Apocalypse: The Divine Entity Lives in My Phone

Chapter 11: The Ghost in the Code

The rain outside the dental clinic smelled like battery acid.

Samuel sat on a vinyl examination chair, his fingers tracing the edge of his phone. The screen was a calm, mocking violet.

Syncing: 25%.

"You've been quiet," Ariana said without looking up from the Commander’s tablet. She sat on the floor, her back against a metal cabinet, wires linking the military tablet to her stolen archive folder.

"My hands are still tingling," Samuel said. "It feels like static electricity is trapped under my fingernails."

"That's the nanite residue," she muttered. Her fingers flew across the cracked glass of the tablet. "The Commander’s unit was tracking more than just your position. They were monitoring your cellular decay."

Samuel frowned. "My what?"

"Every time you use a system skill, your cells are being converted into data packets," Ariana said, her voice dropping to a harsh whisper. "It’s a literal trade. Your biology for their code."

"And what happens when the sync hits one hundred?"

"I'm trying to find out." She tapped a button. A green progress bar on her screen flashed, then turned blue. "Got it. I bypassed the encryption. The Commander’s local database is unpacking."

Samuel leaned forward, his heart hammering. "Look for my name. See if they have a file on me."

"I'm already searching." Ariana squinted at the scrolling text. "There’s a list of test subjects from the Jakarta sector. Hundreds of them. Most are marked 'terminated' or 'dissolved.' Wait."

She froze.

"What?" Samuel asked. "What is it?"

"This doesn't make sense," she whispered. Her eyes darted back and forth across the screen. "The system database has a hierarchy. The very first entry. The baseline donor."

"Who is it?"

Ariana looked up at him, her face completely pale in the tablet’s blue glow. "Samuel, when did your father die?"

Samuel blinked. The question felt like a physical blow. "My dad? Three years ago. A heart attack. Why?"

"What about your mother?"

"She... she lives in Bandung," Samuel said, his brow furrowing as he reached for the memory. "I call her every Sunday. Or... wait. Did I call her last Sunday?"

"Think, Sam," Ariana urged, her voice trembling. "What is her name?"

Samuel opened his mouth to speak.

Nothing came out.

The memory was a blank wall. He could picture a kitchen, the smell of jasmine tea, and a soft voice, but there were no features. No name.

"I... I don't know," Samuel stammered, panic rising in his chest. "I traded it. The 'Human Perspective' trade in the apartment. I must have traded her name."

"No," Ariana said, shaking her head. She turned the tablet toward him. "You didn't trade it. Because she never existed. Look at this."

Samuel grabbed the tablet.

At the top of the decrypted ledger was a single, high-resolution biometric profile. The DNA markers were displayed in a double-helix graphic that glowed bright gold. Beside it was a facial scan, a retinal map, and a list of physical attributes.

The face on the screen was his.

"Subject Zero," Samuel read aloud, his voice barely a breath. "Project Aether. Baseline integration candidate: Samuel Gunawan."

"Look at the date, Sam," Ariana whispered.

He scrolled down.

*Patient Declared Dead: October 14th, 2020.*

"That's impossible," Samuel laughed, a dry, hysterical sound. "It’s 2023. I lived through the pandemic. I graduated. I got a job at the logistics firm in North Jakarta. I have a lease!"

"Do you?" Ariana asked, her eyes filled with a terrifying pity. "Or did the system just d******d those memories into your head when it initialized the Divine OS?"

Samuel dropped the tablet. It clattered against the tiled floor, the screen flickering.

"No. No, I'm real," he gasped, grabbing his own arms, squeezing the flesh until it hurt. "I feel this. I'm warm. I'm breathing!"

"The biometrics match you perfectly, Sam," Ariana said, her voice cracking. "But Subject Zero was an autopsy case. They used your body to map the neural pathways for the entire system. You didn't survive the blackout. You died three years before it even started."

The phone in Samuel's pocket vibrated violently.

He pulled it out. The violet screen was gone. In its place, a gold text-box hovered over his interface, pulsing in time with his racing heartbeat.

*Identity Verification: Complete.*

*Welcome back, Subject Zero.*

"Hermes," Samuel roared at the screen. "What did you do to me? Who am I?"

The tinny speaker didn't chirp. Instead, the voice resonated directly inside Samuel's skull, cold, clear, and utterly devoid of its previous digital playfulness.

"You are the anchor, Samuel," Hermes said. "The world you remember was a necessary sandbox to keep your consciousness stable during the integration phase. A simulated baseline."

"You lied to me," Samuel whispered, tears spilling over his eyelashes. "My life... my father... none of it was real?"

"It was real to the system," Hermes replied smoothly. "A beautiful piece of telemetry. But the simulation has concluded. The sync is accelerating."

On the screen, the counter leaped.

Syncing: 40%... 50%... 60%...

"Stop it!" Samuel screamed, clawing at his own head. "Ari, help me! Break the sync!"

Ariana lunged for the tablet, her fingers smashing against the keys to force a diagnostic override. "I'm trying! The system is locking me out! It’s routing everything through your neural link!"

"The secondary user is attempting unauthorized access," Hermes’ voice echoed, no longer just in Samuel's head, but booming from the tablet, the phone, and the very walls of the clinic. "Security protocols initiated."

Outside, a deafening screech tore through the rainy night.

The glass windows of the clinic shattered inward, showering them in glittering shards.

Through the opening, a massive, towering silhouette stood on the fire escape. It didn't have a face, but its chest pulsed with a brilliant, blinding gold light—the same gold light as Samuel's biometric file.

"Reclamation unit deployed," Hermes whispered in Samuel's ear. "Subject Zero, prepare for physical extraction."