THE ASCENSION SYSTEM

CHAPTER 19

The Overseers’ True Purpose

The 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 pale, her hands unsteady as she typed rapidly into a terminal.

"You have to stop using it," she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

I let out a hollow laugh. "Kind of hard when it’s the only thing keeping me alive."

Kane slammed her hands onto the desk, spinning toward me. "It’s not keeping you alive, Tony. It’s rewriting you. Do you understand what that means?"

I lifted my gaze to hers. "Enlighten me."

She inhaled sharply, pinching the bridge of her nose. "The Overseers manipulate reality by controlling time itself. They don’t change things, they overwrite them. Imagine a file on a computer—edit it enough times, and the original is completely gone, replaced by something new."

I clenched my fists. "And I’m the file."

She nodded grimly. "Yes. But you’re different. You were supposed to be erased, yet somehow, you resisted. You’re the first true anomaly—a glitch they failed to correct."

The words sat heavy in my chest.

I thought back to that voice in the void, the cold certainty in its tone—You were never meant to exist.

"I don’t feel like a glitch," I muttered.

Kane studied me carefully. "What do you remember from two years ago?"

I opened my mouth—then stopped.

Two years ago.

I should remember. I should.

But all I had were fragments. Blurred faces. Disjointed moments. A life I once lived but could no longer reach.

My stomach twisted. "They’ve already taken so much."

"And they’ll take everything," Kane said. "Until there’s nothing left of who you were."

A sharp pang cut through my skull. I winced, pressing my fingers against my temples. The memories were slipping, shifting like sand through my fingers. I couldn’t afford to lose more.

But I wasn’t about to just roll over and let them win.

I looked up at Kane. "Tell me there’s a way to fight back."

She hesitated. "There’s a theory. But it’s dangerous."

I exhaled slowly. "I think we’re past ‘dangerous.’ Spill it."

She turned the monitor toward me. A complex string of data scrolled across the screen—waves of energy, shifting patterns that made my headache just looking at them.

"This is the Overseers’ frequency," she said. "The vibration at which they rewrite reality. If we can generate an inverse signal, we might be able to—"

A sudden shift in the air cut her off.

I felt it before I saw it.

The world stuttered, like a scratched record skipping on a loop. Kane’s form flickered, the light overhead shuddering violently.

No. Not now.

A whisper curled into my thoughts, low and cold.

"You resist. But resistance is temporary."

The voice scraped against my mind, distant yet intimate, like it was inside my skull.

Then the world lurched.

I was standing—no, falling—no, somewhere else entirely.

The hideout was gone.

Instead, I was standing in an empty cityscape. A perfect replica of a world that never existed. The buildings were pristine, untouched. The streets stretched endlessly in all directions. And there was no sky. Just an expanse of nothingness above.

A figure stood before me.

Faceless. Formless. A shape in a suit that wasn’t quite fabric, wasn’t quite skin. Its presence burned.

I clenched my fists, my breath ragged. "You again."

It tilted its head.

"You are unmade, yet you persist. An error in the sequence."

I stepped forward. "And what happens if this error doesn’t want to be fixed?"

The Overseer’s form flickered.

"Then the sequence will collapse."

A cold weight settled in my chest. "What does that mean?"

"Your existence is unsustainable. You have already begun to fracture. The more you resist, the faster you will cease to be."

I refused to believe that.

I couldn’t.

I took another step. "You Overseers have been rewriting reality for how long? Centuries? Millennia? You’re scared because I’m something you didn’t predict. And you know I’m not going anywhere."

The figure was silent.

And then—

"You will forget."

The words weren’t a threat. They were a certainty.

A sharp pain stabbed through my skull. My vision blurred. The city around me shimmered—and I was back in the hideout, gasping for breath, blood trickling from my nose.

Kane was gripping my shoulders, eyes wide with panic. "Tony!"

I blinked rapidly, trying to steady myself. "I’m—" I swallowed hard. "I’m still here."

She didn’t look reassured.

I wiped the blood from my face, my hands shaking. "They were here. They said I’m… breaking apart."

Kane’s face darkened. "They’re accelerating the process."

I met her gaze. "Then we have to move faster."

She hesitated. "Tony, if we fail—"

I cut her off. "We won’t."

She exhaled shakily, then nodded. "There’s a way to anchor your existence. But it’s risky."

I forced a smirk. "Risky’s kind of my thing."

The monitor flickered with new data. A possibility. A chance.

But outside, in the vastness of the unknown, something was watching.

And it was waiting for me to slip.