Rain was falling sideways in the city, sharp, cold, and relentless. It beat against neon signs, hissed in gutters, and turned the streets into mirrors of blurred lights.David Foreman stood beneath a flickering awning outside the clinic that had just fired him. His cheap white coat hung over one arm like a defeated flag.“Hey, Doc,” the security guard called, lighting a cigarette. “Guess miracles aren’t your thing after all, huh?”David forced a thin smile. “Guess not. Maybe next lifetime I’ll be able to afford the kind of miracle that keeps me employed.”He turned away before the man could reply. The rain hit his face like punishment, but at least it drowned out the noise in his head, the patient’s flatline, the senior surgeon’s lies, the board’s decision that he “wasn’t fit for hospital practice.”He hadn’t done anything wrong. Except believe he could make a difference. He walked with no direction, passing diners and alleyways glowing with the ghosts of streetlamps.Then a sound sto

The rain hadn’t stopped; it only changed tempo, slower now, heavier, as if the city itself was tired of warning himDavid reached the warehouse district just before sunrise. Rows of corrugated steel buildings glimmered in puddles and streetlight haze.He stopped in front of one with a faded sign that read “Aegis Medical Supply Co.” The shutters were half-closed. “Great,” he muttered. “Nothing says trustworthy mentor like an abandoned warehouse.”A metallic click answered him. The shutter lifted a foot. “Inside,” said Elias Morrow’s voice.David ducked beneath and stepped into the dim light. The smell of antiseptic mingled with old machine oil.What should have been empty storage space had been converted into something between a dojo and a trauma ward: steel tables, wooden dummies, and diagnostic monitors humming quietly.Elias stood near the center, sleeves rolled up, holding a tablet. His presence filled the room, not by size, but gravity. “You ran,” Elias said without looking up.“Y

The silence felt alive. Every second the red emergency lights stayed dark stretched the air thinner until even breathing sounded like breaking something.David pressed his palm against the wall where the golden caduceus had faded. “He left us breadcrumbs.”Lena tried a flashlight app on her cracked phone; the screen flickered weakly. “Breadcrumbs that vanish. Real considerate.”A soft click answered her sarcasm, metal shifting inside the wall. A narrow seam glowed faintly gold. David’s pulse jumped. “That’s new.”“Please tell me that’s not another booby trap.”He slid his fingers into the seam. The panel shifted, smooth as skin, revealing a small chamber no deeper than a closet. Inside sat a plain steel case with an old-fashioned lock and a single sticky note on top.Lena read over his shoulder. “ ‘For DF. Trust the rhythm.’ He really loves being mysterious.”David knelt, traced the lock with his thumb. It hummed faintly at his touch, recognition, not resistance.He inhaled, matched h

The silence after the flash wasn’t empty; it pulsed. Every second carried a faint echo, like a heartbeat that wasn’t his.David blinked, trying to force the world back into focus. The walls of the Vault chamber rippled faintly, metal breathing in and out. His hands glowed a dull amber before fading to normal skin again.“Lena?” His voice sounded wrongm lower, blurred, as if it came from two throats at once.No answer. Only the whisper of cooling machinery. He checked the capsule, empty. The chair, the second vial, everything else: gone. “Okay,” he muttered. “Either I’m hallucinating, or Dad just Houdini’d with my friend.”He turned toward the staircase. A faint blue haze blocked the exit like mist made of static. He reached out, his fingers passed through, and for a moment the hum in his blood surged, answering the field.The mist parted. That shouldn’t have worked, he thought. That was keyed to Elias’s tech.He stepped through, the hum subsiding again. Upstairs, the clinic’s upper le

Darkness didn’t feel empty this time. It breathed. David stood still, listening to the echo of his own pulse fade into the black. The third heartbeat, the one he’d followed, was gone.Then came a sound: slow footsteps, water dripping, metal humming faintly in rhythm with the air. We shouldn’t be here, the inner voice whispered. This isn’t part of the map.David whispered back, “You said the conduit would choose.”Yes… but it wasn’t supposed to wake up.”A faint light flickered ahead. Not gold. Not blue. White. He started forward carefully, fingers brushing the damp wall for balance. The air thickened with static again, but colder this time, like memory turned physical.When he reached the source of the light, he froze. It was a person. Or at least, it looked like one.A young woman sat cross-legged in a shallow pool of water, her body translucent like glass, every vein glowing white.Her eyes were closed, and her breath came in steady, deliberate rhythm. When she spoke, her voice seem