The story never ends?!

Summer knelt on the rough asphalt, her body wracked by gut-wrenching sobs. The heat from her burning home blasted her face, a hellish wave that carried the scent of melting plastic, charred wood, and her own paralyzing fear. The roar of the inferno was a living beast, consuming her past, her present, and her future.

Summer, screaming until her throat tore: "MOVE! MY FRIENDS ARE IN THERE! MOVE!"

She slammed her fists into her unresponsive thighs, then drove her forehead against the pavement. The sharp pain was a pinprick against the overwhelming agony of her failure.

Summer's internal monologue, a venomous hiss: You call yourself strong? You call yourself Summer Eleven? You’re nothing. You’re a spectator to your own tragedy.

She squeezed her eyes shut, and the world dissolved.

When she opened them, she was standing in an endless, sterile white void. The air was still and silent, devoid of temperature or smell. It was the absolute absence of everything.

Summer (her voice a whisper that didn't echo): "I'm inside my own mind."

She turned slowly, her boots making no sound on the non-existent floor. Awe and dread warred within her.

Summer: "Is this what investigators and writers call a 'mind palace'? A last resort when reality becomes too much to bear?"

A voice, cool and familiar, answered from behind her. "Yes. That's exactly what it is."

Summer spun around. Standing before her was a version of herself, but sharper, harder. She wore the same black outfit from the Halcyon Hotel job in Scotland, her expression one of cold, mocking amusement.

Summer stared, her mind reeling. "Who are you?"

The other her laughed, a sound devoid of warmth, her body moving with a predatory grace. "Isn't it obvious? I'm you. The old you. The one who didn't break."

Summer: "What? How is this possible?"

Her Other Self: "Haven't you figured it out yet?" She took slow, deliberate steps forward, closing the distance. The void seemed to shrink with her advance.

Summer (taking a step back): "Aren't you supposed to be me? Why are you walking toward me?"

The Other Summer stopped two paces away, a smirk playing on her lips. "Haven't you forgotten something important?"

A cold dread washed over Summer. "I… I feel like I have. I've forgotten something crucial." She recoiled from the thought. This was her mind; the realization should have been hers first, not spoken aloud by this phantom.

Summer, bewildered: "What is this? Did I just say that?"

Other Summer: "Have you really become this dull? We are inside your thoughts, your consciousness. How are you supposed to think strategically out there when you can't even think in here?"

Summer: "But… aren't I here?"

Other Summer ( leaning in, her voice a taunt): "Have you really forgotten?"

Summer screamed, the sound swallowed by the infinite white. "TELL ME!"

She was back on her knees, pounding the asphalt. "I don't know why I'm here, but I've forgotten something important! I can't remember because of this… this weakness!"

Her Other Self looked down at her, a mixture of pity and disgust twisting her features.

Other Summer (in a husky whisper): "You've become so pathetically weak."

In a blur of motion, the Other Summer lashed out, her foot connecting with Summer's jaw. The impact was psychic and physical, sending Summer sprawling onto the cold, non-ground. Her head rang.

Other Summer, her voice dripping with contempt: "Ever since you met those two girls, you've softened. You've changed. You care. It made you vulnerable."

Summer pushed herself up on her elbows, shaking her head. Her left eyebrow twitched.

Summer: "Two girls…" She clutched her head, trying to force the memory through the fog of panic. "Sandra? Hayat?"

Other Summer: "Look behind you."

Summer struggled to her feet and turned. The white void was gone, replaced by a massive, shifting mosaic of images from her life, seen through her own eyes. It focused, crystallizing into one scene: Hayat and Sandra, their faces bright with excitement, smiling at her.

Hayat & Sandra's voices (echoing from the memory): "We want to go on an adventure with you tomorrow!"

The memory was a stab to the heart. "That's right," Summer breathed, the truth crashing down on her.

She turned her back on the burning house in her mind, her posture straightening. She looked at her Other Self, her eyes now hard and clear, all trace of hysteria gone.

Summer: "I have to save them."

Other Summer let out a sharp, derisive laugh. "How? You can't even win a fight against yourself right now. Look at you! Summer Eleven! The girl who could do anything, break any law, bend the world to her will! You've become an ordinary girl, obsessed with feelings of love and friendship." She hugged herself, rocking with mocking laughter before suddenly stopping. "What a joke! Save them? Don't make me laugh. Be realistic. You've lost everything. You're drowning in blood, fear, and sentimentality. It's led you to a point your consciousness can't even process."

Summer's voice was steel. "I will do anything to save them. I'm ready to sacrifice myself. You can come back. You can be the one in control. But save them."

Other Summer met her gaze, her own expression finally serious. "I can't. It's not possible for me alone."

Despair threatened to consume Summer again. She fell to her knees, tears finally breaking free. "Please… save them. If anything happens to them… I will never forgive myself. Never."

Other Summer: "You can't just become your old self again, no matter how much you want to."

Summer ( her voice a raw plea): "Please."

A long silence stretched between them. Finally, the Other Summer spoke, her tone different. Calculating.

Other Summer: "Listen. There is a way. You can merge us."

Summer ( looking up, wary): "What do you mean?"

Other Summer: "Combine your attributes with mine. Filter out the weaknesses. Forge a new personality, one capable of doing what needs to be done."

Summer rose to her feet, studying her doppelganger. "How? How do I do that?"

Other Summer: "I'll show you."

The scene behind them shifted again. It showed a younger Summer, laughing, nestled safely between her parents, all three of them consumed by a pure, untainted joy.

Other Summer, her voice losing its edge, becoming almost solemn: "Summer Eleven. No matter what happens, we will always be Summer Eleven. No matter how much time changes us."

A resolve, cold and absolute, settled in Summer's core. "Yes," she said. "I'll do it."

Other Summer: "Don't you dare break this promise."

Summer: "I won't."

The Other Summer extended her right hand, palm open.

Summer mirrored the gesture. Their palms met.

A blinding white light erupted from the point of contact, consuming the Other Summer. Her form began to dissolve, her voice distorting into a fading, electronic echo.

Other Summer (voice fading): "Summer Eleven… forever…"

Summer's eyes snapped open. Reality rushed back in a wave of searing heat and deafening noise. Her house was a roaring funeral pyre against the night sky.

But she was different.

She got to her feet, her movements deliberate and unnervily calm. She walked toward the blaze, her pace starting slow, measured, then accelerating into a full-on sprint without a moment of hesitation. She charged through the front door, now a gaping maw of flame.

The interior was a vision of hell. Fire licked up the walls, consuming the furniture, the art, her life. She looked toward the staircase. With a groan of tortured wood, the top section collapsed in a shower of sparks and embers.

Summer didn't flinch. She looked up at the second floor, her face a mask of cold determination.

Summer: "You think this will stop me?"

She ran back outside and stood in the garden, her eyes scanning the burning structure. She saw it—the window to her room was open, the flames not yet fully claiming the frame.

Summer: "The fire hasn't eaten the window yet."

With a agility that was pure, focused instinct, she scaled the drainpipe and the ornate latticework, her hands finding holds where none seemed to exist. She hauled herself onto the windowsill and dove through the opening.

Inside her room, the heat was unbearable. Through the smoke, she saw them. Sandra and Hayat lay on the floor like discarded dolls.

Summer ran to them, ignoring the flames that reached for her. Suddenly, the air itself seemed to ignite. A fireball erupted, sealing the room in a dome of pure flame, trapping them inside.

Summer stood before her friends, a slow, sardonic smile spreading across her soot-streaked face.

Summer: "So that's how it is."

She began to laugh, a low, crazy sound that grew in volume. She threw her head back, her body shaking with the force of it.

Summer: "This… so this is it!"

Meanwhile. Saito's Hotel Room.

Saito sat on the edge of a neatly made bed in a bland, temporary safe house. Kim stood rigidly before him, while Xian paced nervously, his back to the wall.

Kim: "Leader, where did you send Faiveno?"

Saito (frowning): "I didn't send him anywhere."

Xian ( visibly agitated): "I need to use the bathroom. Excuse me, Leader." He practically fled into the ensuite bathroom, locking the door behind him. He leaned against the sink, his face pale in the mirror.

Xian (to himself): "Where did you go, Faiveno?"

His eyes fell on the small wastebasket. Inside, nestled among crumpled paper, was a sealed envelope. His name wasn't on it. Faiveno's was.

Xian: "What's this?"

He snatched the envelope and tore it open. As he read the single line inside, his expression shifted from curiosity to sheer horror.

Xian: "The Leader needs to see this. Now."

He burst out of the bathroom, clutching the note, his heart hammering.

Xian (voice trembling): "Leader! Leader!"

Saito and Kim looked up, startled by his panic.

Saito (calmly): "What is it, Xian?"

Kim's eyes were already on the paper in Xian's shaking hand, his own face becoming a stoic mask.

Kim (voice low and grave): "Leader, this does not look good. Not at all."

Xian's eyes darted to the hotel room door.

Xian: "I should lock the door. In case someone listens."

At that moment, Saito's phone buzzed. He pulled it from his pocket as Xian moved to the door. Saito looked at the caller ID, his eyebrows rising in shock.

Saito, surprised: "Antoine?"

The hotel room door flew open with a crash, splintering the lock. Antoine stood in the doorway, camera in hand, a triumphant grin on his face. He immediately raised the camera and snapped a picture of Saito's stunned expression.

Antoine: "Yoo-hoo! I haven't heard your voice in ages, you arrogant jerk!"

Saito was speechless, staring at the Frenchman who had materialized out of nowhere.

Saito: "How did you know I was here?"

Antoine: "Your phone. When I call, it reroutes to a local Egyptian number. That doesn't happen if you're in another country unless you pay a fortune for call forwarding."

Saito: "How do you know I paid for it?"

Antoine's grin widened. "Because I haven't topped up my phone credit since I bought the thing."

Xian, unable to contain himself any longer, blurted out: "Leader, you need to know what's in this message!"

Saito looked at him, the humor vanishing from his face, replaced by a leader's focus.

Saito: "Read it."

Xian's voice shook as he read: "'Come to this address alone at 10:00 PM. We will be waiting for you there. - Ezis Empire.'"

Saito: "Where did you find this?"

Xian, his face now slick with sweat: "Leader, that's not what matters right now!" His fear was palpable.

Kim: "What is worrying you, Xian?"

Xian: "This message..." He turned the paper over. On the back, scrawled in hasty letters, was a name.

Xian (his voice barely a whisper): "It's addressed to Faiveno."

The air left the room. Kim and Saito stared, utterly shocked.

Saito: "Why would Faiveno get this? Why wouldn't they send it to me?"

Kim: "Something is very wrong, Leader."

Antoine, finally focusing on the gravity of the situation: "You. Chinese kid."

Xian: "Yeah?"

Antoine: "What is the address?"

Xian: "It's—"

Back in the Inferno.

Summer crouched, cradling Sandra's head in her lap. Hayat lay curled beside them, her face and clothes badly burned. Sandra, miraculously, seemed physically unharmed, but her breathing was shallow.

Summer, her voice unnervingly calm despite the hell around them: "Sandra, please. Wake up."

Sandra's eyelids fluttered open. She looked up at Summer, her gaze unfocused.

Summer (managing a small smile): "Are you okay? What did they do to you before I got here?"

Sandra's voice was a thin, exhausted whisper. "Summer..." She weakly grasped Summer's hand, then was wracked by a coughing fit. "The smoke… it was everywhere. Where's Hayat?"

She tried to look around, but her vision was failing. "I can't see anything… it's so dark. Where is Hayat?"

Summer glanced at Hayat's motionless, burned form beside them for a brief, agonizing moment, then looked back at Sandra.

Summer, her voice gentle but firm: "Don't worry. She's okay now."

A weak, trusting smile touched Sandra's lips. Tears welled in her unseeing eyes.

Sandra: "Oh… good. I'm glad… I'm glad you're both okay. I didn't… I didn't want anything to happen to you."

Summer: "Don't worry, Sandra. Everything is okay now." But as she spoke, Summer's own tears began to fall, cutting clean lines through the soot on her cheeks.

Sandra: "Summer… I'm sorry."

Summer: "Don't talk. Save your strength. You need it now."

Sandra, her voice growing fainter: "I'm sorry, Summer. So sorry. What happened… it wasn't your fault. It was ours."

Summer: "Please, stop. You didn't do anything wrong."

Sandra: "Summer…"

Summer: "What is it?"

With the last of her strength, Sandra raised a trembling hand. She wiped away Summer's tears, then let her hand rest against Summer's cheek.

Sandra: "Take care of yourself, Summer. I really… I really loved you. Thank you… for being our friend."

Summer's voice broke. "Don't say that. I'm the one who should be thanking you. Just tell me… what do you want to do tomorrow?"

Sandra's voice was the faintest breath. "Tomorrow… we can go… on that adventure…"

She offered one last, fragile smile. Then, the light left her eyes. Her hand fell from Summer's cheek, and her body went still.

A profound, silent grief settled on Summer's features. She had failed.

Gently, she laid Sandra's head down on the floor. She then carefully arranged Hayat's body beside her, placing their hands together.

Summer: "Sandra. Hayat."

She closed her own eyes, then wiped her tears away with the back of her hand. The sadness was still there, but it was being forged into something else. Something hard and sharp.

Summer: "So this is goodbye."

The sound of a boot scuffing on debris made her head snap up. Her grief instantly iced over into hyper-alertness.

Summer: "Who's there?"

A figure stepped through the wall of flame as if it were a curtain. It was Faiveno. He looked at Summer, then at the bodies, a twisted smirk on his face.

Faiveno: "Glory to the Ezis Empire."

Summer looked at him, and all the rage, the grief, the fury of the last hour focused into a single, white-hot point. Her face was a mask of cold, murderous anger.

Summer: "Ezis?"

She moved faster than he could react. Her fist connected with his jaw with a sickening crack.

Summer's internal monologue, a vow etched in steel: I will exterminate every last member of Ezis. No matter the cost.

Faiveno, stumbling back: "What are you doing?!"

Summer: "Shut up, you garbage."

She drove her knee into his stomach. He doubled over, gasping. As he did, he fumbled in his jacket and pulled out a small, black pistol.

Summer: "A gun? I don't need a gun to deal with trash like you."

She dropped into a slide, kicking his legs out from under him. He fell hard, and the pistol skittered across the floor. Summer was on it in an instant. She rose, aiming the weapon at his head with a steady, cold hand.

Summer: "Make your peace, garbage."

Faiveno looked up at her, a bloody, mocking laugh bubbling from his lips. "Me? Garbage? But I'm—"

Summer didn't let him finish. "Yes. You are garbage. And now you're going to hell. I'll be sending your friends to meet you, one by one."

She pulled the trigger.

The gunshot was deafening in the fiery room. Faiveno jerked and collapsed, a dark red stain spreading across his chest. He was dead before he hit the ground.

Summer (looking at his body): "I'm coming for you all."

She pulled out her phone and called Elaine. The line picked up instantly.

Elaine's voice (mocking, sweet): "Well? Didn't manage to save them, did you?"

Summer's voice was flat, devoid of emotion. "Where are you?"

Elaine: "Seaside Road. In front of the Kabro Gaber restaurant. Don't keep me waiting."

The line went dead. Summer pulled a cigarette from her ruined jacket—miraculously intact—lit it, took one long, steadying drag, and exhaled.

Ten minutes later, she stood on the sidewalk, facing Elaine and Zayna, who leaned casually against a lamppost, smiling.

Elaine, smiling: "Impressive, how you did all this, Zayna."

Zayna: "How?"

Elaine: "I thought she'd suspect me after the bus incident. So I let the pot simmer on a low heat."

Zayna: "Explain."

Elaine: "When she met Hayat and Sandra and became 'friends,' I knew they were the perfect leverage. People care about their friends more than themselves. So, I ordered two of my followers to start dating them. It wasn't hard. And I tricked one of their lackeys into thinking we were going to unite the two gangs. I gave him the password to say when he saw Summer."

Elaine laughed, the sound grating and insane.

Elaine: "'Glory to the Ezis Empire.' The phrase that opens locked doors."

Zayna: "How did you know about her friend, the leader of the Yasan Square group?"

Elaine: "Everything has a price, my dear Zayna. Everything."

Elaine's phone rang. She answered it, her voice sickly sweet.

Elaine: "Nisma? Long time no see!"

Voice on phone: "Oh, Elaine! Hello! Are you coming to the party next month?"

Elaine: "What party?"

Voice: "It's the introduction party for the new gangs in the country. A real who's who."

Elaine: "Of course I'll be there, darling!"

She hung up.

Zayna: "And what was that about?"

A hysterical, cruel smile spread across Elaine's face.

Elaine: "Watching that girl suffer is just so… entertaining."

Meanwhile, back at the burning house.

Saito, Kim, and Xian finally fought their way through the fire crews to Summer's room. The first thing they saw was Faiveno's body lying in a pool of blood.

He was still barely alive. He saw them and tried to speak, blood bubbling at his lips.

Saito sprinted to his side, dropping to his knees and grabbing his hand. Horror and grief were etched on all their faces.

Saito: "Faiveno! What happened? Who did this?"

Faiveno, his voice a wet, gurgling whisper: "Leader… they promised… they promised to put a gang under your control… if I negotiated alone… here… but…" He coughed, a spray of blood accompanying it.

Kim, his voice tight: "They tricked him."

Xian: "Those bastards!"

Faiveno: "But… a girl… with black hair… black clothes… she shot me… and she… smoked a cigarette…"

Saito: "Don't worry about that now! We'll get you to a hospital!"

Faiveno: "Leader…" With a final, trembling effort, he pulled a necklace over his head—a simple chain with a Filipino symbol and his name on it. He pressed it into Saito's hand. "Kim and Xian… will take care of you… I'll wait… and watch from the other side… Please… don't forget me, Leader…"

His hand went limp. His eyes stared, unseeing, at the smoky ceiling.

The three friends knelt there, tears streaming down their faces as they watched their comrade's life vanish.

Saito's face transformed from grief into a mask of cold, utter rage. He pulled out his phone and called Antoine.

Antoine (on phone): "Saito? What's wrong?"

Saito's voice was a low, dangerous growl: "You said this was Summer's house, correct? Summer wears black clothes and smokes, yes?"

Antoine: "Yes… why?"

Saito: "Summer just killed Faiveno."

Antoine was utterly shocked. "What?!"

Antoine's internal monologue: "Mon Dieu, Summer… what have you done?"

Kim and Xian, their tears now of pure fury: "We will have our revenge on her!"

Saito's face was a storm of anguish and wrath. "Yes."

10:30 PM. Seaside Road.

Summer stood facing Elaine and Zayna, her posture defiant.

Summer: "I've come for your end, Elaine."

Elaine: "Are you sure about that?"

On cue, five members of Ezis Empire emerged from the shadows, forming a tight circle around Summer.

Elaine: "Have fun, boys."

They descended on her. Blows and kicks rained down, driving Summer to the ground.

Summer, spitting blood: "Damn it!"

They didn't let up, beating her relentlessly while Elaine watched, laughing hysterically.

Elaine: "This is your end!"

Summer's internal monologue, clinging to consciousness: I promised myself I would avenge them all.

The Voice of Her Other Self (a whisper in her mind): Use the gun.

Summer's internal monologue: Yes. I'll use it. I'm not weak anymore.

The Voice: Gather all your strength. And fire.

As the blows continued to fall, Summer's hand moved with agonizing slowness to her pocket. Elaine's hysterical laughter reached a fever pitch.

Summer (her whisper lost in the violence): "This is for Sandra… and Hayat…"

She pulled the pistol free.

The sound of the gunshot tore through the night.

THE END!?