Echoes Of Deception

Echoes Of Control

The rain masked their footsteps as they weaved through Redstone’s industrial ruins, keeping to the shadows. Every step was heavier now, not from fatigue but from doubt.

Inside Nick’s head, the whisper still echoed.

Neutralize the threat. Obey.

He pressed his palm against the side of his skull as if he could crush the command, force it out. But it clung, tightening like a noose he couldn’t see.

Anna walked beside him, her breath shallow. “If the command is active, we have to isolate you—”

“No,” Nick said quickly. “Not yet. If I go under, we lose our chance. We don’t even know what triggers the full protocol.”

Leah, walking a few paces ahead, spun around. “What if we’re the threat the code wants you to neutralize?”

Nick stopped. Their eyes met. He didn’t flinch.

“Then I’ll fight it.” He said.

Leah stared at him for a long second. Then nodded.

Anna checked the stolen tablet. “We need shelter. And a way to purge the neural code before it roots any deeper.”

Nick looked up at the blinking skyline. “We need a failsafe.”

⸻

They broke into an old high school three blocks away—boarded-up windows, graffiti layered like history on the walls. Inside, the gym was mostly intact. They secured the perimeter, barricading doors with bleachers and lockers.

Anna laid out tools from Remy’s kit—bio-scanners, a pulse amplifier and a portable neuro-jack. She moved with urgency but Nick could see the tremble in her hands.

“I can try to isolate the corrupted segment,” she said, voice barely above a whisper. “But if I go too deep, it might trigger the kill protocol.”

“Do it,” Nick said without hesitation.

“No,” Leah cut in. “We don’t know what it will do to you.”

“We don’t know what I’ll do to you if we don’t,” he replied.

That silenced them.

Anna bit her lip, then nodded and connected the interface. Wires snaked from the jack to the base of Nick’s neck. A blue light blinked. His breath hitched.

“I’m in,” she whispered. “I can see the neural map… Wait. This—this isn’t just a code. It’s a command tree. There are layers.”

“What does that mean?” Leah asked.

“It means they didn’t just program him to obey,” Anna said. “They programmed him to forget that he was obeying.”

The screen pulsed red. Nick groaned. His jaw clenched.

“Unit 9. Compliance mode. Threat identified: Anna Voss. Neutralize.”

Leah moved instantly, putting herself between them. “Nick! Look at me! You don’t want this!”

But Nick’s eyes were already glassy and cold. Detached.

Anna reached forward, frantic. “I’m initiating a neural loopback—injecting a counter impulse.”

Nick raised his hand but froze mid-motion, fingers twitching.

Then he collapsed.

Anna tore the jack free. “I broke the loop… I think. I don’t know for how long.”

Nick blinked slowly, groaning. “I heard it again. This time… it used your name.”

Leah exhaled shakily. “They’re trying to turn you against us.”

“No,” Nick rasped. “They’re afraid of you. That’s why they want you gone.” He said.

Anna sat back, stunned. “We’re running out of time.”

Nick looked at her, more lucid now. “There has to be a way to rewire the trigger mask the phrase or reroute it.”

Anna shook her head. “We don’t have the tools. Remy might’ve had them, but—”

Nick looked up. “Remy’s backups. He said he left more at ‘The Annex.’ What is that?”

Anna blinked. “It’s an old comms tower. Off-grid. West Ridge.”

Leah stood. “Then we move before sunrise. If Veratech knows we’re here, they won’t wait long.”

⸻

By dawn, they were on the road again, this time in an old van they hotwired from a scrapyard. Anna rode in the back with the neuro-gear, watching Nick like he might disappear again.

The Annex stood alone on a cliffside, overgrown with ivy and antennae. It looked like a relic—but inside, it buzzed with dormant power. Anna powered up the mainframe.

“Remy left everything. Code libraries. Signal intercepts. Even raw memory logs from Project Echo.”

Nick scanned the files. Something tugged at his brain half-formed memories swirling.

A video played: a much younger Nick, strapped to a chair, his head wired into a halo of blinking lights. Kern stood behind him.

“Let’s begin phase two.”

Then the whisper again—“The Forgotten Code.”

Nick recoiled. “Pause it.”

He turned to Anna. “Rewind five seconds. Play it back at 30% speed.”

She did.

But this time, it wasn’t just a phrase. It was a tone, a sound hidden beneath the words, layered in a low-frequency hum.

“That’s it,” Anna breathed. “The real trigger. It’s not the words—it’s the sound signature.”

“We can isolate it,” Nick said. “We can rewrite it.”

Leah grinned. “Let’s turn their leash into a key.”

By sunset, they had the signal.

A counter-frequency that, if played correctly, would override the kill code and burn out the obedience loop without killing Nick.

But it had to be broadcast directly into a Veratech command relay inside the city’s core.

Anna looked at the map. “That’s the relay station in Sector 12.”

Leah sighed. “Great. Right in the middle of their most heavily guarded zone.”

Nick smiled, fierce and focused. “Then that’s where we go.”