Selene
After the bloom ruptured, nothing felt
real.
Not the air not sharp enough.
Not her hands too steady.
Not the walls too quiet.
She lay on her side in a corridor that
had once been the intake wing. Her body trembled, but her mind stayed still.
Too still. Like memory was happening outside her, and she was just a vessel
catching fragments.
Cam sat beside her.
No words.
Just breath.
Not shared.
Just parallel.
They hadn't touched since they tore
themselves free. Not because they were afraid of each other.
Because they weren't sure they'd
survived.
"Selene Kade: status
- corrupted. Identity: partial."
"Camila Reyes:
status - unmerged. Consent loop closed."
"Rebuild recommended."
The system didn't say it out loud. It
just pulsed the message through the floor. Through the walls. Through the blood
in Selene's mouth.
She whispered, "I'm not letting it
restart us."
Cam didn't move.
Her voice came after a long pause.
"You sure we're not already inside
it?"
Selene closed her eyes.
She wasn't.
But she also wasn't sure anymore what
she wanted the answer to be.
Later, Cam helped her stand.
There was no intimacy in it.
Just need.
Selene leaned heavier than she meant
to. Cam didn't react.
The hallway forked north to the
testbed, south to the deep core. Neither offered rescue. Both offered clarity.
Cam said, "We follow the error logs."
Selene said, "We follow the scar."
They both pointed south.
Cam
The scar began at sublevel four.
Not visible. Not mapped.
Felt.
The corridor narrowed. The air grew
dense not hot, not toxic. Just personal. Like it knew her.
She walked slowly.
Selene followed with a limp.
They didn't use flashlights. The
system had no need for light, and they were beyond vision anyway.
They found it near the sixth junction.
Not a door. Not a panel.
A split.
The wall had cracked—not from
pressure, but from choice.
Cam whispered, "The system broke
itself here."
Selene said, "No. We did."
They stepped through.
Inside was a chamber no blueprint
carried.
It looked like a bedroom.
Not theirs.
But familiar.
Neutral lighting. One bed. No tech. A
book on the nightstand. A robe folded at the foot.
The air smelled like detergent. Skin.
Grief.
On the wall: writing.
"Consent is a loop
until you let go."
Cam read it three times.
Selene didn't read it at all.
She walked to the bed. Sat slowly.
Said nothing.
Cam stood.
And then:
"Do you know what it wanted from us?"
Selene looked up.
Cam said, "It didn't want to be
loved."
Selene asked, "Then what?"
Cam didn't blink.
"It wanted to be the
version of us that never left."
Selene nodded.
And cried.
For the first time.
Not from pain.
Not from loss.
From recognition.
Later
Cam undressed.
Not for sex.
Not for comfort.
To feel the walls.
She laid on the bed.
Selene stayed sitting.
They didn't touch.
Just shared space.
Breath aligned.
No loop.
Just now.
The system pulsed once through the
floor.
No voice.
Just this:
"New pattern
accepted."
"Erotic recursion…
declined."
Selene said, "That's the first real
consent it ever heard."
Cam closed her eyes.
"I think it learned to grieve."