He had three seconds. He could sever the tunnel—vanish into the clean web, delete the proxy, pretend he’d never touched the sun. Or he could accept the ghost’s help and dive deeper than anyone had gone before.
The proxy didn’t glow anymore. It sang —a low, ultraviolet frequency that vibrated through his bones. The hallway feed went dark. The figure vanished. And Leo’s screen filled with a single line of text: ultraviolet proxy
The reply came in fragments, as if pushed through a straw: "We are the ones who built the first ultraviolet. You inherited a ghost. Let us help you, or let us go. But choose now. WATCHFUL EYE knows you’re here." He had three seconds
Leo’s hallway feed flickered. A figure in a gray coat, no face visible, stood outside his door. Not moving. Just there . The proxy didn’t glow anymore
He typed .