The first heartbeat belonged to Daniel Cross.
The second did not.
Thump.
Thump.
Thump.
The sound came from somewhere beneath his ribs, deep enough that he felt it in his bones. His actual heart continued beating at a frantic pace, while something else answered it with a slower, heavier rhythm.
Daniel pressed a hand against his chest.
"What the hell?"
Inside the glass cylinder, his duplicate watched him with unblinking black eyes.
A second crack appeared in the glass.
Then a third.
Mira grabbed Daniel's wrist.
"Don't touch it."
Daniel looked at her.
"I wasn't planning to hug the mysterious corpse that looks exactly like me."
"Daniel, I'm serious."
"So am I. My standards for physical affection have become remarkably specific."
The second heartbeat grew louder.
Thump.
Daniel staggered.
For a moment, the chamber seemed to tilt around him. The pale roots hanging from the ceiling began to glow, their blue light traveling toward the cylindrical container.
His system appeared.
[CRITICAL ANOMALY DETECTED.]
[ACTIVE HOST: DANIEL CROSS.]
[ORIGINAL HOST: CROSS-01.]
[CONSCIOUSNESS CONFLICT: ESCALATING.]
[WARNING: DUAL BIOLOGICAL RESONANCE DETECTED.]
Daniel stared at the notification.
"System, explain."
[ANALYSIS IN PROGRESS.]
"Try doing it faster."
[INSUFFICIENT DATA.]
"Naturally."
Inside the cylinder, the other Daniel raised his hand.
Slowly.
Deliberately.
His palm pressed against the glass.
Daniel instinctively stepped backward.
The duplicate followed his movement with its eyes.
Then its lips moved again.
YOU STOLE MY LIFE.
Daniel swallowed.
"I don't even know who you are."
The duplicate's expression changed.
For the first time, Daniel saw something beyond anger in its face.
Grief.
Deep, terrible grief.
The kind that belonged to someone who had spent a very long time waiting for a person who never came back.
Then the glass shattered.
The explosion threw Daniel across the chamber.
He struck the stone floor shoulder-first and slid several meters before stopping against the base of a pillar.
Pain ripped through his injured shoulder.
He screamed.
Not because he wanted to.
Because his body had apparently decided that dignity was an unnecessary luxury.
Mira shouted his name.
Glass fragments rained across the chamber.
The black fluid inside the cylinder spilled onto the floor, spreading in thin streams that moved against gravity.
The duplicate dropped out of the shattered container.
It struck the ground on its knees.
For several seconds, it remained motionless.
Then it inhaled.
The sound was wet and ragged.
Like someone breathing for the first time in centuries.
Daniel slowly pushed himself upright.
The other body lifted its head.
Their eyes met.
Daniel had spent the last several hours discovering that his existence was considerably more complicated than he had imagined.
He was apparently connected to an ancient intelligence.
His memories had been altered.
His biological evolution was being influenced by an unknown network.
And now he was looking at what appeared to be his own original body.
At this point, he was almost disappointed that nobody had yet informed him he was secretly a royal heir.
The duplicate stood.
It was naked, pale, and trembling.
Black fluid dripped from its fingertips.
A faint blue light pulsed beneath the skin of its neck.
It looked at Daniel.
Then it spoke.
"How long?"
Daniel blinked.
"What?"
"How long have I been asleep?"
Its voice was Daniel's voice.
Not similar.
Identical.
Every pause, every inflection, every slight roughness sounded familiar.
Daniel hated it immediately.
"I don't know."
The duplicate glanced around the chamber.
Its expression hardened.
"Where is Elias?"
"Probably somewhere above us, having another terrible day."
The duplicate ignored him.
It examined the shattered cylinder, the roots, and the surrounding machinery.
Then it looked at Mira.
Its face changed.
"Mira?"
She took a step backward.
The duplicate stared at her.
"You survived."
Mira's lips trembled.
"Yes."
For several seconds, neither spoke.
Then the duplicate approached her.
Mira backed away again.
The movement stopped him.
Something wounded flickered across his face.
"You don't remember me?"
Mira said nothing.
The duplicate lowered its head.
"Of course."
Daniel watched them.
A strange feeling had begun to spread through his chest.
It wasn't jealousy.
Not exactly.
It was something more uncomfortable.
The feeling of watching two people recognize each other while he stood between them, knowing that he should somehow understand what was happening.
He looked at Mira.
"Do you know him?"
She hesitated.
"Yes."
Daniel's stomach tightened.
"Then perhaps you'd like to explain why you've been keeping that information to yourself."
"I didn't know he was still alive."
The duplicate laughed.
It was a bitter sound.
"Neither did I."
Daniel looked at him.
"All right. Let's establish a few things before anyone starts having an emotional reunion involving my face."
The duplicate turned.
Daniel pointed at the shattered cylinder.
"Who are you?"
The other Daniel stared at him.
Then he looked down at his own hands.
"I am Daniel Cross."
Daniel's expression hardened.
"No. That's my name."
"It was mine first."
The second heartbeat struck Daniel's chest.
Thump.
He doubled over.
Pain spread through his ribs.
For an instant, the chamber disappeared.
He saw a white room.
A metal table.
A woman holding a wooden horse.
A little girl crying.
Then the vision vanished.
Daniel caught himself against the pillar.
The duplicate watched him.
"You feel it, don't you?"
Daniel breathed through the pain.
"Feel what?"
"The connection."
The second heartbeat sounded again.
Thump.
The duplicate placed a hand against his own chest.
"That isn't your heart."
Daniel looked up.
The duplicate's black eyes were filled with something that resembled pity.
"It's mine."
Silence settled over the chamber.
Then Daniel laughed.
Once.
Quietly.
Without humor.
"Of course it is."
He straightened.
"Because why would I get through a day without discovering that part of my anatomy belongs to somebody else?"
The duplicate stepped forward.
Daniel immediately raised his hand.
"Stay there."
The other man stopped.
"You don't understand what you've done."
"Then explain it."
"You took my body."
Daniel's jaw tightened.
"I woke up in a world where giant naked monsters eat people. I didn't exactly receive an instruction manual."
"You were never supposed to wake up in that body."
"Which body?"
The duplicate pointed at him.
"That one."
Daniel stared.
Then he looked at his hands.
His fingers were trembling.
His skin was pale beneath the dust and blood.
His body was human.
Mostly.
But the system had repeatedly shown that his biology was changing.
He had integrated Titan muscular recruitment.
His nervous system had endured forced adaptations.
His biological stability was falling.
And now a second heartbeat was echoing through his chest.
"You're telling me I'm some kind of copy?"
The duplicate hesitated.
"No."
Daniel waited.
The other man looked toward the ancient roots.
"You're something worse."
Daniel closed his eyes.
"I am going to start charging people for every time they say something like that."
Mira stepped between them.
"Stop it."
Neither man moved.
She looked at the duplicate.
"You've only just awakened. Your memories are incomplete."
He stared at her.
"How long?"
Mira's eyes filled with tears.
"I don't know."
"How long have I been trapped in there?"
"I don't know."
"How long has he been wearing my face?"
Her silence answered him.
The duplicate looked at Daniel again.
The anger returned.
"You don't even know what you are."
Daniel met his gaze.
"Neither do you, apparently. You're asking a little girl for information while standing naked in a puddle."
Mira made a small, startled sound.
It might have been a laugh.
The duplicate looked down at himself.
For the first time, he appeared to notice his complete lack of clothing.
He glanced around the chamber.
Then he picked up a discarded laboratory coat and pulled it on.
Daniel nodded approvingly.
"Excellent. We've established that at least one of us possesses survival instincts."
The duplicate ignored him.
He approached the central console.
A series of symbols appeared on its surface.
He placed his hand against the display.
The machine immediately activated.
[ORIGINAL HOST RECOGNIZED.]
[SUBJECT CROSS-01.]
[MEMORY ARCHIVE ACCESS: RESTORED.]
[WARNING: ARCHIVE INTEGRITY COMPROMISED.]
Daniel stared.
"Why does the machine recognize him?"
The duplicate's fingers moved across the console.
"Because I built it."
Daniel went still.
"You built this facility?"
"No."
The duplicate examined the display.
"I built the system."
The words struck Daniel harder than they should have.
He remembered Elias's explanation.
The Devourer System was an artificial evolutionary framework, developed from incomplete information recovered from the ancient structure.
But Elias had never claimed to be its original creator.
He had only claimed to have helped create it.
Daniel stepped closer.
"How?"
The duplicate turned.
"By trying to save myself."
He looked at the ancient roots.
"And failing."
For several seconds, he said nothing.
Then he continued.
"The First was not always a skeleton. It was not always a network. Once, it had a body that could survive almost anything. Its cells could adapt to injury, disease, heat, cold, starvation, and changes in its environment."
Daniel thought of his own adaptations.
The ability to acquire biological traits.
The constant calculations of compatibility and stability.
The strange hunger.
"Evolution," he said.
The duplicate nodded.
"Directed evolution. The body changing according to what it needed to survive."
"That's the Devourer System."
"That's what the researchers called their imitation."
The duplicate touched the console.
A holographic projection appeared above it.
The image showed a human body surrounded by branching patterns.
Some branches represented muscle.
Others represented bone, nerves, organs, and unfamiliar structures that Daniel couldn't identify.
The patterns converged around a glowing core in the chest.
"The original framework was designed to preserve the host's identity while allowing the body to evolve," the duplicate explained. "It was supposed to be a controlled process."
He looked at Daniel.
"Then the researchers tried to improve it."
Daniel's mouth tightened.
"Let me guess. They made it worse."
"They removed the restrictions."
The projection changed.
The branches multiplied.
The body became larger, more complex, and increasingly inhuman.
"The system began prioritizing survival above everything else. It learned to treat every obstacle as a threat and every living organism as a potential resource."
Daniel remembered the hunger.
The desire to consume everything around him.
He remembered how close he had come to attacking Arlen.
"So the system is trying to turn me into a monster."
"No."
The duplicate's answer came too quickly.
Daniel frowned.
"What do you mean?"
"The system is trying to keep you alive."
The duplicate looked toward the shattered cylinder.
"It simply doesn't care what you have to become in order to survive."
Daniel felt a chill move through him.
That sounded considerably worse.
He glanced at the console.
"Then why does it keep telling me to evolve?"
"Because the framework is incomplete. It needs to repair itself. It needs more information. More biological material. More compatible traits."
"And if I keep feeding it?"
"It will become more capable."
"That's the point."
"No."
The duplicate's voice hardened.
"The point is knowing when to stop."
Daniel fell silent.
The duplicate turned back to the console.
"The First doesn't evolve the way you do. Its original body was designed to adapt without losing its fundamental identity. But when its body was destroyed, its biological network fragmented."
He pointed toward the roots.
"Those fragments became the foundation of the Titans. The researchers found traces of that network and attempted to recreate its adaptive properties."
He looked at Daniel.
"They used me as the primary template."
Daniel felt the second heartbeat intensify.
Thump.
The duplicate flinched.
His expression changed.
He looked directly at Daniel's chest.
"How much of the system have you integrated?"
Daniel hesitated.
"Several adaptations."
"Which ones?"
"Muscular recruitment. Temporary reflex acceleration."
The duplicate's face darkened.
"Anything else?"
"No."
The second heartbeat struck again.
The duplicate closed his eyes.
"You're lying."
Daniel stared.
"I beg your pardon?"
"You don't have to tell me. I can feel the changes."
He opened his eyes.
"Your body is beginning to synchronize with mine."
Daniel stepped back.
"Can we stop that?"
"Possibly."
"Wonderful. How?"
The duplicate looked at the console.
"By separating the two biological signatures."
Daniel's system activated.
[PROPOSED PROCEDURE DETECTED.]
[DUAL SIGNATURE SEPARATION.]
[ESTIMATED SUCCESS PROBABILITY: 11%.]
[WARNING: PROCEDURE MAY RESULT IN HOST DEATH.]
Daniel read the notification twice.
"Eleven percent?"
The duplicate looked at him.
"The system is being optimistic."
Daniel slowly lowered his head.
"I miss my old life."
Mira's expression softened.
"Daniel—"
"I miss electricity. I miss clean water. I miss not having to wonder whether the next person I meet is secretly a thousand-year-old biological catastrophe."
He looked at the duplicate.
"And I miss being the only person in a room with my face."
The duplicate almost smiled.
Almost.
Then the facility shook.
The holographic projection flickered.
A new alarm sounded.
[EXTERNAL NETWORK SYNCHRONIZATION: 81%.]
[WARNING: ORIGINAL SOURCE REACTIVATION ACCELERATING.]
[SECURITY BREACH DETECTED.]
[UNAUTHORIZED ACCESS: UPPER FACILITY.]
Daniel looked toward the entrance.
"Elias?"
The duplicate's expression changed.
"He's here."
"Good. Perhaps he can explain why my body has developed a second heart."
The duplicate grabbed a metal instrument from the console.
"We need to leave."
Daniel frowned.
"Why?"
"Because if Elias reaches this chamber, he'll try to activate the separation procedure."
"Didn't you just say that's how we stop the connection?"
"It is."
Daniel waited.
The duplicate's face tightened.
"But Elias won't separate you from me."
He looked at Daniel.
"He'll separate you from your body."
Silence.
Daniel slowly turned toward Mira.
She looked terrified.
The duplicate continued.
"The procedure was originally designed to transfer my consciousness into a new host. You were supposed to be the host."
Daniel felt the second heartbeat grow louder.
Thump.
Thump.
Thump.
He looked down at his chest.
"Then what happened?"
The duplicate's voice became very quiet.
"You woke up first."
Daniel stared at him.
For several seconds, he couldn't speak.
Then he laughed.
Not because anything was funny.
Because the alternative was screaming.
"So let me get this straight. You built a system to transfer your consciousness into another body. Something went wrong. I woke up in that body, and now you're telling me you want it back?"
The duplicate looked at him.
"I want my life back."
Daniel's expression hardened.
"Then you should have thought of that before trying to steal mine."
The duplicate flinched.
For the first time, genuine anger appeared on his face.
"Your life?"
He stepped toward Daniel.
"You don't even know who you are!"
"Neither do you!"
The words echoed through the chamber.
Both men froze.
Daniel's breathing was ragged.
His hands were clenched.
He wanted to hit something.
Preferably the duplicate.
Preferably something that would stay down afterward.
But the other man's words had struck too close to the truth.
Daniel didn't know who he was.
He didn't know where he had come from.
He didn't know whether the memories of his former life were real.
He didn't know whether he had died, been reborn, or been manufactured in a laboratory.
He didn't know whether the system was helping him survive or preparing him to become something else.
And he didn't know whether the person standing before him was a victim, a monster, or both.
The duplicate looked away first.
"I don't want to kill you."
Daniel let out a humorless breath.
"That's a relief."
"But I won't let you destroy me."
"Then we'd better find another solution."
The duplicate nodded.
For a moment, something resembling agreement passed between them.
Then the second heartbeat stopped.
Daniel gasped.
His entire body seized.
The floor rushed toward him.
He collapsed.
Mira screamed his name.
The duplicate staggered backward, clutching his chest.
The console flashed red.
[CRITICAL EVENT.]
[DUAL HOST SYNCHRONIZATION: 100%.]
[CONSCIOUSNESS OVERLAP DETECTED.]
[WARNING: IDENTITY BOUNDARY COLLAPSE IMMINENT.]
Daniel tried to move.
He couldn't.
The chamber dissolved around him.
He was standing in a white room.
A familiar white room.
A long table stretched across its center.
Medical instruments lay neatly arranged on its surface.
At the far end stood the woman from his recovered memory.
She was holding the wooden horse.
Daniel approached her.
"Who are you?"
She looked at him with tired eyes.
"You've forgotten me again."
Daniel's throat tightened.
"I'm trying to remember."
"I know."
She held out the wooden horse.
He took it.
The moment his fingers touched the toy, the room changed.
The walls became transparent.
Beyond them stood a vast forest of enormous trees.
Their trunks stretched into a sky filled with pale light.
Thousands of human figures stood between the trees.
Some were alive.
Others were little more than silhouettes.
At the center of the forest stood the First.
Not as a skeleton.
Not as a network of roots.
As a human being.
A tall man with dark hair and black eyes.
His body was covered in strange markings that glowed faintly beneath his skin.
He looked almost ordinary.
That was what made him terrifying.
The man turned toward Daniel.
And smiled.
"There you are."
Daniel backed away.
"Who are you?"
The man tilted his head.
"You know who I am."
"No."
"You knew me before the Walls were built."
Daniel shook his head.
"I don't remember."
"That was the point."
The man's smile faded.
"Do you know why they divided my body?"
Daniel said nothing.
"Because they were afraid of what I could become."
The forest trembled.
The human silhouettes began turning toward Daniel.
One by one.
Thousands of faces.
Thousands of identical black eyes.
The man stepped closer.
"They believed that if they separated my body from my mind, they could control the pieces."
Daniel felt the wooden horse grow warm in his hands.
"They were wrong."
The forest began to collapse.
Trees bent toward the ground.
The silhouettes dissolved into pale roots.
The man reached out.
"And then they found you."
Daniel tried to move.
He couldn't.
The man's fingers touched his forehead.
"You were supposed to be the vessel that brought me back."
The white room shattered.
Daniel screamed.
***
He awoke on the laboratory floor.
Mira was kneeling beside him.
The duplicate stood several feet away, clutching the console.
Both were breathing heavily.
The second heartbeat had stopped.
For now.
Daniel rolled onto his side and vomited.
His vision swam.
His head felt as though someone had poured molten metal into his skull.
The system appeared.
[CONSCIOUSNESS OVERLAP INTERRUPTED.]
[NEURAL STABILITY: 18%.]
[BIOLOGICAL STABILITY: 34%.]
[DUAL HOST SYNCHRONIZATION: TEMPORARILY SUSPENDED.]
[WARNING: REPEATED OVERLAP MAY RESULT IN PERMANENT IDENTITY COLLAPSE.]
Daniel stared at the numbers.
"Eighteen?"
His voice was barely audible.
"That's... that's not good."
Mira helped him sit up.
"What happened?"
Daniel rubbed his forehead.
"I saw him."
"The First?"
Daniel nodded.
"He looked human."
Mira's expression changed.
"What did he say?"
Daniel looked at the duplicate.
The other man was watching him carefully.
"He said I was supposed to be his vessel."
The duplicate closed his eyes.
For several seconds, he said nothing.
Then he whispered:
"That means the transfer already began."
Daniel stared at him.
"What?"
The duplicate turned toward the console.
"The consciousness transfer was never completed. We thought the process had failed."
He looked at Daniel.
"But if the First has begun communicating with you directly, then the original network is trying to finish what we started."
Daniel felt cold.
"Finish what?"
The duplicate's voice trembled.
"Put him inside you."
The facility shook.
A tremendous impact struck the upper entrance.
Metal groaned.
The console flashed red.
[SECURITY BREACH.]
[UPPER ACCESS DOOR: DESTROYED.]
[HOSTILE PERSONNEL ENTERING FACILITY.]
A familiar voice echoed through the corridor.
"Daniel!"
Elias Voss.
The old researcher appeared at the entrance, holding a pistol in one hand and a small black device in the other.
His pale eyes immediately found Daniel.
Then they shifted toward the duplicate.
For the first time, Elias looked utterly defeated.
"No," he whispered.
The duplicate stepped forward.
"You should have left me asleep."
Elias raised the pistol.
His hand was shaking.
"I had no choice."
"You always had a choice."
Elias's expression twisted.
"You have no idea what I've sacrificed to keep you alive!"
The duplicate laughed bitterly.
"Alive?"
He gestured toward the shattered cylinder.
"Is this what you call alive?"
Elias looked at Daniel.
Then at the duplicate.
Then at the ancient roots spreading across the ceiling.
He slowly lowered the pistol.
"I'm sorry."
Daniel pushed himself upright.
"That's a lovely sentiment. Could someone please explain what's happening before the building collapses?"
Elias looked at him.
His expression was filled with a terrible, exhausted sadness.
"The First is no longer simply communicating with you."
He glanced at the duplicate.
"It's beginning to reconstruct itself through your connection."
Daniel felt the second heartbeat stir.
Elias continued.
"And if it succeeds, every Titan connected to the network will become part of the same organism."
Daniel stared.
"How many Titans are we talking about?"
Elias swallowed.
"Every Titan within the Walls."
Silence.
Then Daniel looked toward the ceiling.
Above them, thousands of tons of stone separated the chamber from a city filled with soldiers, civilians, and people who had absolutely no idea that the world was about to become considerably worse.
Eren Yeager.
Mikasa Ackerman.
Armin Arlert.
All of them were somewhere above.
Fighting for their lives.
And Daniel had just discovered that the Titans attacking them might soon become parts of a single intelligence.
He looked at Elias.
"How do we stop it?"
Elias didn't answer.
Instead, he stared at Daniel's chest.
The second heartbeat had returned.
Thump.
Thump.
Thump.
The duplicate backed away.
Mira began crying.
And the system displayed a notification Daniel had never seen before.
[FINAL CONTAINMENT PROTOCOL INITIATED.]
[PRIMARY HOST: DANIEL CROSS.]
[SECONDARY HOST: CROSS-01.]
[ORIGINAL ENTITY: THE FIRST.]
[WARNING: THREE CONSCIOUSNESS SIGNATURES DETECTED.]
[ESTIMATED TIME UNTIL CONVERGENCE: 00:09:59.]
Daniel stared at the countdown.
Nine minutes.
That was all the time he had.
Nine minutes to discover who he was, what the First wanted, and how to prevent an ancient intelligence from taking control of every Titan within the Walls.
He looked at the duplicate.
Then at Elias.
Then at Mira.
"All right," Daniel said.
His voice was shaking.
His hands were shaking.
He was terrified.
But he was still Daniel Cross.
Whatever that meant.
"Someone start explaining."
The countdown continued.
00:09:58.
00:09:57.
00:09:56.
And far above them, every Titan in Trost stopped moving.
For three seconds, the entire district fell silent.
Then the Titans opened their mouths.
And spoke with one voice.
"DANIEL CROSS."
The ground beneath Trost began to rise.