The LA apartment thrummed with a faint, restless energy, a stark contrast to the Universal Studios chaos that had defined their weekend. Late afternoon sun slanted through the blinds, casting jagged gold streaks across the hardwood floor. The air still carried a whiff of churro sugar and sunscreen, remnants of their victory high, but the mood had shifted, like a storm brewing just beyond the horizon. Elliot sprawled across the couch, legs dangling over the armrest, tossing a crumpled churro wrapper between his hands like a makeshift ball. “We crushed that park, man, Hyperion’s cash turned us into ride-ruling gods. I’m still hearing those Minion laughs in my sleep. What’s next, storming Vegas with our VIP passes?”

  Marcus, perched at the dining table, didn’t look up from his laptop, his fingers tapping a steady rhythm on the keys. A half-empty coffee mug sat beside him, steam long gone. “Next is you crashing from that sugar binge,” he said, smirking faintly, “those zeros won’t fund your chaos forever. Enjoy the comedown while it’s quiet.”

  Esterio paced from the kitchen, his tea abandoned on the counter, the ceramic mug still warm under his fingertips as he left it behind. His sneakers scuffed softly against the floor, a restless beat that matched the churn in his head. Universal had been a blast, Elliot’s banshee wails on the Jurassic drop, Marcus’s deadpan gripes about overpriced churros, the sweaty, dizzy thrill of it all, but Dain’s words from that balcony night clung like a shadow he couldn’t shake. Galactic Tournament, survival, forces beyond Earth. And those EVO alerts, twice now, fleeting messages that vanished like smoke. He stopped mid-step, rubbing the back of his neck. “Dain wasn’t joking back there. We need to figure out where this is headed, before it runs us off the tracks.”

  Elliot caught the wrapper mid-air, his grin softening as he swung his legs down to sit up. “You’re still chewing on what Dain said? Aliens, tournaments, survival vibes, I think that dude was spitting a blockbuster teaser. Are you seriously buying those galactic things?”

  Marcus snapped his laptop shut with a decisive click, leaning back in his chair and crossing his arms. The faint hum of the fridge filled the pause. “I’m buying that Dain’s not a windbag who wastes breath,” he said, his voice edged with a pragmatism that sliced through Elliot’s levity, “Hyperion’s meeting’s tomorrow, somehome he’s got a play and we’re already in it as he said, like it or not. You don’t drop a bomb like that and walk away whistling.”

  Esterio nodded, his gaze drifting to the window where LA’s skyline shimmered in the haze. “And it’s not just Dain. EVO’s been twitchy, alerts and acting strange, I see lines I didn’t code keep popping up then vanishing. It’s not random noise and the way it keep doing that seem like it’s got purpose and tries to tell me something.”

  Elliot bolted upright, eyes widening as he tossed the wrapper aside, letting it skitter across the floor. “Wait, hold up, someone’s screwing with our baby? After we just proved it’s the best AI on the planet? That’s blasphemy!”

  “Not screwed with,” Esterio said, resuming his pacing, his voice low but firm, “more like a poked. I caught it again before we arrived at Universal, same message and no trace. Those lines of code seem like it’s teasing us.”

  Marcus leaned forward, elbows braced on the table, his usual smirk replaced by a flicker of unease. “That’s not right. We built EVO as a fortress, we locked it down tighter than a bank vault. If something’s slipping through security then it is not a normal at all.”

  Esterio veered toward the counter, snagging his laptop from beside the tea mug and flipping it open with a flick of his wrist. The screen’s glow cast faint shadows across his face as he propped it on the edge. “Exactly. No logs, no footprints,it just disappeared. I’m running a deep dive analysis tonight before Hyperion sits us down tomorrow. We need the answer so we don’t look like a fool in front of them.”

  Elliot hopped off the couch, shadowing Esterio with a bounce in his step, his hands shoved into his hoodie pockets. “What, no tacos first? You’re killing me, man, don’t let Dain’s sci-fi pitch tank the victory lap! We earned some grease after that Minion mayhem.”

  Marcus snorted, pushing up from his chair to grab a water bottle from the fridge. The door rattled as he yanked it open. “Victory lap’s over man, Esterio’s on the warpath now and you're stuck with us, so buckle up.”

  Esterio cracked a half-smile, plugging the laptop’s charger into the wall with a soft click. “Warpath pays off.

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  If this checks out clean, we’re hitting that taco truck tomorrow night, of course it is my treat.”

  “Sold!” Elliot grinned, darting back to the fridge and rummaging through it, the clink of jars and cans punctuating his hunt. “But if robots bust out of EVO, I’m still punching it first, I got that dibs, no take backs.”

  The room settled into a familiar hum, Elliot’s snack raid filling the air with rustles and muttered curses, Marcus tapping his phone with one hand while sipping water with the other, Esterio booting EVO’s interface. The screen flared to life, lines of code scrolling like a heartbeat across the display, crisp and precise. But a shiver ran down his spine, something off, a rhythm that didn’t match the system he’d built. He launched a deep scan, fingers flying across the keys with practiced speed, chasing shadows that flickered just beyond the edges of the digital weave.

  The hours bled away, dusk creeping into the apartment as the sun dipped below the skyline, painting the walls in soft purples and grays. Elliot crashed mid-snack, his head lolling back against the couch, a half-empty chip bag tipping onto the floor with a faint rustle. Marcus slouched in his chair, a finance podcast droning through earbuds, his eyelids drooping as the voice rambled about market trends. Esterio stayed locked in, the scan ticking upward, 95%, 97%, 98%, his focus narrowing to a razor’s edge. The room faded around him, the hum of the fridge and Elliot’s soft snores blending into white noise.

  At 99%, the screen glitched, not a crash, not an error, but a shimmer. Symbols flickered across the display, not the angular lines of modern code, but glyphs, flowing, ancient, glowing like embers in a dying fire. They danced for a heartbeat, melodic and strange, their curves and strokes weaving a pattern that tugged at something deep in his chest. Then they snapped away, replaced by a single line: Subroutine activated. Origin untraceable. Before he could move, the dashboard blinked back, pristine and silent, as if nothing had happened.

  Esterio’s breath caught, his hands hovering over the keys. Those glyphs, they weren’t random. They weren’t even code, not in any language that he’d studied at MIT or hacked together with EVO. They felt older, alive and stirring a memory he couldn’t place.

  Dreams flooded back remind him of those shimmering equations from his dorm nights, stretching into a void he couldn’t reach. And these glyphs carried weight, it feels a primal resonance, like a tongue which has been unspoken since humanity’s dawn. His pulse quickened, not because of fear, but a spark, sharp and unfamiliar, igniting in his veins.

  He leaned closer, replaying the moment in his mind. The glyphs had moved with intent, a whisper woven into EVO’s framework, it was always gone before he could grab it. Not Hyperion’s doing, no corp had tech this raw at this era that he awares of. His fingers twitched, itching to tear deeper into the system, but the scan was done, clean, according to the logs. Too clean. Whatever this was, it wasn’t leaving breadcrumbs, it was daring him to chase it.

  Marcus stirred, yanking an earbud free as the podcast looped to static. His voice cut through the haze, groggy but alert. “You froze up over there, did you find something?”

  Esterio shut the laptop with a soft thud, his voice low, measured. “Not sure yet, but those weren’t our lines that we wrote, these lines, I’ve never seen it before.”

  Marcus pushed up from the chair, stretching with a grunt, his water bottle clinking against the table as he set it down. “Can you define ‘not ours’ for me, are you talking about a breach?”

  “Not a breach,” Esterio said, standing to pace again, his sneakers scuffing the floor, “more like an echo, symbols, not code, ancient-looking, alive. Then vanished, like they were never there.”

  Elliot mumbled in his sleep, shifting as chips crunched under his arm. Marcus ran a hand through his hair, his brow arching. “Alive, huh? You’re sounding creepy now. Hyperion’s got deep tech, could be their signature sneaking in.”

  Esterio shook his head, stopping by the window to stare at the city’s glow. “Not their style. Hyperion is sleek and predictable but this was raw and messy. It looks like…. it’s watching us.”

  Marcus let out a low whistle, crossing his arms with a slow nod. “That’s a wild jump, but if it’s not them, we’re walking into the meeting tomorrow half-blind. Dain might know what’s tripping EVO, or he’s part of the game.”

  “Yeah,” Esterio said, turning back, his gaze sharp, “either way, we’re not playing catch-up. I’ll strip EVO down tonight, see if it coughs up more.”

  Elliot snored louder, a chip bag rustling as he rolled over. Marcus smirked, grabbing his phone off the table. “Good luck waking that one, he’s out ‘til tacos hit the table. I’ll dig into Hyperion’s public moves, see if anything lines up with this.”

  Esterio nodded, sinking back into his chair and flipping the laptop open again. The screen flared, EVO’s interface staring back, silent and unyielding. But those glyphs lingered in his mind, Edenic, unbroken, a whisper threading through his blood. Dain’s warning twisted anew, not a game, but a pull, a thread tightening around them.

  Something ancient was stirring, and EVO was just the spark.

  He cracked his knuckles, diving back into the code with a quiet intensity. The night stretched ahead, LA’s hum fading beyond the glass, a distant pulse against the stillness. Whatever this was, it wasn’t waiting, and neither was he. The glyphs had spoken, if only for a moment, and he’d chase that echo until it gave him answers.