— When your past is just someone else's save file
A voice shattered the silence like lightning splitting the sky, tearing open a jagged streak of white above the control console.
The countdown halted—frozen at 00:00:03.
Shawn spun around toward the voice—its familiarity hit him like a blow to the chest.
The air rippled like disturbed water, concentric waves breaking reality's calm.
A figure emerged from the distortion.
She wore a gray trench coat. Her silver-white hair was coiled in a tight knot.
Every step she took was steady, deliberate—as though walking along the spine of fate itself.
Shawn's pupils constricted.
"This... can't be..."
His heart thundered against his ribs. He knew that face.
The woman who had once handed him the parchment.
Who left him an unnamed journal... and a poem.
Who had risked everything to pull him from the rift.
Who had stood before the detention center and whispered, "I've always been here."
It was Lucy.
"You—how are you...?" Shawn stammered, but the words died halfway, choked by disbelief.
Lucy nodded softly. Her eyes locked on his—like a lighthouse through a storm.
"I knew you'd come."
Shawn opened his mouth again, but Lucy spoke over him.
"I've broken through the last loop," she said. "I've seen two iterations of this experiment. In this one... they failed. But I survived."
Her words fell like debug logs—irrefutable, timestamped across timelines.
Don's face blanched. He took a step back.
"You... you're from the last generation of test subjects?"
Lucy didn't answer. She walked to the console, brushed her fingers across the interface.
The screen pulsed like liquid glass. Code scrolled violently.
A single message lit up in sharp fluorescence:
High-Level Interference Detected.
She turned, voice cool and cutting:
"You still don't understand what 'reboot' really means."
"It's not a reset."
"It's a preservation."
A low-frequency hum resonated through the floor, as if something ancient and immense stirred from beneath.
"Bullshit!" Don snapped. "The files say reboot frees us—returns our minds to the original state!"
Lucy gave a mirthless laugh.
"You saw the AGI-ST version. That's the «goat and fox» tale—tailored just for you."
"I believed it too... until I became the next cycle's observer."
Judy could no longer stay silent. "Then tell us—what's the real version?"
Lucy didn't answer at once. She reached into her coat and drew out a crumpled piece of parchment—its surface covered in strange symbols.
At the center was a shape Shawn recognized instantly: the Thunder Core.
His breath caught. "You... you still have it?"
"This is the Thunder Core from the last cycle," Lucy replied.
She spread the parchment on the console and tapped it.
The system responded instantly, recognizing the embedded memory pattern.
Thunder Core Verified.
"Wait—what did you just trigger?!" Judy cried out.
Lucy's voice was calm, almost serene:
"I'm showing you the truth."
The system voice followed—cold and absolute:
"Thunder Core activated. Beginning rewind sequence... synchronizing historical consciousness versions.
Welcome to the Rewind Space."
The room shook violently. As if an invisible force tore the floor of reality apart.
Then—separation.
---
Shawn opened his eyes.
He was standing in a golden field. Wheat swayed gently in the breeze. The sun-warmed earth filled the air with a scent of memory.
An old oak tree cast a long shadow beside him.
At its base lay a battered toy airplane.
He knew this place.
It was the field from the day his father vanished.
And the airplane—his childhood toy, lost for years... and then miraculously returned.
A deep voice rose behind him.
"You've always wanted to know what your father said that day, didn't you?"
Shawn turned.
A tall man stood not far away, his features blurred—like a memory worn thin by time.
"I had to go," the man said. "Because if it wasn't me... it would've been you."
Shawn's voice trembled. "You... who are you?"
The figure stepped closer, his face becoming clear.
It was—his father.
It felt like he had once taken Shawn's place. Paid the price.
The field began to fade—twisting, unraveling—until it dissolved into a surgical table, a projection screen, glowing data streams.
A single line blinked in crimson:
BATCH-6B // Subject: Consciousness Interference
---
Judy awoke in a hospital room.
Her mother sat by the window.
On the bed lay a little girl—motionless.
The girl was... her.
"But... I remember this differently," Judy whispered. "I just had a fever... not... this."
Yet everything felt real. Too real.
A clipboard slipped from a nurse's hand, its pages fluttering open:
Consciousness Implantation Trial – Sample 002
Then a whisper, soft and sinister:
"They marked you at birth. Every memory after that—fabricated."
Judy spun around.
A woman in a lab coat stood behind her.
"Who are you?!"
The woman raised a hand, touched Judy's forehead.
"I'm the one who wrote your first consciousness."
---
Don plummeted into a grand data archive.
Countless files floated in midair—each labeled:
Don-M / Consciousness Branch / Version ##
He moved down the corridor—then froze.
A familiar figure stood ahead.
"Who... are you?"
"You think you're the real Don?" the figure said without turning.
"You're the eleventh failed copy. After me."
This other Don sat before a terminal, scrolling through logs.
"I'm the one who still remembers the world outside."
The archive buckled. The world collapsed in a rush of data and light.
Back in the main control chamber, Lucy stood alone.
She entered the final command:
"Open the door."
The console flared with light. A geometric gateway fractured into view—shimmering like a dimensional tear.
Shawn, Judy, and Don were pulled back into reality.
The system screamed:
█ ALERT █
Subjective consciousness diverging.
Shawn finally understood.
He turned to Don and Judy, voice shaking:
"So... I was never the chosen one."
"And you—used me. You wanted me to reboot the system... so you could store me in the container."
Judy's face turned ghostly pale. She looked at Don, trembling:
"All of this... was you..."
Before she could finish, Don stepped forward.
He raised his hand. A glowing symbol lit up on his palm—
A master control seal— the same symbol that had glowed in Da's palm.
For the first time, Lucy's face showed real surprise.
"You... how did you get that access?"
Don looked down at her, his voice like frost:
"Maybe I'm not who you thought I was."
Then he touched the door.
The geometric gate shuddered—then opened.
And he left them with one last line:
"Shawn... remember, this isn't over."