The door slid open with a slow metallic inhale—
as if the room beyond it were alive.
A cold draft touched Nora's face, thin as a whisper yet strangely warm at the edges. She felt it curl around her neck like a cautious hand testing her pulse. Kael stepped in front of her, shoulders tense, weapon raised, his eyes locked on the darkness ahead.
Rian swallowed hard. "Why does it feel like something's… waiting?"
Nora didn't answer.
Because she felt it too.
The hallway beyond the door looked normal at first glance—smooth metal walls, flickering strip-lights, scattered debris—but the deeper they walked, the more every sound changed. Their footsteps didn't echo.
The air didn't feel still.
The corridor didn't feel empty.
It felt inhabited.
As if the entire hallway breathed—a slow expansion and contraction, barely visible, but undeniably there.
Rian paused, waving a hand in front of him. "Is it just me, or is this place moving?"
Kael touched the wall with the edge of his glove. The metal seemed to pulse faintly under his palm—like a slow heartbeat behind cold steel.
"This place isn't a hallway," Kael muttered. "It's a system. A living system."
A sudden hiss cut through the air.
Nora spun around—
but the corridor behind them had vanished.
Where the door should have been, there was only a solid wall of dark metal, seamless and smooth, as if it had never been open at all.
Rian backed away until he hit Nora's shoulder. "No. No, no, no—this place changes its structure. It traps people."
Nora tried to force her shaking voice steady. "Then we don't stop. We keep moving."
They walked deeper.
The lights above dimmed one by one.
Every few meters, the corridor shifted tone—acoustics changing, temperature dropping, the walls narrowing almost imperceptibly. Metal plates slid silently, reshaping pathways in a slow, deliberate rhythm.
As if guiding them.
Or herding them.
After several minutes, they reached a wide circular chamber. It was different from every room they had seen in the facility—colder, smoother, almost polished. The air felt thick, humid, and carried a faint scent of copper.
In the center of the chamber hung a massive object suspended by thick cables—
a pod.
The surface of the pod was metallic but veined with translucent patches, like something organic grew beneath the metal shell.
It pulsed.
Breathing.
Inhale…
Exhale…
Rian whispered, "What is that thing?"
Kael leveled his weapon. "Something we should destroy."
But Nora stepped forward slowly, drawn toward the pod. The device in her pocket vibrated again—stronger than ever, and warm enough to feel through her jacket.
"It's reacting," she said. "This pod is connected to the device."
Kael tensed. "Then step back. Whatever wakes up when that thing reacts, we don't want it waking up."
But Nora couldn't shake the sensation that some unseen tether pulled her toward it—like a memory she didn't remember having… trying to surface.
She reached out—
The pod jerked violently.
All three froze.
Kael raised his weapon again.
Rian stumbled behind a pillar.
The pod's cables strained, stretching, pulling, as if something inside pushed against the surface, desperate to break free.
A hairline crack split across the shell.
The hiss of escaping pressure filled the chamber.
Nora stepped back, heart slamming. "It's opening."
The crack spread like a lightning bolt. Layers peeled aside, revealing a dark interior fogged with cold vapor. Slowly, it cleared—
And a figure sat inside.
Human-shaped.
Thin.
Still.
Its head lowered, its limbs hanging limp. Tubes connected its skin to the walls of the pod, pulsing faintly.
Rian whispered, voice trembling, "Is it alive?"
Kael took a single step forward.
And the figure's head snapped up.
Nora's breath caught.
Its eyes opened—
wide, reflective, unfocused.
But not monstrous.
Familiar.
Too familiar.
Because the face staring back at them…
was Nora's.
A perfect mirror of her—even down to the scar on her eyebrow—just thinner, paler, hollowed by years of confinement.
Rian gasped. "Nora… it looks like—"
"I know."
Her voice barely escaped.
The figure inside the pod blinked slowly, like a puppet trying to remember how to control its own strings. Then its mouth opened—not to scream, not to speak…
To breathe.
A sharp inhale—
the exact same moment Nora inhaled.
A perfect reflection.
Kael grabbed Nora's arm. "We're leaving. Now."
But the pod-Nora reached out one trembling hand, pressing her palm against the inside of the cracked shell. Her lips shook as she whispered, barely audible:
"Don't… leave… me…"
The lights flickered violently.
The chamber shook.
Something massive stirred behind the walls—
the same deep groans they heard in the lower levels.
But now, it sounded awake.
Rian screamed, "MOVE!"
The pod burst open in a violent explosion of steam and metal fragments. The duplicate Nora collapsed onto the floor, gasping, choking, limbs twitching like someone relearning how to be alive.
Nora dropped to her knees beside her, overwhelmed, horrified, shaken to the core. "What are you? Who put you here?"
The duplicate's hand shot up, gripping Nora's wrist with icy fingers. Its eyes widened in terror—not at Nora—but at something behind her.
Nora turned slowly.
The wall behind them bulged outward—
as if something enormous pressed against it from the other side.
Kael fired three rounds into the wall. The metal rippled but didn't break—it responded like skin struck by blades.
The entire chamber inhaled deeply.
All the lights died.
Darkness swallowed them all.
And in the pitch-black, a voice—not spoken, not human—vibrated through the walls, through the floor, through Nora's bones:
"She was the first.
You are the last."
The chamber exhaled—
and the floor split open beneath their feet.
[To be continued...]