Volume 1 – Chapter 10: The Weight of Truth

[April 23 – 1:00 AM]

The hours had been like one long blur. It was dark — darker than usual, as though the night had devoured the city whole. The silence filled the air like a weight on our chests. I hadn’t slept. Neither had Rika. Not since the knock at the door, the voice — calm, measured, disconcertingly familiar.

We had made a choice, whether we were prepared or not. We couldn’t wait anymore. The longer we spent in this crumbling structure, the more it seemed we were just sitting around waiting for some kind of event to unfold. But there was no time, and the walls began to close in faster than I could digest it.

Rika supported herself on the desk, back to the wall, eyes flitting toward the corner where the door still felt like its secrets were intact. Her arms were locked tightly across her chest, and that familiar set to her jaw was there. She was trying to keep it together, trying to prevent us both from going insane, but I noticed how her composure cracked at the edges. She was scared. We both were.

“I don’t like this, Kaito,” she said, low voice. “We’re too exposed here.”

“I know,” I said, looking back at the desk where the USB was still sitting, the USB with everything we had been needing. The one that had led us to this moment. I hadn’t touched it since the man left, but it felt like it was beckoning me. It contained answers — answers we sorely needed.

Rika could tell I was skeptical. “We can’t trust this. We don’t know who that man was. Or why he gave us this.” Her voice came out sharp, but underneath it I could feel the uncertainty, the fear.

My fingers hovered over the keyboard for a moment longer. But I couldn’t back down now. Now we were too deep to turn back — and we didn’t.

“I’m running it,” I said, my voice more firm than I felt. “We don’t have a choice.”

Rika squinted but didn’t argue. She didn’t need me to remind her that we didn’t have time to mull over our options. The world was not waiting for us to decide.

I plugged the USB in. The laptop screen flickered, for an instant, as if it were contemplating whether or not to continue. It held, as though something was tugging at the very tapestry of time. And then, as if a switch had flipped, a folder emerged.

"Project Eclipse."

The words felt heavy. I knew what it was, though I didn’t want to admit it. It was the same name that was spoken in the video, the one that came with the warning. What it was, I don’t know, but it wasn’t a project; it was much bigger than that. It was the key to everything.

I clicked the folder open. There were files in there — lots of files, too many for me to process easily. Documents. Diagrams. Data logs. But one stood out. A video file. I clicked on it, my heart thumping in my chest. The screen froze for a moment and then the video played.

It was dark at first; the video was grainy. But then it cleared to show a man — his face was darkened by shadow, but he had something unforgivingly familiar about him. I couldn’t figure out where, but I knew I’d seen him.

“Project Eclipse,” the voice said, smooth, confident, but with a tremor underneath. “It’s been set in motion. The finish is inevitable, but there is still time to alteration things. If you’re willing to pay the price.”

The words ricocheted in my mind, and I froze. What did he mean? Sacrifice? Time to change things? The end was inevitable?

Rika leaned in, staring at the screen. “What is this? Who is he?”

I shook my head. “I don’t know.”

The video went on, and the figure in the darkness spoke in cryptic riddles. “You’ve seen the signs. You’ve felt it, haven’t you? The world is falling apart, and the only way to save it... is by making the ultimate decision.”

The man pitched forward, and in that second, the light reflected off his pupils. They were cold, calculating.

“You think you’re ready? Think again. Because this won’t be easy. Once you make this choice, there is no turning back. Do you understand?”

I felt like I was drowning in a box. Courses started bobbing around in my head. But none of it made sense. None of it fit together.

And then, cut to black — only silence remained.

I turned to Rika. Her face was ashen, her lips a tight line. “What do we do now?” she asked quietly.

I didn’t have an answer. Before us was now the decision. But how could we make a decision without knowing what it meant? What were we even to think about making a choice this large?

But the world was already different — around us. The signs were everywhere. The meteor. The strange warnings. The cryptic messages. The voice at the door.

“We’re going to have to find out what Project Eclipse is,” I said, my own voice sounding empty, far away. “We’ve got to know what we’re dealing with.”

Rika nodded, but I could see the same fear in her eyes that I had in my gut. We were standing on the edge of something we didn’t yet understand, something larger than either of us could command.

Now the room was smaller, the walls leaning in as the truth started to bear down. Because whatever this project was, it was connected to everything that was happening. The meteor. The impending disaster. The chaos.

And we were right in the thick of it.

“We need to get out of here,” Rika said suddenly; her voice cut through the haze of my thoughts. “This place is too exposed. We need to move. We need to find answers. And fast.”

I didn’t argue. We had to leave. It wasn’t safe here anymore. And wherever we went next, I knew we had to be ready for whatever lay ahead. The fact was, the end might be inevitable, but there was still time to turn it around — if we could find the way to stop it.

But we didn’t have much time.

And the clock was ticking.

[April 23 – 3:00 AM]

The streets outside were quiet, but my nerves were jangling. I couldn’t shake the sense that we were not alone. That everything we did was being monitored.

But we couldn’t stay. Not in that building. Not in that room. We had to move, to stay one step ahead of whatever was going to come for us.”

We didn’t know where to go. We didn’t think who to trust; But we did know one thing. We couldn’t wait anymore.