Echoes of the Mindstream

The whole station started shaking as it began to hum to life, an unnatural energy coursing through its metallic veins. The vibrations rattled the floors beneath them, and the deep, eerie glow from the power core pulsed through the walls like a heartbeat. Whatever had embedded itself into the station's systems was no longer dormant—it was awake.

Lyra barely had time to regain her footing before the comms crackled with static. The distorted voice returned, stronger now, its presence suffocating as if it were everywhere at once.

"You… should not have come."

Before anyone could respond, the derelict ships floating near the colony flickered to life, their dormant engines sputtering before roaring with unnatural vigor. The once-lifeless vessels, some broken beyond repair, began shifting position, forming an eerie blockade around the station. Their lights, dim and flickering, pulsed in sync with the power core's glow, as though they too had become extensions of whatever had taken hold of the station.

Kaelen swore under his breath, steadying himself as he scanned the display on his wrist interface. "The ships—those things are moving under their own power. No crew. No signals. Just… reanimated husks."

Eron was already working, his cybernetic limbs whirring as he accessed the station's systems. "Something's overriding the core's failsafe mechanisms. It's not just rebooting the station—it's rewriting it."

Rhea closed her eyes, tapping into the Mindstream, her body flickering with chaotic colors as she reached for an explanation. Her bioluminescent glow pulsed erratically, her connection struggling against an unseen force. When her eyes snapped open, her expression was pale, shaken. "There's something inside the core. Not a program. Not a mind. It's… ancient. And it's aware of us."

Lyra clenched her fists. "Then we're not sticking around to find out what it wants."

A deep rumble echoed through the station as one of the derelict ships suddenly fired thrusters, repositioning itself directly in their escape route. More ships followed, forming an impenetrable net around the docking bay. Whatever this force was, it wasn't just trying to scare them—it was trapping them.

"The Solstice is still docked," Kaelen said, his voice tight with urgency. "If we move fast, we might be able to break through before they close in completely."

Eron's fingers flew across his holo-interface. "I'll need to override the docking clamps manually. Whatever's got its claws in this station is preventing a remote disengage."

Rhea's glow brightened as she pulled her focus back to the present. "We don't have time to be careful. We either get out now, or we don't get out at all."

Lyra nodded, gripping her weapon tighter. "Then we move. Now."

As they sprinted toward the docking bay, the station's walls trembled, vents hissing as emergency systems activated of their own accord. The artificial gravity flickered, throwing them off balance for a brief moment before stabilizing again. Overhead lights flashed erratically, their flickering rhythm almost resembling language—coded messages in the form of chaotic illumination.

"Stay."

Lyra ignored it, pushing forward.

Eron was the first to reach the docking control panel, his mechanical fingers working rapidly to bypass whatever foreign code had locked them in. "Almost there," he muttered. "Just a few more seconds—"

A sudden metallic shriek reverberated through the docking bay, followed by the unmistakable sound of metal tearing apart. One of the derelict ships had latched onto the station, its mangled hull twisting unnaturally as something inside it forced it to move. The ship's docking bridge extended, its doors peeling open like the maw of some great beast.

Rhea gasped, stepping back instinctively. "Something's coming through."

Kaelen raised his blade. "Then we hold the line."

Lyra steadied herself, her heart pounding against her ribs as she watched the darkness within the derelict ship begin to shift.

Something was stepping out.

And it was waiting for them.

A being older than time, imperceptible by mortals—especially those who were not attuned to the Mindstream—loomed before them. For Lyra and her group, trained for the unknown, such an encounter was not beyond their understanding. Unlike others, prolonged proximity to Rhea, one of the most powerful Mindstreamers to exist, had conditioned them to withstand the presence of things that should not be. While the others could vaguely make out the dark silhouette of a figure approaching, Rhea saw something far worse.

Her bioluminescent form flickered violently, her glow shifting erratically as her connection to the Mindstream rippled like a disrupted current. She staggered back, eyes wide, breath short. "It's... looking through us," she whispered, her voice raw with something Lyra had never heard from her before—fear.

Kaelen tightened his grip on his blade, his stance tense but steady. "Define 'looking through us.'" His voice was low, controlled, though the edge of uncertainty bled through.

Rhea swallowed, forcing her focus. "It's not just seeing us—it's seeing everything we are, everything we were, everything we could be."

Eron cursed under his breath, his cybernetic limbs humming faintly as he flexed his fingers. "So we're already compromised. Great."

Lyra kept her weapon raised, her mind racing through their options. Running wouldn't work—not from something like this. Fighting it? Even worse. But if Rhea was right, and this thing was sifting through their very existence, then there had to be a way to turn that against it.

The entity took another step forward—or, at least, the space around it shifted, folding in a way that made Lyra's head throb. The air itself felt wrong, as though the station wasn't just shaking from its power but was actively rejecting its presence. Emergency lights flickered, casting elongated shadows that moved independently of their sources.

"You should not have come." The voice wasn't from the intercom. It wasn't from the walls. It was inside their skulls, layered, fragmented, spoken from countless voices across time.

Kaelen flinched, shaking his head. "We're not here for you. We just want out."

The air around them pulsed. A pressure weighed down on them all, thick and suffocating, pressing into their lungs, their minds. Rhea let out a sharp gasp, her hands clutching at her temples. "It's—It's pulling us into its awareness. If we don't resist, we'll—"

She didn't finish. The space around them rippled, and suddenly, they were elsewhere.

The station corridor was gone.

Instead, they stood in a vast, endless expanse—a void without stars, without walls. A place where time itself seemed to shudder, unable to maintain form. The only constant was the being before them, its shape now clearer. A mass of shifting darkness, flowing like liquid shadow, its edges twisting in fractal patterns that defied reality. Faces—thousands, maybe millions—flickered within its form, appearing and vanishing in less than a heartbeat.

Eron's voice was tight. "This isn't real. This is... something else."

Lyra's hands clenched into fists, the weight of the place pressing down on her. "Rhea, tell me we're not stuck."

Rhea's glow flickered weakly. "We're inside its perception. It's trying to overwrite us—to make us a part of its memory."

Kaelen took a step closer to Lyra, his usual calm resolve barely holding. "Then how do we get out before we stop existing?"

The thing moved, and Lyra felt something inside her mind shift, a foreign presence sifting through her thoughts, peeling them apart layer by layer.

Memories that weren't hers flickered before her eyes—visions of a world long before her time, of civilizations erased from history, of minds consumed and rewritten. It wasn't attacking them.

It was assimilating them.

Lyra grit her teeth and reached for the one thing she knew was real—her own will. "No. We're not part of you. You're not part of us. We are not yours."

The void around them trembled. The being hesitated. The pressure lessened—but only slightly.

Rhea's eyes flashed open, her entire form burning with sudden light. "We push back. Together. Now."

Lyra didn't hesitate. She focused on what was real—Kaelen's steady presence, Eron's unwavering resilience, Rhea's connection to the Mindstream. They were not alone. They were not lost.

They were not its.

The void fractured.

Reality slammed back into place around them. The station reappeared, its cold metal walls solid beneath their feet. The lights flickered violently, sparks raining down from overhead conduits. The entity was still there, still watching—but now, it was retreating.

Its form began to fade, unraveling at the edges as though something had forced it back into its own realm.

"Not yet," it whispered, a final echo in their minds before it was gone.

Silence. True silence.

Eron let out a long breath. "I hate everything about that."

Kaelen sheathed his blade, exhaling slowly. "Agreed."

Rhea swayed slightly, catching herself against the wall. "It will come back. Maybe not now. Maybe not soon. But it will remember us."

Lyra steadied herself, holstering her weapon. "Then next time, we make sure we're ready."