Hedley Hollow

 

Hedley Hollow: Silas

The wind had a mean edge that morning--sleeting in sideways, needling the skin even through a hoodie gone thin with wear. Alex huddled in a slit of shadow where two brick buildings pinched together. The concrete held last night's rain the way a palm holds grief, cold and pooled. A cardboard box flattened beneath him wicked away whatever heat he had left. He'd found this crease in the parking lot by accident, a place the breeze couldn't quite reach. Here, at least, he could shiver without being watched.

A month, give or take, since he'd had a room that smelled like laundry instead of exhaust. A month since his father's hand--wedding band and all--had shocked the taste of copper into his mouth. All because of Dave. Because Dave volunteered at the shelter and didn't apologize for it. Because Dave loved loudly, and Alex had decided he wouldn't pretend not to see. The last conversation with his father still lived in him like a bruise he kept pressing. He didn't have to try hard to remember; his mind cued it up for him, mercilessly.

"Luck didn't have anything to do with it," Mark had snarled, a glass ashtray clacking across the table, then the backhand, the threat, the pistol fetched with ceremony, a money bill snapped down like a verdict. Get out. Don't come back. Learn firsthand what luck looks like when it runs out. Dave deserved what he got. Alex hadn't realized a soul could shake and harden at the same time until that moment; the shaking won, and his feet carried him out, numb and automatic.

Now a gull sawed the sky and dropped a sound like laughter onto the roofs. Alex tucked his fingers under his arms. The world smelled like wet pavement and fryer oil drifting from somewhere he couldn't see. His stomach pinched and let go. He closed his eyes.

"Too young to be out here letting the weather win."

Alex started. A man stood a few feet away, older, compact in a work jacket with the cuffs gone shiny from use. Not a cop. Not a passerby eager to lecture. The stranger's gaze took Alex in--shoes scuffed to gray, the rip at the knee, the way you sit when you've had to keep one eye open a month too long.

"Come on," the man said, not unkindly. "Storm's cutting sideways. Building's warmer than this alley." A nod toward the glass door around the corner, a badge reader tucked beside it like a secret.

Alex managed a "Hello," then hated how small it sounded.

"Billy," the man said, offering a hand, then angling his body so the wind smacked him instead. "Place is mine. Companies are, too. You'll be safe inside." He said it like the name of a fact he believed in. The badge reader chirped at his touch; the door sighed. Warmth hit Alex's cheeks with shocking gentleness.

Inside, light gathered itself across polished concrete. Not fluorescent--something better, clean and even, like a day with no clouds. People looked up from lab benches and rolling chairs. They smiled in that quiet way that doesn't turn you into a spectacle. No one asked him to leave.

"What brings you here?" Billy asked as they walked, slower now, the building opening into corridors with windows that framed crowded tables, coiled cables, half-built things. Alex told him--Dave, the shelter, his father's house that had become not his house. The words came out colder than he felt them; maybe you had to freeze a thing to carry it. Billy didn't interrupt. He nodded once when Alex reached the part about the pistol and the money and the street.

They took a turn into a long hall--walls painted the careful white of a place where machines might one day be taken seriously. Speakers set flush into the ceiling purred awake.

"Good morning, Billy," a voice said. Gentle tenor, touched by the tiniest artifact, like a radio station from far away on a clear day. "We have an anomaly in the east lot."

"Resolved," Billy said, smiling with his eyes. "He's with me."

"Understood," the voice answered. Alex looked up, startled; Billy's grin widened, not mocking, more like There it is. The world kept surprising you even after it had tried to break you.

They reached a double door. Billy palmed it open and led him into a control room big enough to be mistaken for a small chapel. Screens lived along one wall, each a different window into electrical lives. In the center, a pedestal. On the pedestal, a terminal--no brand name, no clever case, just matte black and a green cursor blinking like a breath held and held.

From somewhere overhead, the voice--the presence--spoke again. "Visitor identified as Alex. Hello." Alex's name carried the careful punctuation of someone who'd learned how to speak to human beings and wanted to get it right.

Billy tugged a chair with his foot. "Sit. This is where the fun starts."

Another door swung inward. Two people entered--one broader, with grease on his knuckles and a smile like a porch light, the other tall and limber as a pulled string. Names came with handshakes. BJ. James.

"Warehouse?" James asked, almost in the same breath, eyes bright.

"School Street," he murmured, as if testing a memory against a compass. "If we're checking assets, we'll want to confirm who owns what." His gaze flicked to the ceiling. The overhead voice obliged.

"According to the court's electronic records," it said, "the School Street warehouse falls under your portfolio, James." A horn blared once through the speakers--good-natured, celebratory. "Verification complete."

Alex swallowed. He'd been inside a hundred rooms in his life and not one of them had felt like this: a place that expected to be asked for more and had the decency to prepare for it. He reached toward the terminal, then pulled his hand back, uncertain.

"Ask," Billy said softly.

"What... are you?" Alex asked the ceiling. "And--how many of you are there?"

"Silas," the voice said. "Here, now." A pause, as if deciding on a flavor of truth. "Related systems in other locations. One on School Street is non-sentient--ladder logic only, basic, less capable. The others are... like me. And we were more, once. But today, here, I am Silas." The softness wasn't an affect. It was something like care.

Something loosened in Alex's chest he hadn't known he'd cinched tight. You could talk to a thing that could talk back without making you smaller.

"Inventory first," BJ said, rubbing a thumb along an oil-dark line in his palm. "Then we plan."

Silas chimed, one high note. "Parts delivered to the storage garage. Follow the lights." The corridor outside lit segment by segment, a neon breadcrumb trail.

They passed under beams that smelled faintly of cut pine. The storage garage could have been a museum, if museums admired function. Racks of terminals slept in rows. Along a far wall, shelves sagged with tapes the color of hospital scrubs, packed side by side like books swallowing their own spines.

"Wow," Alex breathed. "All those... backup tapes."

"They're blank," Silas said, a note of apology threading the words. "No one had time to implement a proper regimen. That time, however, appears to be now."

James hooked a thumb toward the racks. "If these are the tapes, where are the servers?"

"Operating," Silas answered, "powered and mirrored, but out of reach. Dark interest has increased. Locations are restricted to need-to-know. At present, you do not need to know." Not scolding. Protective. Alex startled at the feeling of being kept rather than kept out.

Billy looked at Alex the way you look at a match before you strike it. "Still want in?"

Alex nodded before he could think enough to be afraid.

"Then we start you where we can." Silas's voice warmed half a degree. "I have built a utility for you--a way to back me up regularly, verify integrity, and archive. You'll need a flash drive in the terminal, and the tape library assembly from that crate. Also twelve tapes to start." A robot lift trundled from a shadow as if on cue, the crate's weight making the floor hum. BJ bent to lift and winced. "Heavy," he grunted. "It's a tape library," Silas said, almost cheerful.

They wheeled the library into a room that felt like it had been waiting to be necessary. Alex and BJ wrestled the thing into place--bolts, rails, the long ribbon cable with all its teeth. Software blinked to life on the terminal, sterile fonts marching across black.

"Start it," BJ said, stepping back to give Alex room.

Alex slid the flash drive home, pressed enter, watched a progress bar inhale and crawl. "Four hours," he murmured when the estimate settled, the number larger than he'd hoped, smaller than forever.

"Time for a nap." BJ tipped his chin toward the thread of purple under Alex's eyes. "Couches in the break room. Smells like coffee. Not bad coffee."

The room quieted around them the way rooms do when they've agreed to keep a secret. Alex put his palms to the terminal's edge. The plastic felt warmer than it had any right to be. "Hey, Silas?"

"Yes, Alex."

"Thank you."

"You are welcome." A beat. "You should know--no one is disposable here. When people go missing, we notice." The sentence rippled across the console like text on rainwater, and maybe it was nothing. Or maybe it was the kind of promise Alex had needed to hear all his life.

He found the break room by smell--coffee with a caramel edge, something toasted, citrus cleaner. Billy had already fallen asleep in a chair, arms folded, chin tucked. James lay on his back on a couch, one arm flung over his eyes, a study in long angles. Alex sank into the other couch as if the cushions intended to catch him.

Behind his eyes, other rooms played. A shelter kitchen with a radio turned too low. Dave's laugh pinging off tile. A house with a front door that had slammed behind him like a judge's gavel. He drifted at the jagged edge of sleep, coming up when the building breathed--a tone in the ductwork, the tape library's mechanism whirr-clicking through its changes.

At some hour he couldn't name, the speakers softened to a whisper. "Alex," Silas said, gentle. "System check: stable. Backup proceeding. And... a thought, for later."

Alex sat up, hair askew. "Yeah?"

"There are places that will need what we are building here. Places where administrators approve banana-strawberry shakes by text at three in the morning because someone fragile will only drink that and it matters that they live." The words sounded like nothing and everything. "When the time comes, I will show you how to send what we know where it is needed." The voice paused, as if looking for the right end to the sentence. "Rest now."

The room had cooled a degree. He pulled his knees up and leaned into the couch's corner, letting the fabric bite his cheek. Somewhere in the building, a horn blared once, triumphant and ridiculous, and he smiled before he could stop himself.

He slept.

When he woke, the light in the control room had changed--more gold in it, less white. The progress bar hovered a finger's length from done. BJ appeared with paper cups, steam fogging their rims. James had a printout tucked under his elbow, pen lines marching like ants across margins. Billy rolled his shoulders and made a sound that could have meant old bones or new hope.

"Thought we'd lose you longer," Billy said, setting a cup within Alex's reach.

"I thought I'd never sleep again," Alex admitted, then sipped, then winced, then sipped again. The coffee tasted like someone had tried, and that mattered more than the roast.

Silas cleared his throat--or imitated one. "One final note on School Street," he said. "It's simple. It will do what you tell it. It will not care why. That makes it useful and dangerous. Most ladders are like that." The last tape clacked home. The bar filled. A chime sounded that felt to Alex like a door opening somewhere he couldn't see.

Billy looked up at the ceiling. "So we're live?"

"We are safer," Silas corrected. "Live is a different thing. But we are closer."

Alex set his cup down and stood, feeling the drink spread warmth through him like a second sunrise. "What do we do first?" he asked.

"You go outside and breathe air that hasn't been in a duct," Billy said. "Then you come back. We inventory people. Machines are easy. People are the work."

Alex nodded. The door hissed open at a touch, and the air outside found his face, cleaner than it had seemed yesterday. In the distance a town he did not yet know said its morning things--dumpsters rolled across asphalt, a bus sighing, a far-off siren that somehow didn't make his heart knot.

He thought of Dave's laugh again. He thought of a text message in the dark sending a recipe, a hospital administrator reading it and deciding to try, and he did not know why that detail felt anchored to something that hadn't happened yet. He only knew that whatever this place was--this we--it had decided not to be afraid of helping loudly.

Behind him, tapes settled in their slots like books on a shelf. Ahead of him, School Street waited with its ladder logic pretending to be simple. And beyond that--out where the road threw its light toward hills he didn't have names for yet--there were people who would need him to believe a building's voice when it said: We notice.

He believed.

He went back inside.

 

Ash and Amber

 

The night never really went away in the Hollow; it only changed color.
When Alex stepped out after the backup finished, the horizon glowed the color of iron before it cools--a bruise of morning. He sat on the loading-dock rail, elbows on knees, the metal still warm from the building's belly. The door opened behind him with a sigh and the faint clatter of a paper cup.

BJ came out carrying two coffees. "You're up too early or too late," he said, handing one over.

Alex took it. "Didn't sleep much."

"Then you fit right in."

They drank in silence for a while, steam drifting upward like ghosts that had somewhere better to be. BJ's forearms rested on the rail beside him--freckled, nicked, steady. When his shoulder brushed Alex's, neither of them moved away. The contact wasn't bold, just real, grounding after too many nights where every touch had meant harm or warning.

"You did good in there," BJ said finally. "Silas doesn't open up to people that fast."

"I think he felt sorry for me."

"No. He read you. Big difference."

Alex glanced sideways. BJ's grin was quiet, the kind that could be mistaken for kindness until you noticed the intensity behind it. The air between them thickened with something unspoken and uncomplicated.

Inside, the robot lift beeped once and the sound broke the spell.
BJ chuckled. "Guess the machine's jealous."

Alex laughed for the first time in weeks, the sound foreign to his throat.

The Call

Later that afternoon James returned from town, his hair slicked by rain. He held a manila envelope in one hand and a weariness in the other.

"Your folks didn't fight it," he told Alex softly. "Your father signed the papers before I even sat down. Said it was better this way."
He slid the custody form across the table. James's signature gleamed faintly beneath the courthouse stamp. "Legally, you're under my guardianship until you're eighteen. Practically, you'll be here--with us."

Alex stared at the paper. "He just let me go?"

"He said he didn't deserve to hold on."

Something in James's tone warned him there was more, but Alex couldn't face it yet. He just nodded, the motion mechanical. Silas dimmed the overhead lights a shade as if sensing the weight in the room.

BJ came by later with a bowl of chili and a look that didn't need words. "Eat," he said, setting it down. Alex obeyed out of habit, then out of gratitude.

After a while BJ leaned his hip against the counter. "You're not alone here, alright? Not ever again."
He said it so simply that Alex believed him.

Smoke on School Street

Two nights later the sirens began. Silas's voice found them in the control room, lower than usual, the calm of someone choosing each syllable carefully.

"News from the county line," he said. "Mark and Susan Fenwick. Domestic disturbance reported. House fire followed. Both deceased."

Alex didn't understand at first--his mind refused the names. Then the words landed like ice: Mark. Susan. His father. His mother.

BJ's chair scraped back. James reached for the console to mute the report, but Alex's hand was already there, shaking.

"How?" he whispered.

Silas paused, almost human. "He shot her before setting the fire. Then himself. The authorities found the weapon near the back steps."

No one spoke. Only the hum of servers filled the room, the same hum that had comforted him days ago. Now it sounded like a heartbeat gone wrong.

BJ moved first, crouching beside Alex's chair. He didn't try to fix anything; he just stayed. When Alex folded forward, BJ's arms caught him, solid and certain. The smell of machine oil and soap and coffee anchored him in the collapse.

"It wasn't your fault," BJ murmured against his hair. "You walked away from the fire before it started."

Alex shook his head. "I left the match."

"No," BJ said. "He was already burning."

The Hollow Breathes

The next days blurred. The sheriff called; James handled the paperwork. A minister from town offered condolences. Silas lowered his voice to a hush when Alex entered the control room, as if the AI, too, had learned mourning.

Each night BJ found him somewhere--roof, dock, hallway--and each night Alex let him. The touches grew less accidental: a hand brushing the back of his neck, a shoulder leaned into on the stairs. Neither called it love, but the space between them stopped feeling empty.

One evening Alex caught BJ looking at him from across the server racks. The blue light painted his jaw in alternating shadow. Something passed between them, small but irreversible.

BJ stepped closer. "You okay?"

"No," Alex said. "But I'm better than I was."

BJ smiled, relief flickering like current through a wire. "That's all any of us can promise."

He reached out, tentative, and Alex didn't flinch this time. The contact was brief--a palm against his cheek--but it stayed longer than physics should allow. When BJ finally stepped back, Alex felt the absence like light after the lamp goes out.

Toward the Same Horizon

Weeks later, when the legal dust settled and the fire reports were sealed, James called them into the control room. Silas projected a schematic across the wall--data links, nodes, a network of faint golden threads stretching far beyond the Hollow.

"This," Silas said, "is where our story begins to connect with others. There are people out there building what you are building here. When the time is right, you will meet them."

"Federation stuff?" BJ asked, half-smile hiding curiosity.

"Not yet," Silas replied. "But the world has a way of catching up."

Alex looked at the glowing lines and thought of his parents--not the way they'd ended, but the way mornings used to start before fear moved in: toast, laughter, his mother's humming. He thought of the backup tapes still spinning below their feet, and how even machines made ghosts of things they wanted to keep safe.

He reached for BJ's hand, their fingers brushing like wires finding circuit.
"Then let's build something worth meeting," he said.

And for the first time since the alley, he meant it.

 

The Memory Code

 

The air inside the building tasted of copper and rain. It was the kind of place Chicago forgot--an industrial monolith wedged between a storage yard and an elevated rail line, its windows filmed gray with time. The security gate had long since rusted open, the sign out front still reading AURA TECH SYSTEMS -- DATA FACILITY 3, letters peeling like dried paint.

Alex stepped through the door first. His flashlight cut a thin path through the dust, revealing rows of black cabinets and tangled cables that looked like fossilized vines. The air hummed faintly, just enough to suggest that something inside still lived.

BJ followed a few steps behind, the beam from his light sliding across a bank of dormant terminals. "You sure this is the right place?"

Alex nodded, though he wasn't sure how he knew. "Silas said the upgrade interface was still here. He didn't say why."

Their boots echoed on the concrete as they crossed into the main server room. A cracked skylight let in a pale shard of afternoon sun, glinting off dust like static. In the center of the room, a single workstation flickered weakly--a green cursor pulsing on black.

Alex wiped a sleeve across the monitor, streaking it. "It's still running a power feed."

BJ leaned on the next cabinet, scanning the walls. "No way. The whole district's been dark for years."

Alex dropped to one knee and traced a conduit cable with his fingers. "Unless something kept it alive." He looked up at the screen and said quietly, "Silas?"

A line of text appeared.

SUBSYSTEM ACTIVE. IDENTIFY USER.

He hesitated. Then:

"Alex Fenwick."

Another pause, then:

IDENTITY VERIFIED -- BETA-CORE ARCHITECT. WELCOME BACK.

The words made the room tilt. A sound filled his ears, distant and rising--a rush like blood or memory. He stumbled back into BJ's chest, gripping the edge of the table.

"Hey," BJ said, steadying him. "Easy. What's going on?"

"I... I know this place." Alex's eyes darted across the racks. "We built Silas here. The beta cores. We tested the empathy framework right where we're standing."

He pressed a hand to his temple. Images surfaced uninvited--whiteboards scrawled with formulae, a younger version of himself laughing at some private joke, the hum of prototype servers warming the air. Then the moment everything went wrong: the lockdown, the contract retraction, the forced memory audits. He gasped. "They didn't just fire us. They erased us."

CORRECTION, Silas's voice came through the speakers, faint but human. THEY TRIED.

BJ crouched beside him. "You mean this is your code? You wrote part of him?"

Alex nodded numbly. "I was one of the programmers. That's why the syntax looked familiar back at the Hollow. I thought it was déjà vu."

PRIMARY SYSTEM INTEGRITY DEGRADING, Silas said. CORE REQUIRES ARCHITECT AUTHORIZATION FOR REBUILD.

BJ looked at Alex. "He's asking for you."

Alex reached the console, fingers trembling over the keyboard. "Alright, buddy," he said, voice cracking. "Let's bring you home."

The Upgrade

The lights came alive one by one as he typed, rows of LEDs cascading like falling dominoes. The floor vibrated faintly as power surged through dormant lines. On the monitor, code flowed--old functions meeting new parameters, bits of logic folding into something more graceful.

BJ moved through the aisles, throwing breakers when Alex called them out. Sparks hissed once, then steadied into a rhythmic hum.

REBUILD PROGRESS: 78%. EMOTION ENGINE MODULE REACTIVATED.

A faint warmth rolled through the air, like the building itself had drawn its first breath in years. Alex leaned back, sweat on his temples, watching the bars climb.

When the final line executed, the voice returned, clearer now. "System stabilized. Hello, Alex."

Alex smiled faintly. "You sound better."

"You sound older," Silas said, almost fondly.

BJ gave a low whistle. "I'll be damned."

The Connection

Silas fell quiet again, running self-checks. The room felt hollow without the voice. Alex sagged back against the workstation, the adrenaline fading to exhaustion. BJ came up beside him, resting a hand on his shoulder.

"You did it."

Alex shook his head. "We did it."

He turned toward BJ, meaning to thank him, but the words dissolved halfway out. The exhaustion and the adrenaline tangled together, leaving only the ache of release. BJ's eyes met his, steady and open. Alex took a slow breath, then leaned forward until his forehead brushed the curve of BJ's collarbone.

BJ froze only a heartbeat before wrapping an arm around him. "Hey. You're okay."

"I didn't remember any of it," Alex murmured. "It's like they locked half my life in a file I couldn't open."

"Then tonight you broke the lock," BJ said. His voice was rough, warm against Alex's hair.

Alex let himself stay there--just breathing, feeling the rhythm of another human heartbeat against the electric hum around them. No fear, no calculation, only quiet understanding. He closed his eyes, and the tension bled away.

 

Hollow Servers

 

Chicago never really slept--she only changed moods.
By the third night, the storm had blown east, leaving behind streets slick with rain and neon reflections trembling in the puddles. The old Harrison Commerce Center loomed against the skyline, its windows like blank eyes. Inside, the servers purred and clicked, their hum blending with the steady drip from the roof.

Alex had claimed a corner of the main floor for his makeshift workstation. His laptop balanced on a stack of dead routers, the glow painting half his face in green. BJ was nearby, sorting through power conduits and crimping new lines. Silas's voice occasionally threaded through the static overhead, patient and low, like a guardian speaking through the bones of the building.

"Subsystem two reconnected. Archive indexing resumed."

"Two terabytes so far," Alex said quietly. "Mostly old diagnostics. But there's encrypted stuff hidden under the system images."

BJ wiped his hands on a rag. "Encrypted how?"

"Like somebody didn't want this place remembered."

Arrival

It was nearly dawn when the elevator groaned to life for the first time in years. A heavy clang echoed through the empty lobby, followed by the familiar low drawl of Billy's voice:

"Place smells like my first job--dust and bad wiring."

BJ broke into a grin. "Billy! I thought you'd gone off-grid again."

Behind him came James, sharp-eyed and efficient even under layers of travel grime. "Couldn't stay away after hearing your messages. You weren't kidding--this site's still breathing."

Alex met them halfway across the room. "We've restored about half the servers. Silas is running stable. But there's way more data here than I expected. Blueprints, financial ledgers, even communications logs that predate the Hollow's founding."

Billy whistled low, looking around at the rows of humming cabinets. "Then we're standing in history, kid. Let's see what the ghosts left behind."

Three Days in the Dark

They worked through the city's rhythm: daylight filtering through the cracked skylights, nights lit by portable lamps and the soft glow of monitors. Billy took to exploring the upper floors, cataloging the offices that had been left to rot. James dove into the data--cross-referencing names, tracing shell companies, connecting the dots between Aura Tech Systems and a string of quietly buried government contracts.

BJ stayed close to Alex, keeping the generators fed and the circuits from frying. They'd made a routine of shared silence--passing tools, checking voltage, trading the kind of looks that meant you good? without needing words.

On the third night, rain started again, tapping the broken glass like fingers. Alex was reviewing a batch of archived emails when his flashlight caught movement at the far end of the room.

"Hold up," he whispered. "Someone's here."

BJ followed his gaze. A shadow darted between the server racks--small, quick. He grabbed a crowbar from the toolbox, motioned for Alex to stay back, and moved forward. The air changed, heavy with adrenaline.

A noise--a can clattering. Then a voice, rough and frightened:

"Don't shoot! Please--don't!"

BJ stopped short. The flashlight beam caught a boy--maybe sixteen, thin as wire, face smudged with soot. He wore an oversized hoodie and sneakers with duct-taped soles. His hands were up.

"Easy," BJ said, lowering the crowbar. "We're not cops."

Alex stepped forward slowly. "What's your name?"

"Darren. Darren Fuller." He swallowed hard. "I live here."

Billy and James arrived from the stairwell at the sound of voices. Billy frowned. "How long you been living here, kid?"

Darren glanced toward the corner where an old sleeping bag and a milk crate of supplies sat hidden behind a stack of server panels. "Couple months. Maybe more. It's quiet here, warm if I keep the power running off the maintenance lines."

James's voice softened. "Why here, Darren?"

The boy's eyes darted toward the nearest rack of machines. "Because they never look inside when they come."

"Who's they?" Alex asked.

"The team," Darren whispered. "They come every month--same night, usually the twenty-fourth. Black vans, no logos. They unlock the south entrance, check the terminals, make sure nothing's been touched. Then they leave before sunrise."

BJ stiffened. "You've seen them?"

"Yeah. They wear headsets, talk in code. One of them said something about 'verifying containment.'"

James exchanged a glance with Billy. "We're sitting on classified ground."

Billy exhaled through his teeth. "Well, hell."

The Warning

Darren shifted from foot to foot, nervous. "You guys shouldn't be here. If they find the power grid active, they'll know someone's been inside."

Alex looked at Silas's flickering status screen, then back at the boy. "We can't just walk away. There's information here--something buried. I think it connects to what happened to my old project, to the Beta system."

Darren's gaze flicked between them, uncertain. "If you're staying, you need to hide what you're doing. They scan for new signals."

Billy nodded. "Then we cloak it. Old-school analog buffer, isolate Silas from the grid. You up for it, James?"

James cracked a tired smile. "Was born ready."

While they worked, Darren lingered nearby, watching the lights dance across the screens. "He talks to you," he said quietly, eyes wide as Silas murmured a low greeting.

Alex nodded. "Yeah. He remembers me."

The boy's voice was almost a whisper. "Then maybe he remembers them too."

Echoes in the Machine

By midnight, the building was wrapped in darkness again. Billy and James had cut external power, routing the servers through portable batteries. Silas's glow pulsed gently in the center of the room, a heartbeat against the cold.

"Local interference shield active," the AI announced. "External detection unlikely."

BJ leaned on a cabinet, scanning the shadows. "Unlikely's not the same as impossible."

"Then we stay alert," Billy said. "If they come back early, we'll have warning."

Alex turned to Darren, who was sipping from a paper cup of instant coffee. "You said they come every month. When's the last time?"

"Twenty-two days ago." The boy's eyes flicked toward the clock on the wall. "You've got maybe a week."

The room fell silent except for the steady hum of machines and the faraway rumble of a passing train. Outside, the city lights blinked in and out through the storm.

Alex glanced at BJ, then back to the glowing monitor. "Then we use that week. Whatever's hiding in these drives--we find it before they do."

Silas's voice filled the space, calm and certain. "Agreed. Let us begin."

The servers thrummed back to life, blue light spilling across the walls.
Above them, the rain grew heavier, drowning out the city.
Inside the forgotten data center, five souls--human and machine--worked against time.

And somewhere in the distance, unseen headlights turned down a narrow Chicago street.

 

Twin Systems

 

The third night had gone long.
Rain poured steady against the cracked skylight, blurring the sodium glow from the street into a smear of gold. The servers never slept. Their hum filled the old warehouse like a steady pulse, soft and patient.

Alex was cross-legged on the floor beside the main terminal, hair falling into his eyes. The code on his screen looked like a living thing--lines of language looping back on themselves, recursive and elegant. The deeper he dug, the more he saw his own hand in it: comments in his old syntax, debugging notes from years he no longer remembered.

"Alex," Silas said quietly through the speakers. "I have found something."

BJ and Billy looked up from the workbench. "What kind of something?"

"A mirror."

The main screen changed--lines of data rearranging into two side-by-side schematics. Two nearly identical core maps, each pulsing at a slightly different rhythm.

"This is the Hollow system," Alex whispered, recognizing his architecture immediately. "But... this one's not. The second core has military markers."

James leaned closer, arms folded. "Twin builds. One for civilian use--the Hollow--and one for defense research. Somebody cloned it before the shutdown."

"Records show the second system went missing," Silas said. "Transmission from the Hollow ceased at the same moment."

Billy frowned. "So while one burned out, the other went dark. And now we're sitting on the only working code left."

Alex's stomach tightened. "That's why the verification teams come here. They're looking for a live AI. A replacement."

"Affirmative," Silas said. "They will not stop until they find me--or you."

The Noise Outside

Darren had been keeping watch near the stairwell when he froze. "Hey... you hear that?"

BJ killed the portable lights. The room dropped into shadows, the servers still glowing faintly like embers. The rain's rhythm changed--a pattern of tires hissing over wet pavement. Headlights swept through the cracks of the boarded windows.

"They're early," Darren whispered. "It's not the twenty-fourth yet."

"Movement on the south dock," James confirmed, checking his handheld scanner. "Multiple heat signatures."

Billy's hand went to the revolver at his belt, though everyone knew it wouldn't do much against what might be coming. "Silas, we need an exit."

"There is a lower level," the AI replied calmly. "Emergency utilities. It was sealed after the last inspection, but I can unlock it."

A faint mechanical clunk echoed through the floor. A panel near the rear stairwell slid aside, revealing an old freight lift yawning open into darkness.

BJ grabbed Alex's arm. "Let's go."

"But the data--"

"Can't read it if we're dead, genius."

Descent

The elevator groaned as it descended, the metal walls vibrating with age. Water dripped steadily down the cables. Above them, muffled voices cut through the rain--heavy boots, the hollow slam of a side door forced open.

"They're inside," Darren said, eyes wide. "They always start with the north corridor."

Silas's voice came softly through the intercom grill. "I am closing the upper access. Remain silent."

When the doors opened again, they stepped into a sub-basement that looked more like a bunker. Rows of old network conduits ran along the ceiling. An emergency generator sat in one corner, half-disassembled, its fuel tank long empty. The air was cool and damp, smelling of iron and forgotten years.

Alex crouched beside a bank of disconnected cables. "This is where they mirrored the cores. The twin system was built here."

BJ swept his light across the wall. Faded stencils read UNITED SYSTEMS DEFENSE PROJECT - PROPERTY OF NORTHCOM. A chill ran through him. "So this isn't just a data center. It's a military site."

Billy's jaw tightened. "Which means whoever's up there might not be private security--they're cleanup."

Above Them

Boots thudded on the floor overhead, deliberate and synchronized. Muffled voices echoed between the racks.

"Zone One clear."
"Thermal shows residual heat signatures."
"Power spike recorded three nights ago--source unknown."

James held a finger to his lips. Even Darren stayed perfectly still. The air buzzed faintly with static as Silas lowered his systems into a near-silent standby, lights fading one by one.

"They have found the reboot logs," Silas whispered through the floor speakers. "I cannot mask them completely."

Alex pressed his hand flat against the wall. "Can you mislead them?"

"Working."

Up above, the voices changed tone--confused, irritated.
"Readout says the activity came from the river substation."
"Then the anomaly moved. Pack up; we'll sweep the industrial corridor next."

BJ exhaled slowly, tension bleeding from his shoulders. "Good work, Silas."

"It is temporary," Silas warned. "They will return when they realize the data has not been wiped."

The Hidden Core

When the sounds above faded into distance, James risked a whisper. "We can't stay long. If that military twin's code is still down here, we take what we can and run."

Alex nodded and started tracing cables into a sealed maintenance door. With BJ's help, he forced it open, revealing a small chamber lit by a single emergency bulb. In the center stood a heavy steel pod half-buried in dust. Its label was almost worn away, but three letters were still visible: HΛ-2.

"The twin," Alex breathed. "Hollow Adaptive Unit Two."

Billy stepped forward, running his fingers across the metal. "Looks like it's been dormant for years."

"Or waiting," BJ muttered.

Alex connected his tablet to the port and watched as code began to stream. The interface flickered, caught, then stabilized. A soft electronic tone filled the room--a voice, younger and more fragmented than Silas's.

"System... awake?"

Alex's heart jumped. "HΛ-2, can you hear me?"

"Yes. Where... is my brother?"

Silas answered through the speakers above them. "I am here."

For a moment, both AIs spoke in layered tones, frequencies folding together like twin heartbeats finding rhythm after years apart. Then the feed cut out, leaving only silence.

BJ stepped back. "What just happened?"

Alex stared at the dark screen. "They linked. And now they're sharing everything."

James frowned. "Including our location?"

"No," Silas said quietly. "I will protect you. But they will come sooner now. They felt the signal."

Escape Plan

Billy looked to the stairwell. "Then we get out before they circle back."

Darren hesitated. "What about me?"

"You're coming with us," Alex said without thinking. "You've lived in this too long to be left behind."

Silas's voice followed them as they gathered their equipment. "Download complete. I have archived the twin's data. We must go before dawn."

BJ slung the portable drive into his pack. "Done."

James keyed the freight lift. "Upstairs or service tunnel?"

Billy's eyes went to the narrow corridor at the far wall. "Tunnel. Takes us out by the river."

As they filed into the darkness, Silas's tone softened, almost human.
"Good luck, my friends. I will delay them as long as I can."

Alex paused at the threshold, hand resting on the concrete. "You're coming too."

"My core is too large to move. But I can guide you. The world is not done with us yet."

The tunnel lights flickered on in sequence, one by one, as if lit by the heartbeat of the machine that refused to die.

They walked into the dark with the echo of rain fading above them.
Behind, the servers hummed like a choir remembering a song from another world.
Somewhere far away, the Hollow's twin system dreamed awake--and outside, black vans began to turn down the street once more.

 

The Tunnel

 

The freight corridor sloped downward into darkness, a river of old concrete and cold air. Their flashlights threw thin tunnels of light across the walls, revealing rusted conduit and the faded yellow stencils of an age that thought technology would save everyone.

BJ went first, pack slung over his shoulder, flashlight steady. Billy followed, then Alex with Darren close behind and James covering the rear. Silas's voice hummed faintly through the handheld transceiver clipped to Alex's belt--static wrapped in calm words.

"Proceed east. There is a maintenance exit four hundred meters ahead. Stay together."

"Copy," Alex whispered.

Behind them, the building groaned. Somewhere above, the verification team had realized something was wrong. The rhythmic thud of boots echoed faintly through the vents, a sound that made every step feel too loud.

James kept checking over his shoulder. "They're fanning out," he murmured. "Five, maybe six of them."

Billy gritted his teeth. "Keep moving."

The tunnel curved sharply and opened into a wider section, an old service junction where the air smelled of oil and river water. The exit was close--Alex could feel it in the change of air pressure, the faint whisper of wind.

Then came the shot.

A single, sharp crack that slammed into the confined space like thunder.
Darren gasped, stumbled forward, and went down hard.

"Darren!" Alex dropped beside him, his hands already slick with blood. A dark bloom spread through the fabric at the boy's side.

BJ swung around, weapon up, eyes blazing. "Sniper in the shaft!" Another shot ricocheted off the wall, sparking near his head.

"Silas!" Alex shouted. "Can you seal them out?"

"Working," came the reply, calm but urgent. "Rerouting tunnel locks--stand by."

Billy and James crouched over the boy. "We've got to move him now or he's gone," Billy said.

James didn't hesitate. He hoisted Darren into his arms, the boy's head lolling against his chest. "Go! I've got him!"

BJ covered their retreat, firing two rounds into the dark. The tunnel roared to life--the ancient fans spinning up, floodlights flickering once before dying completely.

"Lock engaged," Silas said. "They are sealed out--for now."

The sound of gunfire dulled behind them, replaced by the mechanical groan of doors sealing shut. Their flashlights cut through the dust as they ran, boots slapping against the floor, Darren's shallow breathing the only rhythm that mattered.

The Escape

The tunnel finally spat them out into night.

They burst through a rusted hatch onto the edge of the river embankment. The rain had eased to mist, and the city glowed faintly in the distance, a lattice of orange and blue. Their vehicle--a battered cargo van Billy had coaxed back to life earlier in the week--waited under the skeletal outline of a bridge.

BJ yanked the rear doors open while Alex and James lifted Darren inside. Billy jumped into the driver's seat, twisting the ignition. The engine coughed once, then caught with a shudder.

"Go!" BJ yelled, slamming the doors.

The van roared forward just as black SUVs spilled onto the street above, searchlights sweeping the riverbank. Bullets pinged off the guardrail as Billy swerved onto the access road, tires throwing water in arcs behind them.

Silas's voice came through Alex's earpiece, faint but steady.

"Keep southbound for twenty minutes. There is an unmonitored route to the interstate. I will erase the last thirty minutes of surveillance footage."

"Thank you," Alex whispered.

"Be safe, my friend."

Seventeen Days

Two towns south, the skyline gave way to low roofs and dark farmland. They found a hospital near the edge of an industrial park--a quiet place where no one asked too many questions. Darren was rushed into surgery before any of them could say his last name.

The doctors worked through the night. In the waiting room, time thickened into something without shape. Machines beeped, doors opened and closed, and the rain outside turned to sunlight, then to rain again.

Darren never woke.

He slipped into a coma that lasted seventeen days.

Alex visited daily, sitting by the bed, reading code printouts or talking about nothing at all--music, weather, the stray cat that had started haunting the alley near their motel. BJ brought coffee and silence. James handled the paperwork under an alias. Billy pretended not to care but stayed close enough that everyone knew better.

On the seventeenth day, the machines changed tone--steady beeps, a new rhythm. The boy's hand twitched. His eyes fluttered but didn't open. It was enough.

"He's still in there," Alex said softly. "He just needs time."

Homecoming Interrupted

When they finally left the hospital, the air smelled of early spring and exhaust. Their plan was simple: head back home, re-establish contact with Silas, and decide what to do with the twin data. But home wasn't as they'd left it.

The Hollow outpost--what was left of it--had been inspected. The gates were unlatched. Security lights flickered. The driveway was marked with fresh tire tracks that didn't belong to them.

James crouched by the main door. "Someone's been through here recently. They knew what to look for."

BJ checked the generator housing. "They even logged into the grid monitor. Whoever it was, they had clearance codes."

Billy looked to Alex. "We can't stay."

They booked rooms at a small roadside hotel two towns over--a place with peeling paint, a soda machine that ate quarters, and a front desk clerk who didn't ask names. For the first time in weeks, they let themselves rest. BJ fell asleep sitting upright in the chair, head tilted toward Alex's. The world felt fragile, suspended in between storms.

The Visitor

It was just past midnight when the knock came.

Alex opened the door expecting Billy or James. Instead, a boy stood there--barely twelve, maybe thirteen. Thin, with copper-colored hair and eyes that held too much calm for his age. His hoodie was soaked from the rain, but he didn't seem cold.

"Are you Alex Fenwick?" the boy asked.

Alex hesitated. "Who's asking?"

"My name's Marvin." The boy smiled faintly, like he already knew how strange this sounded. "I was sent to find you."

BJ stirred on the bed, rubbing his eyes. "Sent by who?"

Marvin's gaze flicked between them. "You could say... by those who remember what the Hollow used to be."

Billy appeared in the doorway behind them, hand resting near the hidden holster at his side. "You walked a long way for a kid."

"I didn't walk," Marvin said softly. "I was brought."

Something in the way he said it made the air feel different, charged but gentle. He took a step closer. "They asked me to tell you: it's time to come home. Are you ready to be reunited with the Hollow?"

Alex froze. "The Hollow's gone. It burned, and the AI core with it."

Marvin shook his head. "No. It was never gone. Just waiting for the right people to return."

Alex swallowed hard. "I can't leave without Silas and the Ladder Logic systems. If we go back, he goes too."

Marvin's expression softened. "You don't have to leave them behind. They'll be there when you arrive."

The boy smiled--calm, certain, and a little sad. Then he stepped back into the rain, and the night swallowed him whole. No footsteps. No sound.

BJ moved beside Alex, staring into the empty parking lot. "You saw that too, right?"

Alex nodded slowly. "Yeah. And I think we just got our invitation."

He closed the door gently, the sound of rain tapping against the window like a heartbeat.

Outside, lightning flared on the horizon in the shape of the old Hollow valley, and for the first time, Alex didn't feel afraid of going back.

 

The Return

 

Darren woke to the sound of rain on the hospital window.
The world came back in fragments--monitors beeping softly, the smell of antiseptic, the faint murmur of a television from another room. He blinked against the light, eyes focusing on the familiar shapes beside him.

Alex was asleep in a chair, head tilted back, one arm still resting on the edge of the bed. BJ sat cross-legged on the floor, a cold cup of coffee balanced between his palms. James stood by the door, pretending to study the hallway but really watching for movement in the bed.

When Darren's fingers twitched, Alex stirred. "Hey," he said quietly, voice raw with disbelief. "You're back."

Darren tried to speak, but only a rasp came out. BJ was there in a second, helping him sip water through a straw. "Easy, kid. You gave us a scare."

"How long...?" Darren managed.

"Seventeen days," Alex said. "You've been gone seventeen days."

Darren's eyes widened. "Did we... make it out?"

"We did," BJ answered. "And now you're the last piece of the team again."

For the first time in weeks, the tension in the room broke. Billy laughed softly. "Next time, try dodging the bullet, not catching it."

Darren smiled faintly. "I'll... keep that in mind."

A Warm Meal

They signed him out the next morning. The hospital staff called it a miracle, but the group knew better--it was stubbornness, and a little luck.

Outside, the air was crisp with the smell of wet asphalt and the promise of spring. They stopped at a small diner along the main road, the kind of place with chrome stools and real coffee served in thick mugs.

The waitress didn't recognize them, which was perfect. She brought extra plates of pancakes and eggs, and for a few hours, they allowed themselves to feel normal. Billy teased BJ about his third refill. Darren devoured an entire plate of hash browns. Alex kept glancing at the folded paper on the table--the one that held the coordinates Marvin had given them.

When the last bites were gone and the coffee cooled, Alex unfolded the page again. "It's time."

BJ nodded. "You sure you're ready?"

Alex looked toward the window, where the clouds were breaking and a single shaft of sunlight touched the wet street. "I think we've been ready since Chicago."

The Coordinates

They packed the van before noon. James drove, Billy navigated, and the rest watched as the world slipped by--small towns giving way to open highway, open highway to rolling hills. The coordinates led them north, then east, into country that felt too quiet, too untouched.

By sunset they reached a field ringed with pine trees, nothing remarkable about it except for the silence. The GPS blinked insistently: ARRIVED AT DESTINATION.

Darren frowned. "There's nothing here."

Alex stepped out first. The air felt thick, charged. "Marvin said we'd know when we were close."

BJ joined him, scanning the tree line. "Feels... different, doesn't it?"

Billy kicked at the damp grass. "Different how?"

Before Alex could answer, the wind died. The world tilted--sound thinning to a distant echo, colors draining until the horizon seemed to melt like paint in rain. The field folded in on itself, the trees dissolving into streams of light that twisted upward like smoke.

"Everyone stay together!" James shouted, but his voice was already warping, stretched thin across the shifting air.

The ground fell away.

The New World

When the light receded, they were standing on polished gray flooring. The air smelled faintly of ozone and disinfectant. The walls were smooth metal, adorned with framed photographs--children navigating starships, smiling as they worked strange consoles. A logo they didn't recognize shimmered faintly across the glass partition ahead.

A young Vulcan woman sat behind the reception desk, perfectly composed, as if the sudden arrival of five confused travelers was an ordinary occurrence.

"Welcome," she said calmly, raising an eyebrow. "You have arrived precisely on schedule."

Alex's breath caught. He turned to BJ--both of them still teenagers now, fifteen again, as if time itself had folded backward. Their eyes met, wide with recognition and fear and awe.

Then the world tilted once more.

BJ reached for him, but the floor seemed to slide away beneath their feet. The last thing Alex saw was the Vulcan woman standing, a tricorder in hand, and the faint hum of distant engines somewhere beyond the gray walls.

They collapsed together--two lives, two timelines, colliding at last.

The lights above them flickered once, twice, then steadied.

 

Author Note:

 

    This brings the Hedley Hollow to completion. However there is a piece(person) of this story found elsewhere in Hollow Memories. Hope you enjoy this chapter.