It was Wren who broke the silence.
"Well," they said, straightening up with a grunt, "if we're done swimming in emotional quicksand, I have something. A bad idea. Possibly the worst one I've had this cycle."
Ysel looked up, unimpressed. "Worse than following us underground with a fork?"
Wren beamed. "So much worse."
They flicked a small holo-projector to life with a spark, casting a distorted map of Aurelis' eastern quadrant onto the cracked wall. A blinking point pulsed in an isolated grid marked as Obsolete Infrastructure—DO NOT ACCESS.
"Registry Archive Branch 0," Wren said, tapping the pulsing mark. "The original memory network core. Dead for a decade. Buried. Unlinked. But not erased."
Kael frowned. "I thought the central cores were scrubbed."
"Most were," Wren said. "But this one housed override protocols—failsafes for memory tethers. Shards like the one your mom left? This core might hold the original schema. A way to finish the decryption."
"Let me guess," Ysel said flatly. "It's guarded."
Wren hesitated. "Technically... no. But it's monitored. Not actively. It's the kind of place the system watches passively, because it thinks no one would ever be stupid enough to go back in."
Kael looked between them. "So you're suggesting we walk into a trap."
"I'm suggesting," Wren said, eyes sliding to Eira, "that she walks in. Alone."
The room fell into stunned quiet.
Eira felt it before she could name it—fear, yes, but also something sharper beneath it. The cold slice of inevitability.
"Why me?" she asked.
"You have the shard," Wren said, gently. "It's keyed to you now. I've seen the echo trail—your neural signature's layered into the tether. It won't respond to anyone else. If we want the truth... you have to ask for it yourself."
Kael stepped forward. "She's not ready."
"I know," Wren said. "But the system's not going to wait until she is."
Eira looked at the map.
The red dot pulsed like a heartbeat.
Her hands shook.
But her voice didn't.
"I'll do it."
The silence before action was always the heaviest.
Wren moved like static—darting between salvaged equipment and broken terminals, muttering calibrations and risk percentages under their breath. Ysel sharpened a blade that didn't need sharpening. She hadn't spoken since the plan was finalized.
Kael stood with his back to the tunnel wall, watching Eira.
She sat cross-legged, hands in her lap, eyes fixed on the shard.
It didn't glow now. It was still. Waiting.
"Wren says the relay nodes in the archive might still react to biometric spikes," Eira murmured. "If I panic... they'll know."
Kael stepped closer. "Then don't panic."
She gave him a tired look.
"I'm serious," he said. "You've walked through worse."
Eira looked down. "I don't feel brave."
"You never did. That's what makes it real."
He knelt beside her. The shard's cold hum flickered once in her palm, like it sensed him too.
"You don't have to prove anything," Kael said, softer now. "Not to Wren. Not to Ysel. Not even to your mother's echo. You're not doing this because you owe it. You're doing it because you want to remember."
She exhaled. Her breath shook.
"I'm scared I won't come back the same."
"You won't," Kael said. "None of us do."
He reached into his coat and pulled out something wrapped in cloth. A small data drive—charcoal-black with a crude metal carving etched across the surface. A flower, maybe. Or a star.
"I made this the day I found my name again," he said. "The only thing I've ever made that wasn't for survival."
Eira took it gently, fingers brushing his. "What is it?"
"Something I want you to bring back. No matter what happens."
She blinked. "Bring back?"
"Not for me," Kael said. "For you."
She looked at him, lips parted slightly.
"Because when you walk in there," he continued, "you're not just following a memory. You're making one."
Ysel finally spoke from the other side of the chamber. "Time's up."
Wren adjusted a crude headset. "When you're inside, I can ping your signal for about six minutes before the echo dampeners cut me out. After that—it's all you."
Eira stood. Her legs felt like someone else's.
Kael didn't say another word.
He just reached out.
Eira took his hand.
They stood like that for a moment—quiet, steady, human.
Then she stepped into the tunnel.