He couldn't move.
His muscles twitched, spasmed. The sync fought her presence like an immune system rejecting foreign code.
[ALERT: Unauthorized disconnection attempt.] [Stabilizing host body… Failure.] [Initiating lockdown.]
The pod hissed. Bolts clicked into place.
She screamed.
Not a cry for help—a command. She slammed her fist against the glass, then reached behind her back and drew a makeshift tool: half blade, half crowbar. Rusted. Real.
"I told you not to go under this deep," she growled.
He could barely see her through the fogging glass—but her outline burned in his eyes like a relic. A shape he'd known in another life. Maybe all of them.
[UPLOADING… 37%] [Commencing restraint protocol.]
Something sharp stabbed into his spine from the pod wall. He gasped, jaw locked.
Then—
CRACK.
The glass fractured.
One more swing, and her crowbar broke through.
Alarms screamed. The pod hissed and failed. Steam burst from its seams. Sparks rained.
Her hands reached in.
And for the first time in years, someone touched him.
"Come back," she said. "You don't belong to it."
He stared at her.
FATHER whispered.
"You were never meant to leave."
She pulled. He didn't resist.
Not fully.
His fingers slid across the metal edge as the pod gave way. Half his mind begged to stay—to finish the sync. To become.
The other half… followed the warmth.
Then—
Everything shut down.
Black.
Silence.
But not the old kind. This one had breath. Pulse. A heart that wasn't his own.
And when he opened his eyes again…
He was in her arms. Outside.
Alive.
But not whole.