The alarms echoed through the station like a primal scream—mechanical, but filled with unmistakable panic.
Lan was already moving, pulling Nam by the arm as the walls around them began to shift. Panels folded inward. The smooth metallic floor cracked open to reveal glyphs that pulsed red.
"We need to get out of here!" Lan shouted.
"But the sphere—" Nam turned back, the image of the Watchers still burned into his mind.
"They activated something," Lan snapped. "We don't even know what it is. We need distance—now!"
The chamber trembled.
From the center of the black sphere, a thin beam of dark light pierced upward, disappearing into the void above. It wasn't just light—it was signal. A call. A declaration.
And something out there was answering.
As they sprinted back through the corridor, the passage itself began to disintegrate—folding like paper, melting like wax. The structure wasn't breaking… it was evolving.
"This station is rewriting itself," Lan breathed. "It's becoming something else."
Suddenly, their comm-links crackled.
"This is Commander Voss of the Tinh Van Armada. Trần Hoàng Nam, respond immediately. The station is emitting unknown frequencies. Are you responsible?"
Nam grabbed his wrist communicator. "We triggered nothing! The signal's coming from something ancient—buried inside the G-Delta 7 system."
"You need to evacuate. Now. All vessels in orbit are picking up temporal distortions. Something's bleeding through."
Nam froze.
Bleeding through.
Lan met his gaze. "The door isn't just open…"
Nam finished, "…It's being torn apart."
Suddenly, the station's gravity shifted again—this time violently. The floor tilted. A gravitational wave slammed into them, tossing them against the corridor walls.
Beyond the hull, space itself rippled—a kaleidoscope of shifting stars and black veins tearing through the void.
A new voice cut through their comm-link.
"Trần Hoàng Nam, this is Overseer Ayen of the Coalition Vanguard. We are detecting an unknown vector breaching through the black hole's containment shell. Do not let it escape."
"Let what escape?" Nam shouted.
No answer came.
Only a distant rumble.
And then… a single word.
"Reclaimer."
Lan's blood ran cold. "That countdown—it wasn't to a message. It was to an arrival."
Outside the viewport, something massive began to emerge from the rift.
Not a ship.
Not a lifeform.
Something in between.
Alive.
Awake.
And ancient.
Nam stared, heart pounding. "This isn't just a warning. It's a return."