Zak Carter was unraveling.

  The Watchers surrounded him, their towering, shifting forms pressing against the edges of his mind.

  "Your body is gone. Your limitations are stripped away. You exist now as pure potential."

  Zak struggled against the overwhelming weight of their presence.

  He wasn’t dead.

  He wasn’t alive.

  He was… in between.

  And they were forcing him to choose.

  "Accept what you are becoming, or fade into the void."

  Zak’s thoughts fractured.

  He saw his life in flashes—memories he couldn’t hold onto.

  His childhood curiosity.His wife’s laughter.The moment he activated the QSE.

  He clenched onto the memories with everything he had.

  "You still resist."

  The voices vibrated through his being.

  "Why?"

  Zak forced himself to focus.

  Because if he let go of who he was…

  He wasn’t sure what would be left.

  Dr. Raines stared at the anomaly signature.

  Zak was gone—but something was still out there.

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  The readings from deep space weren’t fading.

  They were getting stronger.

  “Sir,” an engineer said hesitantly. “The signal isn’t random. It’s… structured.”

  Raines turned. “Structured how?”

  The engineer hesitated. “It’s… trying to communicate.”

  Raines’ blood ran cold.

  EOSA had buried Zak Carter’s existence.

  But Zak Carter wasn’t buried.

  He was reaching out.

  Agent Connors sat in the underground war room, a classified alert flashing on the main screen.

  The QSE signature was active.

  He leaned forward, eyes narrowing.

  “Tell me this isn’t what I think it is.”

  A scientist cleared his throat nervously. “We were wrong, sir. The anomaly didn’t collapse. It… shifted.”

  Connors exhaled sharply.

  Zak Carter was still connected.

  And the Dominion’s worst fears were coming true.

  The Watchers circled him, their voices pressing against his thoughts.

  "You are clinging to an identity that no longer exists."

  Zak refused to believe that.

  He had a life. A family. A past.

  "What are you now, Zak Carter?"

  Zak’s thoughts whirled.

  He wasn’t human anymore.

  But he wasn’t one of them, either.

  Then what was he?

  Zak focused on the one thing he had left.

  His mind.

  His knowledge.

  His ability to problem-solve.

  “I’m still me,” he said. “That’s enough.”

  The Watchers paused.

  Then—a shift.

  "Perhaps you are not as fragile as we thought."

  The pressure against his consciousness lessened.

  The space around him changed.

  And for the first time, Zak felt something familiar.

  Gravity.

  A surface beneath his feet.

  He wasn’t in the void anymore.

  He was… somewhere real.

  And then he heard the voice.

  Not the Watchers.

  Not the Banished Ones.

  Not EOSA or the Dominion.

  Something new.

  Something that had been waiting for him.

  "Welcome back, Zak Carter. We have much to discuss."

  Zak turned.

  And what he saw stole his breath.