Rain began to fall.
It started as a mist, then turned to a steady drizzle that soaked through Ethan's clothes as he stood in the clearing just outside the compound. Trees loomed around them like guards, their twisted limbs creaking in the wind. The van was parked two kilometers north, hidden in a gully. But none of them moved toward it yet.
The girl sat on a rock near the tree line, barefoot and shivering, her white gown clinging to her like wet paper. She stared at the ground, arms wrapped around her knees, as if trying to disappear.
No one spoke.
Maxwell was pacing. Harper was rechecking her weapon. Liam's voice crackled through the comms.
"You made it. I've got your signals again.Ethan tapped his earpiece. "We pulled out a subject. Female. Alive."
There was a pause.
"You found her?" Liam's tone shifted. "The girl from the surveillance feed?"
"Yeah," Ethan said quietly. "But she doesn't know who she is."
Harper approached the girl, crouching beside her. "Do you remember anything? Your name, where you're from?"
The girl didn't answer. She didn't even look up.
Harper tried again, softer. "You helped us. Back at the tower. Do you remember that?"
Still nothing.
But Ethan noticed her hands. They were clenched, trembling,not from cold, but something deeper. Like she was holding something inside, something barely contained.
"She spoke when we pulled her out," Ethan said. "She told me to run. Like she knew what was coming."
Maxwell grunted.
They all looked at him.
"What?" he said,in a defensive tone. "You saw what was inside that place. Those things weren't just experiments. They were weapons. She might be one of them."
"She's a kid," Harper snapped.
Maxwell didn't flinch. "A kid that doesn't bleed, doesn't scream, and moves like a ghost. I don't care what she looks like."
The girl finally looked up. Her eyes weren't blank anymore.
They were focused. Sharp.
Ethan stepped between her and Maxwell. "We don't even know what they did to her. She's not the enemy."
"Yet," Maxwell muttered.
Ethan turned back to the girl. "Hey. Can you walk?"
She nodded slowly.
"Then let's get out of here."
The van's engine rumbled low as they tore down an unmarked service road through the woods. Harper drove. Maxwell rode shotgun, rifle across his lap. Ethan sat in the back with the girl, a blanket wrapped around her shoulders.
Rain pounded the roof like gunfire.
Liam's voice came through the dash speaker. "I ran facial scans on her. Nothing in any database. She doesn't officially exist."
"Of course she doesn't," Ethan said. "They erased her."
"No," Liam replied. "She was never there to begin with. No birth record, no school ID, no arrest, nothing. She's a ghost."
The girl stirred beside him. She'd been silent since they left, but now she looked at Ethan again, eyes scanning his face.
"Why did you come?" she asked quietly.
Her voice was hoarse, like it hadn't been used in years.
Ethan hesitated. "To find out what they were hiding."
"You weren't supposed to see me."
He frowned. "You knew we'd come?"
She looked away. "I knew someone would. Eventually."
Harper glanced at the mirror. "Why were they keeping you there?"
The girl didn't answer.
Ethan pressed gently. "You said you didn't know who you are. But you've been in two of our safe zones. You avoided every camera. You moved like you were trained."
"I wasn't trained," she whispered. "I was built."
The van fell silent.
Harper gripped the wheel tighter. "Built?"
The girl nodded. "They call it imprinting. Taking pieces of people. Memories. Skills. Dreams. They imprint them onto blanks,bodies grown without identity. I'm one of those."
Ethan's voice dropped. "How many others?"
She turned to him, expression blank.
"I don't know. I think… I was the first one that woke up."
"Woke up?"
"They made me forget. Over and over. Every time I started remembering… they reset me."
Harper blinked, stunned. "You're saying they wiped your mind?"
The girl's eyes turned glassy. "I think I fought back. But I don't remember how."
Maxwell finally turned around, his voice low. "Then how do you know they did all that to you?"
She didn't answer at first.
Then she opened her hand.
In her palm was a small metal chip—no larger than a fingernail. Scorched around the edges. A neural drive.
"I pulled it out myself," she said. "Before they caught me."
Ethan stared at it. "That's how you found us. That's how you knew where to go."
The girl nodded once.
Harper slowed the van as a checkpoint loomed,an old gate used by park rangers that now marked the edge of Caligo's surveillance range. The moment they crossed it, they'd vanish off-grid again.
"Where do we take her?" Harper asked.
Ethan didn't have an answer.
Liam offered one. "There's a secure facility in the old subway tunnels near Midtown. We rigged it with dampeners. No signals in or out. She'll be safe there."
"She's not a prisoner," Ethan said firmly.
"She's not safe," Liam replied. "And neither are we if Caligo tracks her again."
The girl looked up. "They won't stop. Not until I'm dead. Or back in that place."
Ethan clenched his jaw. "Then we stop them first."
Maxwell scoffed. "You're talking about a war."
"Maybe it's already started," Harper said.
The van passed the checkpoint.
The girl reached over and touched Ethan's arm, her hand still cold. "There's something else," she whispered.
"What is it?"
"They weren't just using me. They were… feeding something through me."
Ethan leaned closer. "Feeding what?"
She stared out the window as the rain picked up again, eyes unfocused, like she could see something miles away.
"Pain," she said softly. "Not just mine. Everyone's. They made me a mirror."
Ethan swallowed hard.
They drove on in silence.
But no one felt safe anymore.
Not even her.