Chapter 71: Do You Revoke Protocol Zero? I kept shouting. The word tore out of me like something alive, something that didn’t care if my throat cracked or my lungs burned. “STOP!” I didn’t just say it. I threw it at them. At the orderlies. At the walls. At the air that had been holding me still for too long. I didn’t know if it would work. I didn’t know if anything I did mattered anymore. But I said it anyway. And then I said it again. Mirabel moved before I could think about what came next. She didn’t wait for me to catch my breath or steady myself. She didn’t ask if I was ready. She just stepped forward, scalpel in hand, humming like it was breathing with her. She didn’t look at me. She looked at them. The orderlies. The ones who were still frozen mid-step, caught between taking her and letting her go. Their faces were blank. Too blank. Like paper that hadn’t been written on yet. Like screens waiting for a signal. She didn’t speak. She didn’t have to. I knew what she wanted. I knew what she expected. She wanted me to do more than shout. She wanted me to act. To move. To put myself between her and them. Not just with words. With my body. With my hands. With whatever was left of me that still worked. I lunged. I didn’t think. I didn’t plan. I just moved. My feet hit the floor hard, my arms swung out, and I grabbed her wrist. Not gently. Not carefully. I yanked her back, pulling her behind me like I was shielding her from something that could still hurt her. Like I was finally doing what I should have done years ago. Like I was making up for every time I stood still and watched her get taken away. The moment my fingers closed around her wrist, the orderlies started to glitch. It wasn’t slow. It wasn’t subtle. One second they were just standing there, frozen in place, and the next their edges started to fray. Their white coats didn’t tear. They pixelated. Broke apart into tiny squares of color and code, like a screen losing its signal. Their hands dissolved first. Then their arms. Then their faces. The blankness cracked open, revealing lines of numbers and symbols underneath, cascading down like rain on a broken monitor. They weren’t people. They never were. Just programs. Echoes. Things the system had built to keep me in line, to keep me quiet, to keep me from ever doing this. From ever choosing her. The hallway around us started to dissolve too. The walls didn’t crumble. They unraveled. White paint peeled back into streams of glowing code, revealing the machinery underneath. The floor split into grids. The ceiling folded into layers of data. The air didn’t thin. It didn’t thicken. It just changed. Became something else. Something digital. Something designed. Something that knew I was breaking its rules. I didn’t let go of Mirabel’s wrist. I held on tighter. Like if I let go, she’d vanish too. Like if I let go, none of this would be real. Like if I let go, I’d wake up back in that room with the counter ticking down and the photograph of someone I didn’t recognize. She didn’t pull away. She didn’t flinch. She just stood there behind me, solid as stone, her scalpel still humming in her other hand. I could feel it in my chest. Not the sound. The pulse. Steady. Strong. Not scared. Not desperate. Just there. Just real. The orderlies didn’t attack. They didn’t even try to move. They just stood there, glitching, dissolving, breaking apart into fragments of code. I watched as their features disappeared, replaced by streams of numbers and symbols. I watched as their bodies collapsed into nothing, leaving behind only the faint outline of where they’d been standing. I watched as the system tried to rebuild them, tried to put them back together, tried to make them real again. It failed. The code stuttered. The numbers flickered. The symbols scrambled. The system didn’t know what to do with me anymore. It didn’t know how to handle someone who refused to follow the script. Someone who refused to let go. Mirabel squeezed my wrist. Just once. Just enough to remind me she was still there. Still real. Still with me. I didn’t turn around. I didn’t need to. I knew she was watching me. I knew she was waiting. I knew she was testing me. Seeing if I’d hold on. Seeing if I’d stay. Seeing if I’d keep choosing her, even now. Even here. Even when the world around us was falling apart. The lead orderly didn’t dissolve like the others. It stayed. Its body glitched. Its coat pixelated. Its hands broke apart into lines of code. But its face. Its face stayed intact. Blank. Empty. Like a mask with nothing behind it. It didn’t move. It didn’t speak. It just stood there, staring at me with eyes that weren’t eyes, with a mouth that wasn’t a mouth, with a face that wasn’t a face. And then it turned its head. Slowly. Deliberately. Like it was being pulled by strings. Like it was being controlled by something that didn’t care if it looked human anymore. It turned its blank face toward me, and for a second, I thought it was going to attack. I thought it was going to lunge. I thought it was going to grab Mirabel and drag her away like it had done before. It didn’t. It opened its mouth. Not to scream. Not to shout. Not to threaten. To speak. In a voice that wasn’t a voice. A voice that was flat. Mechanical. Cold. A voice that came from everywhere and nowhere all at once. A voice that didn’t belong to a person. A voice that belonged to the system. “Do you revoke Protocol Zero?” The words hit me like a punch to the chest. Not because they were loud. Not because they were angry. Because they were familiar. Because I knew what they meant. Because I knew what Protocol Zero was. Because I knew I was the one who had written it. I didn’t answer. I couldn’t. My mouth opened. My lungs filled with air. My throat tightened. But no sound came out. I stood there, frozen, my fingers still wrapped around Mirabel’s wrist, my body still shielding her from something that wasn’t even real anymore. I stood there, staring at the blank face of the lead orderly, listening to the echo of my own voice asking me a question I didn’t want to answer. Do you revoke Protocol Zero? I knew what would happen if I said yes. I knew what would happen if I said no. I knew what would happen if I didn’t say anything at all. The system didn’t care about my hesitation. It didn’t care about my fear. It didn’t care about my guilt. It just wanted an answer. It just wanted me to choose. Mirabel didn’t move. She didn’t speak. She didn’t even breathe. She just stood there behind me, waiting. Watching. Letting me decide. The scalpel in her hand pulsed. Once. Twice. Three times. In time with my heartbeat. In time with the code swirling around us. In time with the question hanging in the air. Do you revoke Protocol Zero? I opened my mouth again. I tried to speak. I tried to say something. Anything. But the words wouldn’t come. They were stuck. Buried under years of silence. Buried under layers of lies. Buried under the weight of everything I’d done and everything I’d failed to do. The lead orderly didn’t move. It didn’t blink. It didn’t glitch. It just stood there, staring at me with its blank face, waiting for my answer. Do you revoke Protocol Zero? I tightened my grip on Mirabel’s wrist. I took a step forward. I didn’t let go. I didn’t turn around. I didn’t look away. I just stood there, facing the thing that wasn’t a thing, listening to the voice that wasn’t a voice, waiting for the words that wouldn’t come. Do you revoke Protocol Zero?