Ashes of the Self

Jessica stood at the edge of the facility, staring at the forgotten ruin beneath the moonlight. This was the last piece of Project Dominion.

She had told no one where she was going. Not Olivia. Not Leanna. This was hers to finish.

The facility wasn’t in any records because it wasn’t supposed to exist. She had found it buried in the remnants of Vanguard’s data, tucked away in a corrupted drive she had pulled from the vault before setting it ablaze.

It was the last outpost of the project that created her. And tonight, it was going to burn.

* * *

She moved through the abandoned corridors, her footsteps silent, measured. There were no guards. No scientists. Just dust, empty terminals, and echoes of the past.

She stopped in front of a rusted metal door. Pried it open. Inside, she found what she was looking for. Hard drives. Old paper files. The last documentation of what she was.

Jessica ran a gloved hand over the folders. Page after page, blacked out, redacted, gone. All but one. Her file remained, untouched by time or fire. They had preserved her, even after everything. A final insult. Or a final fear.

She stared at it for a long time. Then, without hesitation, she struck a match.

The paper curled in the flame, blackened, disintegrated into nothing. She lit another. And another. Soon, the fire spread, licking at the walls, consuming everything.

No more records. No more Dominion. No more ghosts.

* * *

Jessica stepped out as the fire roared behind her, consuming the last remnants of her past. She didn’t stay to watch it burn. She walked. Not fast. Not hiding. The flames behind her hissed and snapped in the night. Somewhere in the distance, a dog barked. A city breathed. And Jessica kept walking. Walking into a world that would never stop hunting her.

But this time, she wasn’t running.

She knew what this meant. It meant that she would always be hunted. She had burned too much, erased too many of the wrong people. But she didn’t care. She didn’t care because she refused to run anymore. She was the one making the moves now.