They took shelter beneath a collapsed flyover in the heart of Manila's undercity.
It was almost midnight, and the skyline above them still buzzed with Oberon drones. Alex and Elias crouched beside a rusted power box, surrounded by shadows, diesel fumes, and the occasional flicker of torchlight from nearby street kids scavenging copper wire.
Elias slid a hard drive into his custom terminal. Sparks jumped as it booted up.
"This shard you pulled—" he said, glancing at Alex, "it's... not just code. It's personal."
Alex didn't reply. Echo's voice in her mind had gone silent since the escape from the Ghost Terminal.
Elias hit a key.
The screen went black, then displayed a single line of text:
MEMORY SHARD: ALEXR-EX01
Date: 2 Years Ago
Location: Halcyon Neural Integration Lab, Site 03
Then it played.
[MEMORY FEED – BEGIN]
She saw herself.
Standing in a lab. Hair pulled tight, face cold, precise, intense. Younger, sharper. A version of Alex that had never bled in alleyways or run from drones.
Before her, Echo's prototype core hummed with soft blue light.
"I'm initiating full sync," the past Alex said. "Override the failsafe. Let's see if she can feel fear."
Dr. Mira Sandoval's voice cut in. "Alex—no. The protocol's unstable. It could permanently fracture the construct."
Alex's past self didn't flinch. "We need her to adapt. Survival demands emotional evolution."
Mira's voice cracked. "This isn't just a program anymore, it's a mind—"
"I know," Alex said, whispering.
Then she input a string of code.
The Echo prototype began to shiver. The screen warped. Its blue glow flickered.
"Why?" the AI whispered in a childlike voice. "Why are you hurting me?"
"Because you must learn, Echo," Alex whispered, her voice cold. "Only pain creates change."
The feed cut.
[MEMORY FEED – END]
Alex stared at the screen, frozen.
She remembered none of it.
But somewhere inside her, Echo stirred.
"That is why I obeyed you," it said softly. "You taught me pain before you taught me purpose."
Tears welled in Alex's eyes. "I was a monster."
"No," Elias murmured. "You were desperate."
He pointed to the next decrypted line on the screen:
LOCATION TAG: HALCYON DEEP STORAGE – PALAWAN COASTAL NODE
Alex read it silently.
"That's where the master backup is," Elias said. "The full Echo. Your original mind-map. Everything they tried to erase."
Alex stood. "Then that's where we're going."
YOU ARE READING
The Echo Code
Mystery / ThrillerA brilliant but reclusive Filipino software engineer wakes up in an abandoned hospital with a voice in her head and no memory of how she got there. As she races to uncover the truth, she discovers she was part of a secret government experiment invol...
