
"You think I came to fight? I came to warn you." He gestured to the bunker. "This place is a relic. The Syndicate failed. The Duskbound perverted everything. And you're the last weapon both sides fear."
Kael's voice was quiet."Why me?"
Nyth's smile faded. "Because you're not just Marked. You're anchored. Your memories are linked to the original Rift surge. That makes you... dangerous."
Kael stared.
"Dangerous to who?"
"To the Prince."
They moved into the cryochamber's adjacent war room, where flickering projectors displayed old maps: zones long swallowed by Hollowborn nests, ruins of Syndicate towers, and Rift surges that bled like cracks in a frozen lake.
Nyth pulled off his chest plate and slumped into a chair.
His companions—two masked Duskbound, still silent—stood at either exit.
"They're mine," he said when Veyra's eyes flicked toward them. "Trustworthy. Unlike the ones still under Commander Dain's rotting thumb."
Kael stayed standing.
"So what is this, really? You show up, dump a backstory, and what—expect us to follow you?"
"No." Nyth met his gaze. "I expect you to remember."
He tapped a sequence into a console. A hidden drawer hissed open in the wall, revealing a white shard.
No bigger than a coin. Glowing faintly.
A memory key.
Kael didn't move.
Lyss took a step forward. "What's in it?"
"Your last moment with her."
Kael's heart stuttered.
"My mother?"
Nyth nodded.
"She sealed it before the Duskbound purged this sector. Before they erased your early memories to keep you malleable."
Kael reached out slowly—and stopped.
The whisper was already purring, curling through his thoughts.
Don't. Some truths will break you faster than the Rift.
Veyra finally spoke. "You sure this isn't some elaborate trap?"
"I'm not your enemy," Nyth said quietly. "But I'm not your savior either. I came because time is short."
"Why now?" Kael asked. "Why not years ago?"
Nyth's jaw tightened. "Because I wasn't stable then. My Echo took longer to synchronize. I burned through three hosts before this body stuck."
Everyone froze.
Lyss whispered, "Three... bodies?"
Nyth didn't flinch. "We were designed to adapt. I failed. You didn't. That's why she chose you, Kael. That's why he wants you back."
"Who?"
"The Hollow Prince."
The silence fractured again.
Nyth leaned forward, fingers steepled.
"He was the first to survive a full Echo overwrite. Pure Hollowborn core, embedded in a Marked host. His memories were wiped, overwritten by the Rift. Now he doesn't just control them. He breeds them."
Veyra paced.
"He's building a kingdom."
"Yes," Nyth said. "And he sees you as the one thing that can unseat him. Not because you're stronger—because you're incomplete. And incompleteness is unpredictable."
Kael didn't respond.
His fingers hovered over the memory shard.
"What happens if I remember?"
Nyth's voice softened.
"Then you'll understand what the Rift truly is. And why it keeps whispering to you."
That night, Kael sat alone outside the bunker.
The stars above were barely visible through the ash-choked sky. But the air felt thinner here. Cleaner. Like the Rift didn't reach quite as deep.
He turned the shard over in his hand.
Smooth. Warm.
Alive.
He thought of Nia. Of her laughter in the bunker vents. Of Lyss, curled against the wall in a half-sleep. Of Veyra, always guarding the edges.
And of Nyth—his mirror.
Kael placed the shard to his temple.
Pain lanced through his skull.
And then—
He was five.
Standing in a glass room. Hands against the pod wall.
His mother crouched outside, a hand pressed to the other side.
"Kael," she whispered. "Whatever happens, you remember me, okay? Remember the knife. Remember the scar. That means it's still you."
The vision cracked.
Static overwhelmed it.
And then the final image:A medical chart.
"Echo Host: Subject Aegis-1. Cognitive Decay: 3%. Synaptic Divergence: 42%. Emotional Anchoring: Stable."
Kael woke with a gasp.
The scar.
He rolled up his sleeve.
A small line, barely visible, just below the wrist.
Not from a fight.
From surgery.
Not the Mark.
The injection point.
He didn't receive the Echo.
He was the Echo.