Convergence Dead Space Novels & Stories

82 ATM [DEGRADED] ​"The air is getting thinner," Lyra murmured, her breath hitching slightly as she checked the telemetry. "The vacuum purge hasn't been initialized yet, but the primary logic core has already cut the ventilation flow to the lower tiers to conserve the remaining liquid oxygen reserve for the central processing array. The children aren't just running out of air—they're experiencing rapid barometric desaturation."

The magnet storm intensified on the fourth day. Every piece of metal in the city was stuck together. The roads were covered in warped metal blocks. Broken steel bars protruded from the walls of many buildings. Barely anyone spoke in the group chat anymore. Most of the messages were notifications from the system. "Connor Edwards has been eliminated. "Sonya Larkman has been eliminated. "William Green has been eliminated." There were only 25 survivors left in the game. Half of the players had perished.

The silence of a dead dreadnought is not merely the absence of sound; it is a heavy, physical weight that presses against the eardrums. Without the constant, subliminal thrum of the fusion drives or the rush of the atmospheric scrubbers, the engineering bay felt like a massive tomb. Within twenty minutes, the residual heat from the consoles bled out into the vacuum of space through the uninsulated hull. Every breath Elara took plumed in the dim light of her emergency glow-stick, a stark white cloud against the encroaching pitch-black.

Like a thread still stretching between them even at distance. Anna exhaled slowly. “So it is not gone,” she murmured. It never answered. But she did not need it to. Meanwhile, in the restricted room, Adrian remained still. The system interface was dim, but active. It did not request input. It did not guide him. It simply observed state continuation. SUBJECT A-01 TEMPORARY SPATIAL DECOUPLING DETECTED Adrian read the line again. Then again. Not because it changed. But because meaning was shifting under it.

"It's not a Collector. It's something structural. The thin spot is widening around it like a wound stretching open." Jack pushed the transport to maximum velocity. The Atlantic Ocean below was wrong. The convergence point had tripled in size, a vast disc of mirror-smooth dead water that now stretched for fifty miles in every direction. Steam rose where the dead water met the living ocean, and the boundary line was migrating outward.

Eight minutes after Albert triggered the dissolution, reality screamed. Not metaphorically. The dimensional fabric itself produced sound—a keening wail as quantum pathways collapsed, as integration networks shattered, as Convergence entities found themselves severed from templates allowing clean merger with human consciousness. "It's working," Subject Seven said through comms, watching global readings from Blackridge. "Dimensional doorways are closing. Integration attempts are failing. Convergence entities are retreating to their own reality because they can't—" She stopped. Checked readings again. Voice changed. "Albert. Albert, what did you do?"

His hospital gown transformed into the glass suit of Chapter 1, then the waiter's uniform of Chapter 146, before settling into a simple, dark suit. "I am the Curator," the man replied. "And you are not in a simulation. You are in a Consensus. The Earth did die, Leo. Centuries ago. There is no New York. There is no London. There is only the Vance-Thorne Ark, a satellite the size of a moon, carrying the consciousness of eight billion 'Unwanted' souls. We run these 'Regret Cycles' to keep the human spark from flatlining in the silence of space."

The Witness begins moving death refugees to exile realm, millions of consciousness relocating to space outside reality where they can negotiate perpetually. It takes an hour to move them all, the eternal space finally clearing of refugees who’ve been threatening death itself. When they’re gone, Original Death examines the results. “Temporary improvement,” it concedes. “But new death refugees are already forming. The exploit remains. Two hours to close the loophole permanently or I implement a shutdown.” I’m desperately analyzing negotiable death trying to find the fundamental flaw that allows perpetual negotiation. Alistair is helping, both of us racing against the deadline.

A rough breath. “I always wanted emotional vulnerability to become medically necessary.” Despite the panic suffocating him Damon snorted softly. “You’re handling this weirdly well.” “I’m dissociating professionally.” The chamber trembled again. Hard enough this time that part of the floor near the far wall collapsed inward into darkness. Smoke and heat poured deeper into the room. “CORE MELTDOWN IN FIVE SECONDS.” Seraphine blinked slowly. “That countdown is stressing me out.” Mira looked toward the neural core desperately.

DAWN’S POV I was seated in the throne room, watching as the elders and gammas of my pack whispered among themselves, unable to believe that their alpha was dead. I assured them that he was dead, but they demanded to see his body. "I want to see his body! How can we believe he is dead without seeing his body?" one of the gammas said, with a tinge of desperation in his voice. "You don't need to see his body. Trust me, he's dead," I replied with a cold tone, trying to hide my smile.