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District Three's understructure wasn't drawn on official schematics anymore. After the Grid Fire, whole blocks had been condemned sealed off by reinforced overlays and left to rot in the dark beneath newer scaffolds. But not all had stayed abandoned.
The old rail systems, twisted and buckled by time and neglect, had become arteries for something else: supply runners, dissidents, black-market netrunners, and, increasingly, those drawn toward the growing legend of Echo.
Kiera knelt beside an exposed cable junction, light from her wristpad illuminating the spliced wires. "They're piggybacking off maintenance feeds," she muttered. "But this isn't old tech. It's reactive. Someone's been upgrading the signal architecture."
Behind her, Luro kept a cautious eye on the tunnel's far end. His augmented lenses clicked quietly as they refocused. "You're saying someone's using live command systems down here?"
"Not just using." She pulled a twisted, metallic data-shard from the line and held it up. "They're reprogramming the pulse structure. Look at this filament pattern Uchiha encryption embedded in cityside tech. That's ARASHI-level customization."
Luro's brow furrowed. "Why wouldn't the city detect that?"
"They would," Kiera said. "Unless the protocol wants to be found."
A sudden skitter echoed from deeper in the tunnel too quick for a drone, too light for a person. Kiera froze.
Luro tilted his head, lifting a sidearm from his belt. "That sounded like…"
A flicker.
And then the tunnel lights pulsed red.
Earlier That Day – Resistance Node C6
Three levels above the tunnel, within a hollowed-out medical facility long since repurposed, Aiden crouched beside a circular vault door embedded in the wall. The air here was stale, full of medicated dust and ozone, like the building still remembered what it used to be.
"I don't think it's just a vault," he murmured, pressing his palm to the surface. Chakra-sensitive steel responded with a brief shimmer of violet. "It's part of a larger sequence."
Drey stood behind him, poring over the layered maps they'd acquired. "It's on every schematic pre-fire, but removed from everything after. This was central command for subdistrict response units. Emergency fallback shelter."
"Or containment," Aiden muttered.
"What do you mean?"
He didn't respond. Instead, he exhaled slowly and sent a pulse of chakra into the locking mechanism. The pattern on the steel flared once then dissolved.
The vault hissed.
Drey took a step back. "Wait wait, are we doing this now? You said we were waiting on Kiera."
Aiden's eyes didn't leave the opening door. "We're out of time."
The steel split, revealing a chamber bathed in cold blue light. The air that emerged wasn't musty it was sterile. Too sterile.
Inside, dozens of stasis pods stood in a ring around a hollow dais. Screens flickered overhead, their code ancient but still running. And in the center, suspended in a containment field, was a humanoid form no taller than Aiden, face obscured by a plating mask.
"Echo," Drey whispered.
The figure twitched.
Back in the Tunnels
The red lights dimmed, then flared again twice, then thrice.
Kiera dropped the shard. "That's a code pattern."
"Emergency broadcast?"
She shook her head. "It's a call. A location ping."
Luro checked his scanner. "Coordinates match Node C6."
Kiera's eyes widened. "They found Echo."
They ran.
Vault Chamber
Aiden stepped forward cautiously. The air shifted around him sensors reacting to proximity, scanning for identifiers.
"Stand clear," a synthesized voice warned from above.
Too late.
The containment field around the figure fizzled, then cracked webs of energy spidering through the air. The figure inside convulsed once, twice, then dropped to the floor with a metallic thud.
Aiden raised a hand, ready to defend
but the figure didn't move.
Drey crept forward. "Are they alive?"
Kiera's voice rang from Aiden's comm before he could answer. "Whatever you just did, it sent a trigger through half the district."
"I didn't " Aiden began, but Echo stirred.
The mask lifted with a hiss of hydraulic breath.
And a pair of pale eyes, lined with deep carbon implants, opened.
"…Uchiha…" it whispered.
Aiden froze.
"Who are you?" he asked.
The figure rose unsteadily. Its voice shifted deeper now, layered with static. "ARASHI Protocol designates Echo as emergency countermeasure. Class three."
Drey flinched. "Countermeasure against what?"
Echo turned toward Aiden. "Against the one who survived."
Above the District – Resistance Relay Tower
In the dark of the tower's highest level, a woman in a crimson jacket leaned on a railing, watching the city flicker in broken rhythms. Her name was Maren, and she didn't officially exist.
The comms array behind her blinked to life.
"Echo has activated," a voice reported through static.
Maren didn't turn. "I'll handle it."
The voice hesitated. "Are you sure? The last record "
"I said I'll handle it."
She tapped a long-dead neural port at the base of her neck, reactivating code she hadn't accessed in years.
"Send my location to District Three. They'll come to me."
And beneath her, the lights in the city's southern quadrant began to go dark, one by one.
Vault Chamber, Moments Later
Kiera and Luro burst into the chamber, weapons half-drawn, only to stop short at the sight.
Echo stood fully upright now, calm and silent. Aiden stood nearby, brow tense.
Kiera walked straight to the interface panel. "That thing's ARASHI-tier. Why the hell is it looking at you like you're a threat?"
Echo answered instead. "Genetic signature match. Uchiha. Anomaly class."
"Anomaly?" Luro echoed.
"Echo is not programmed to destroy Uchiha. Echo is programmed to monitor for deviation."
Aiden's voice was low. "Define deviation."
Echo paused. "Temporal divergence. Presence of multiple timelines. Active resistance to canon events. You are an unauthorized narrative variable."
Drey blinked. "What the hell does that mean?"
Echo's eyes glowed slightly. "It means he doesn't belong here. And something else is trying to correct that."
Suddenly, the vault systems dimmed again.
From above, Kiera's comm buzzed. Maren's voice cut in.
"If you want to live, leave the vault. You're about to get a visitor."
A low rumble built beneath them.
And then the floor split open.
End of Chapter Eighteen
The collapse wasn't a cave-in. It was deliberate mechanized segments parting like petals of a steel flower. From the dark emerged something impossible: an obsidian-colored construct, shaped like a human spine, woven through with chakra seals and etched in alien language.
Echo stepped forward.
"That is what ARASHI was built to fight."
Aiden stared into the dark. The seals burned into his retinas.
And for the first time, he remembered something from before.
A war.
A name.
And a promise made under blood-red skies.
"...Madara?" he whispered.
The construct moved.
To be continued.
/-\
If you wish to read more or simply support me than check out my Patreon at
"https://www.patreon.com/Its_Zack/"
You can Get Access to 3 More Chapters OR 7 More Chapters if you want.