2025-02-26 13:00:46The Second Attack
The city was suffocating tonight.Rain dripped from rusted fire escapes, slicking the pavement in an oily sheen. The air smelled of burnt rubber and electricity, a metallic tang that clung to my tongue. My pulse pounded in my ears as I moved through the alleys, keeping to the shadows. Every muscle in my body screamed from the last fight, but I couldn’t stop. I wouldn’t stop.Elias was gone. And I was next.I kept moving, listening. Watching. The city had its rhythm, its pulse—but something was wrong. It wasn’t just quiet. It was controlled. Engineered.Then I saw them.Six figures. No, eight. Tactical gear, matte-black armor designed to blend into the night. Their movements were synchronized and precise.This wasn’t a random ambush. This was a kill box.A voice crackled in my stolen earpiece. Cold. Mechanical.“Primary target acquired. Engage.”They moved in perfect unison. Th
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THE ASCENSION SYSTEM CHAPTER 15
Escape and RevelationSmoke burned my lungs, every breath a reminder that I was running out of time. The alarms screamed overhead, red lights flashing across the steel corridors, casting jagged shadows that moved like ghosts. My boots pounded against the grated floor, every step echoing like a countdown to my own death.Elias was right behind me, bleeding, staggering—but he never slowed. His sharp, silver eyes burned with a determination that almost made me believe we could make it out. Almost.“Left,” he rasped, shoving me forward. “Stairwell—hurry!”The door was just ahead. Freedom was beyond it. And yet, I hesitated. My instincts screamed at me—something was wrong.Elias turned back, lifting his gun toward the security panel, but before he could fire, the metal barrier behind us slammed shut. The sound was final, like the lid of a coffin.His jaw tightened. He knew what this meant.“No,” I said. “We both go.”
THE ASCENSION SYSTEM CHAPTER 16
Hunting for the TruthI had expected this to be easy. A name, a location, and a few well-placed questions should’ve led me straight to Dr. Valeria Kane. Instead, I found nothing.No records. No address. No trace that she ever existed.I leaned back in my chair, staring at the blurry photograph of her that I’d managed to dig up. Short black hair, piercing gray eyes, a sharp intellect written all over her face. A scientist who once worked for Project Nexus before vanishing into thin air. Either she didn’t want to be found, or someone had made damn sure she wouldn’t be.I cracked my knuckles and exhaled. "You’re out there, Kane. I just have to look in the right places."The dingy motel room smelled like old cigarettes and I regretted it. My laptop hummed on the table, a dozen tabs open—government databases, classified reports, underground chatter. But every lead hit a dead end. Whoever erased her did a damn good job.But not perfect
THE ASCENSION SYSTEM CHAPTER 17
The Overseers Move FirstThe pain was the first thing I felt. A deep, splintering ache at the base of my skull radiates outward like a shockwave. My vision swam as I tried to push myself up from the cold, wet ground. Gravel bit into my palms. The lighthouse loomed in the distance, its rotating beam slicing through the fog.I had no idea how long I’d been out.Dr. Kane was gone.I wiped my face. Blood smeared across the back of my hand—dripping from my nose, pooling in my ears. A sharp ringing buzzed in my skull, distant and unnatural, like a sound that didn't belong to this world.Then I remembered.That voice."You were never meant to exist."It hadn’t been spoken. It had been placed inside my mind. A weightless, formless presence had invaded my thoughts, speaking with the finality of a death sentence.I staggered to my feet, breathing hard. My body felt wrong—like something had reached inside me and t
THE ASCENSION SYSTEM CHAPTER 18
Finding KaneThe deeper I dug, the more the world tried to erase her.Dr. Valeria Kane didn’t just disappear—she was removed.No digital footprint. No public records. No one even remembered working with her. It was like chasing a ghost whose name had been swallowed by time itself.But ghosts leave traces, no matter how hard you try to bury them.After a week of dead ends, encrypted messages, and a few too many close calls, I found the crack in the system. An old, defunct biotech forum buried in the dark web, its posts scrubbed of anything useful—except one.A cryptic reply to a decade-old thread. A set of coordinates. A time.And a warning."Don’t come unless you’re ready to lose everything."That was how I ended up here.A nameless safe house buried beneath an abandoned subway station, the air thick with dust and paranoia. The walls were lined with rusted servers, their lights blinking like dy
THE ASCENSION SYSTEM CHAPTER 19
The Overseers’ True PurposeThe first thing I lost was my mother’s voice.I didn’t realize it at the time. The memories were still there—the image of her laughing, the warmth of her embrace. But when I tried to recall the sound of her voice, it was gone. Like a tape that had been erased.Then came the missing streets. The ones I swore existed, where I used to walk home from school. Places I knew, yet when I returned, they weren’t there. No one else remembered them.And now—I didn’t know my brother’s name.Because I had a brother. I knew that much.But when I tried to picture him, I saw only a silhouette.A hollow space where he used to be.And with every use of this power—every moment I defied them—more pieces of my past slipped away.I sat in the dimly lit hideout, gripping the edges of the rickety metal table as if that alone could anchor me to something real. Kane paced before me, her face
THE ASCENSION SYSTEM CHAPTER 20
A New Enemy AppearsThe first sign of danger was the silence.Kane had been talking—her voice sharp, urgent, rattling off equations and theories as she tried to piece together a way to keep me from vanishing completely. But suddenly, she stopped.The air turned wrong. Thick. Heavy.My skin prickled.Then—"Target identified."The voice wasn’t human. It came from everywhere and nowhere, distorted and fragmented like a corrupted file trying to play itself.I spun around, instincts flaring.A figure stood at the far end of the hideout.Tall. Masked. A black bodysuit covered every inch of their form, lines of glowing circuitry pulsing along their limbs. The air around them shimmered, distorting like heatwaves on asphalt.A notification flashed in my vision.[Caution: Opponent is using a perfected version of the system.]Perfected.That meant whatever was inside m
THE ASCENSION SYSTEM CHAPTER 21
The Unstable PowerThe world wasn’t supposed to bend like this.I reached out, my fingers hovering inches above the glass of water on the table. I concentrated, feeling that strange, pulling sensation deep in my chest. The air around my hand hummed, electric, like the universe itself was holding its breath.For a moment, nothing happened.Then the glass flickered—vanished—reappeared a foot to the right, teetering on the edge."Not bad," I muttered.The next second, the entire table snapped out of existence.I gasped, my balance tipping forward as the space where it once stood was now empty air. I stumbled, barely catching myself before hitting the floor. My stomach churned. The chair beside me flickered, as if it couldn't decide whether it existed or not, before vanishing completely.I forced a slow breath through my teeth."Okay, that wasn’t supposed to happen."A slow clap echoed behind me.I turned, already bracing for the unimpressed stare. Kane stood in the doorway, arms crossed,
THE ASCENSION SYSTEM CHAPTER 22
The Overseers’ InfluenceThe city had never felt this quiet before.Even with the usual buzz of people moving, talking, and traffic humming in the background, something felt off. Like the entire world was holding its breath, waiting for something to happen.Dr. Valeria Kane and I walked side by side down the crowded street, though I wasn’t sure where we were heading. She hadn’t said a word since we left my apartment, just kept moving like she had a destination in mind. Her face was unreadable, her jaw tight.The silence stretched between us until I finally snapped."Are you gonna tell me where we're going, or do I just follow you around like a lost puppy?"Kane didn’t slow down. "Watch."I frowned. "Watch what?"Then I saw it.A man walking ahead of us stopped mid-step. Not a slow pause, not hesitation—he just froze. One foot in the air, eyes open, lips slightly parted.Time didn’t slow down. The world didn’t glitch. He just stopped.A woman walked past him without noticing. A group o
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CHAPTER 180
The Untouched ShadowThe broken metal and wires of the Overseers’ control room were all around us. We had done this. We had broken their system, bit by bit, and fought through their guards. But looking at the mess, I didn’t feel good. Just empty and annoyed.Kane kicked a broken piece of a machine. It made a noise in the big, ruined room. “We took down their system, destroyed their buildings…” Her voice was tight like she was trying not to be angry. “…but it feels like we didn’t even touch the real problem.”Elias nodded, looking sad, as he looked at the mess. “The Overseers were just tools. Complicated ones, but still just a way to get what they wanted.” He looked out at the empty land through a hole in the wall. “The real power… it’s still out there, untouched.”Darren sat in a corner, looking white and tired. The memories he found had hurt him a lot. “And if they could control something like the Ascension System…” His voice was soft, like a whisper. “…what else can they
CHAPTER 179
The Unseen WatcherKane walked back and forth in the room we were using as a lab. Her boots made soft sounds on the floor. The air felt heavy like we hadn't done anything right. Tony… I still saw his fading eyes. What had that thing done to him? Was he still… Tony?Elias played with his machines, looking annoyed. “It’s like we’re fighting a ghost, Kane,” he said quietly. “A power that doesn’t follow any rules we know. The Overseers… they were just toys, weren’t they?”That thought made me cold. Toys. And we were so focused on them, we didn’t see the real person in charge.I suddenly felt cold, even though the room was warm. It wasn’t just cold; it was… something else. A feeling. Like when you know someone is behind you, even if you can’t see them.“It’s not just the system,” I said slowly, looking around the room. Nothing looked wrong. The machines hummed softly, the lights made long shadows. But… “I feel like… someone is watching us.”Elias stopped what he was doing and l
CHAPTER 178
Slipping AwayThe white light still hurt my eyes, even if I wasn’t seeing it now. Was I? Everything felt blurry, like a bad dream. Kane… her face… was she there? I remember a quick look like she was worried. Or maybe the bright light tricked me.The sounds around me were wrong. They twisted and broke, like talking underwater. Or maybe there was no sound, just a buzzing in my head that ate my thoughts. Words floated around, pieces of talk, but they didn’t stay. They didn’t make sense anymore.My own hand looked far away. Like it belonged to someone else. I tried to close my fingers, but it felt slow, like moving through thick mud. Was this still my hand? Was I still me?A cold fear grabbed me, worse than before. Not fear of pain, but fear of… disappearing. Like a picture in the sun, the colors faded away until nothing was left.Don’t forget me… please… The thought went around in my empty head, a soft cry against the growing confusion. Who was I asking? Kane? Elias? Darren…
CHAPTER 177
The Glitch in the MemoryMy fingers moved fast on the screen. The broken data from the Overseers jumped and changed. Kane looked closely, her face showing she was thinking hard. “If they were scared,” she asked quietly, “why did they want to control Tony so much?”Elias touched a black, shiny piece they found. His small machine showed strange power inside it. “Maybe,” he said slowly, “control was how they protected themselves. Maybe it was a way to use what they didn’t understand as a weapon.”Darren, still looking white and shaky, moved restlessly. He didn’t want to think about the things put in his mind, but we needed answers. Now, his eyes moved around the room like he could still hear bad things. “There was a name…” he whispered, his voice soft. “I think I heard… something about a ‘Conduit’…”Conduit. The word stayed in the quiet room. It felt important and dangerous. Kane and Elias looked at each other, knowing this could be something big. My own mind raced. Was I t
CHAPTER 176
A Pledge of AidBlue light from Kane’s key blinked in the dark. Fake Kane made a scary noise. My head still hurts from the changed memories. Kane’s light helped."I don’t know all they did, but they feared something… something they couldn't control."A voice cut through the air. Darren stood in the doorway. He looked sure now, not unsure. His eyes looked at Kane with hope.Kane looked at him, not sure but hoping. "Why now, Darren? After all the bad things?"Darren stepped in. He looked at Kane, then Elias with his weapon. "Because I see what they took from me… from all of us. I won’t let it happen again."I need to think clearly. My body felt heavy. The floor was cold.His words felt important. Darren used to work for the bad guys. Trusting him felt wrong.Kane looked hard at Darren. "Feared what, Darren? They controlled everything. What scared them?"Darren looked worried. "There were whispers… about something old. Before everything changed. They called it… the Unmake
CHAPTER 175
The Rewriting BeginsMy breath was short. The shiny building across the street felt wrong. I looked hard, a cold knot in my stomach. The bright picture Kane made on the wall was gone. Now there was a plain, creepy shape.Need to be strong. My muscles hurt, but it felt a little real."The street… not… different…" I said quietly. The air felt still and wrong. The buildings looked a little off, the signs making weird shadows.A quick thought of Kane and me here, laughing about her drawing. Her smart face… it felt far away. Did that happen here? Or was my brain playing tricks?More. Focus, Tony, focus. The metal hurt, but it felt real.I tried to remember talking to Kane about the bad things coming, the quiet talks about a power that could change everything. But the words were mixed up. Her voice sounded strange."Did I say that? Or… someone else?" The question stayed in my head, making the bad feeling worse. The outside and my memories felt wrong.I felt dizzy. I leaned on the
CHAPTER 174
Tracking the Ghost SignalsMy back hurts. It always did after bending over Elias’s weird machine for hours. Wires snaked all over the dusty floor like metal snakes connecting old parts. The air buzzed a little, like the nervous lights on the screens. The screens showed numbers and letters that didn't make sense. It felt like they were asking questions we couldn't answer.“There!” Elias said suddenly, his voice tight. He pointed at a tiny light that flashed and disappeared on a screen. “A weak signal… it’s not coming from anywhere we know.”Kane leaned closer, her dark eyes looking hard. The dim light in our hidden room made her face look serious. “Can you find it?” she asked, her voice quiet but strong.Elias shook his head. “It’s like a ghost. It shows up and then vanishes. One second it’s strong, the next… nothing.” He messed up his hair with his hand, something he did when he was frustrated.“But it’s connected to the leftover energy from their system, right?” Kane asked
CHAPTER 173
Darren's AwakeningA shake went through me, not from being cold, but from something deep inside, like the ground moving in my head. It was like a wall broke, and a rush of pictures, sharp and scary, filled my mind. White rooms with nothing in them. Shiny metal tools. Faces that didn't show any feelings, just watching. Overseers. The word sounded again in the new parts of my memory that had just woken up. Feel your muscles work hard."It was me…" The words barely came out of my throat, rough and sound strange even to me. "All this time… the things I remember… they really happened." My hands squeezed tight, and I could almost feel chains digging into my wrists, even though they weren't there. It wasn't just a feeling; it was something I remembered. Something awful.Kane and Elias were standing in front of me. Their faces looked worried. They had been trying to help me remember things, to get through the confusion in my head. Now, the confusion was gone, and everything was cl
CHAPTER 172
Kane's UneaseThe silence in our makeshift base camp used to be a relief, a breath after the storm of the Overseers. Now, it’s a heavy blanket, suffocating me with a sense of wrongness I can’t quite place. The emergency lights we rigged up flicker erratically, throwing long, dancing shadows that make the sterile white walls seem to breathe.Outside, the usual city sounds – the distant sirens, the rumble of traffic – are still there, but underneath it all, there’s a low hum, a vibration in the air that makes my teeth ache. It’s like the world itself is holding its breath.Kane paces in front of Elias’s makeshift console, her brow furrowed like a stormy sky. She stops abruptly, her gaze fixed on the chaotic display of flickering lights and jagged lines. “Something’s wrong,” she says, her voice tight with a concern that mirrors the knot in my own nonexistent stomach. “The readings are fluctuating wildly, more than before.”Elias, hunched over the equipment, his fingers flying acros
