Kael stared at the final line of the notebook.
He came back.
The words had been written harder than the others.
The ink had cut into the paper.
Kael ran his thumb over the sentence.
“This wasn’t written after they found someone,” he said quietly.
Shade stood beside him.
“How do you know?” “Because whoever wrote this was afraid.” Kael turned the page.
Nothing.
He flipped it again.
Nothing.
The rest of the notebook had been torn away.
Shade crouched beside the remains of the campfire.
“There were twelve.” Kael looked at him.
“What?” “The notebook said there were twelve.” Shade pointed toward the ground.
Twelve bedroll marks surrounded the dead fire.
Kael counted them.
One.
Two.
Three.
Four.
Five.
Six.
Seven.
Eight.
Nine.
Ten.
Eleven.
Twelve.
His eyes narrowed.
“Then where did the thirteenth sleep?” Shade didn’t answer.
Kael slowly looked toward the forest.
The question suddenly felt wrong.
Not because there was no answer.
Because he already knew it.
He walked past the bedrolls.
The trees opened into a small clearing.
There was a stone.
Nothing special about it.
No markings.
No blood.
No inscription.
Just a stone half-buried beneath the roots.
Kael stopped.
His chest tightened.
He had seen it before.
Not here.
Somewhere else.
Somewhere buried beneath memory.
He knelt and brushed away the dirt.
Underneath was a small metal tag.
Kael picked it up.
The metal was blackened with age.
But the number was still visible.
K-07 Kael’s fingers tightened around it.
Shade stared at the tag.
“That was yours.” Kael shook his head.
“No.” Shade tilted his head.
“You said it was yours before.” “I said it belonged to me.” He looked at the twelve bedrolls.
Then at the empty space beyond them.
“But I don’t think I was the thirteenth.” A sudden pulse moved through the Abyss.
The flowers around them bent.
The air became cold.
Kael’s vision blurred.
And memory returned.
Not as a vision.
As a voice.
His own voice.
Seven years younger.
Terrified.
“Cairos.” A younger Cairos stood across from him.
Blood covered one side of his face.
Behind him stood eleven soldiers.
The twelfth was on the ground.
Dead.
And Kael was standing beside the gate.
Not outside it.
Not inside it.
Beside it.
Holding something in his hands.
A small metal object.
The same tag.
K-07.
“You have to go,” Kael said.
Cairos shook his head.
“Not without you.” “You don’t understand.” “Then explain it.” Kael looked toward the gate.
Something was moving behind it.
Something enormous.
Something that did not have a shape.
“I’m the reason it knows we’re here.” Cairos stepped closer.
“Then we’ll kill it.” Kael almost laughed.
“You can’t kill something that doesn’t belong to our world.” The gate shook.
The soldiers raised their weapons.
Kael looked at Cairos.
There was fear in his eyes.
But beneath the fear was something else.
Regret.
“I need you to lie.” Cairos froze.
“What?” “When they ask what happened here…” Kael swallowed.
“Tell them I betrayed you.” Cairos stared at him.
“No.” “Tell them I opened the gate.” “No.” “Tell them I killed the others.” Cairos stepped forward.
“You want me to make them hate you?” “I want them to stop looking for me.” The gate shook again.
A crack appeared across its surface.
Kael’s voice dropped.
“If they come looking for me, they’ll find it.” Cairos finally understood.
His face changed.
“You’re staying.” Kael nodded.
“I have to.” “You’ll die.” “I already did once.” Cairos looked at him for a long moment.
Then Kael placed the K-07 tag into his hand.
“Make sure they believe I’m dead.” Cairos closed his fingers around it.
“I’ll never forgive you.” Kael smiled faintly.
“You don’t have to.” The memory shattered.
Kael stumbled backward.
Shade caught him.
For several seconds, neither of them spoke.
Then Shade looked down at the metal tag in Kael’s hand.
“You chose to stay.” Kael stared at it.
“Yes.” “You weren’t taken.” “No.” “You weren’t betrayed.” Kael closed his eyes.
“No.” Shade’s voice was quiet.
“Then why did you forget?” Kael looked toward the darkness beyond the trees.
“I don’t know.” A sound came from behind them.
A soft metallic click.
Both turned.
At the edge of the sanctuary stood a figure.
It looked human.
At first.
Its body was wrapped in the remains of an old expedition uniform.
Its face was hidden behind a cracked mask.
Kael stepped forward.
“Who are you?” The figure didn’t answer.
Instead, it raised one hand.
In its palm was a piece of paper.
The missing page from the notebook.
Kael’s breath caught.
The figure dropped it.
The paper landed between them.
Kael picked it up.
There was only one sentence.
HE CAME BACK BEFORE YOU DID.
Kael stared at it.
Shade moved closer.
“Who came back?” The figure finally spoke.
Its voice was distorted.
But Kael recognized it.
It was the same voice from the thirteenth door.
“Your replacement.” Shade froze.
Kael looked at him.
The figure continued.
“You were not the first K-07.” Silence.
Shade’s eyes widened.
Kael’s grip tightened around the page.
“What was I?” The figure tilted its head.
“The original.” Kael felt the Abyss move beneath his feet.
The figure pointed at Shade.
“And he was made because you failed.” Shade took a step backward.
Kael immediately moved between them.
“No.” The figure didn’t attack.
It simply looked at Kael.
“You remember now.” Kael’s jaw tightened.
“Not enough.” “That is why he came back.” “Who?” The figure’s mask cracked.
Something black spilled from beneath it.
“The one you were created to contain.” The sanctuary trembled.
The flowers collapsed.
The peaceful forest began to disappear.
Shade grabbed Kael’s arm.
“Kael.” “I know.” The figure stepped backward into the darkness.
Kael shouted.
“Wait!” It stopped.
Kael’s voice hardened.
“Why are you searching for us?” For the first time, the figure sounded almost human.
“I’m not searching for you.” It looked toward Shade.
“I’m searching for him.” Shade went still.
The figure vanished.
Kael looked at Shade.
Neither spoke.
Then the system appeared.
MEMORY RESTORATION: 27% ORIGINAL DESIGNATION: K-07 STATUS: FAILED A second message appeared.
REPLACEMENT UNIT: S-01 Shade stared at the words.
“S-01…” Kael looked at him.
“That means…” Shade finished the sentence.
“I wasn’t made to replace you.” The Abyss went silent.
Shade’s expression changed.
“They made me because they couldn’t control you.” Kael looked down at the ground.
The pieces were finally beginning to fit.
The expedition.
The gate.
The twelve.
The thirteenth.
The replacement.
The Abyss.
And the thing that had been waiting behind the prison.
Kael slowly closed his hand around the notebook page.
“Then we find out what happened to the first twelve.” Shade looked at him.
“And the thing behind the gate?” Kael looked toward the darkness.
“We find that too.” A faint tremor passed through the ground.
Far beyond the sanctuary, something struck the prison walls.
Once.
Twice.
Then again.
The system appeared one final time.
PRISON INTEGRITY: 84% CONTAINMENT FAILURE: 16% Kael stared at the number.
“We’re running out of time.” Shade stepped beside him.
“Then we stop running.” For the first time since returning to the Abyss, Kael smiled.
“Yeah.” He looked into the darkness.
“Let’s go find what I died for.” CREATORS’ THOUGHTS Okikiayo_Fadiji Some truths hurt more when they finally make sense.
Kael’s return was never an accident.
The expedition wasn’t sent to discover the Abyss.
It was sent because of Kael.
And Shade wasn’t created simply to replace him.
He was created because the original K-07 couldn’t be controlled.
But if Kael was the original…
Then the question becomes: What exactly did the Abyss need him to contain?