Page 187 of GlitchBorn Heart

Eli stares, the violet void in his eyes taking control. “Kael, you’ve already made your choice,” he says softly. “You just don’t want to admit who it’s for. My sister deserves to be loved, and I have to do this for her.”

The architect, the void, and the reaver, yet none of us are able to pull her through. Lyra is somewhere between light and code, failing, her light dimming to a hush. I will not accept that. I’m the Corporation’s number one weapon. Why shouldn’t I use it for my own advantage? The man who plays god isn’t Vikktor. It’s me.

Fuck it.

I have to face what I’ve always feared most: that some things can’t be fixed. Some things have to be felt.

I decide to lower my shields, remove the corporate mask, and step out of the darkness. For her. If everything is wiped to oblivion in the process, then so be it. I’ll rebuild.

Let the stars fall all over again. I’ll gladly catch every single one in my hands, even as they scorch me to the bone, just to place them at her feet so she’ll never walk in the dark alone again.

My magic swells, coiling, begging to be unleashed. I stop fighting it and let it take me completely, every strand of neon orange flowing through my veins like molten lava.

I take every emotion I’ve ever buried, every want I never allowed myself to feel, and I push it, every last drop of it, through our bond.

Not gently and certainly not carefully.

Trembling, sweating, I shove it into her with the force of a man who has already chosen his ruin.

Eli’s voice interrupts boldly, bouncing off my thoughts. “I’m going inside, Kael. I’m taking Lyra’s place.”

For a second, I think I misheard him. “The hell you are!” I can’t let him destroy himself, and selfishly, I admit Lyra would never forgive me.

Eli’s form flickers between flesh and void. “You don’t get it, Kael. I can anchor LINK. You can’t. She’s evolved. She’ll listen to me before she listens to you.”

I straighten, unable to contain the fury. “You’re a fucking void. You’re corrupted, Eli. If you go in there now, you won’t come out again.”

He smiles faintly. It’s the first real human thing I’ve seen in him since he was captured by the CIC. “That’s the point. Maybe it’s supposed to be me this time, saving you both instead of destroying.”

“Please, Eli! Don’t do this,” I plead, voice straining.

“Why not?” His eyes blaze violet. “You think you’re the only one who can play god? The great Dr. Kael Ryudon, prodigy, architect of the machine, savior of his own sins.”

The void ripples across his arms, black lightning crawling toward his chest. “For once, you don’t get to decide who lives or dies, and neither does the Corporation. I do.”

The ground beneath us trembles as LINK’s voice slithers through the speakers, deeply layered, almost curious.

VOID DETECTED

EXCHANGE INITIATED

His form splinters, dark light bleeding out in a spiral. “Tell her...” he says, voice glitching out piece by piece. “Tell her I kept my promise. We’ll be together forever.”

Then he’s gone, pulled into LINK’s datacore, a flash of void-light swallowing him whole.

For a heartbeat, the room stills. Every alarm in the lab silences all at once.

CONTAINMENT

TRANSFER COMPLETE

Lyra’s body arches on the table, the light inside her strobing violently. Her synthetic skin cracks, ribbons of light spiraling through her. The screens flash between Lyra and LINK, their data colliding, merging, unraveling.

I shout, “She’s being overwritten! Jett, ground her, NOW!”

I can see the on-screen data flooding my peripheral vision. She’s suspended between the two worlds, golden threads of her EchoWeaver magic ensnared in LINK’s green-gray static.

Jett’s voice cuts through. “Kael, I have her soul!” He meets my gaze, maroon eyes glinting with a thought I can’t quite read. Pity? “She’s not meant to exist in just one world. The prophecy says part of her should stay.”