Chapter 41 Just Echoes
Zara’s POV
Everything went silent.
One second, a junior was charging toward me, fist raised.
The next second… she collapsed at my feet like a puppet whose strings had been cut.
Dead.
Just....dead.
I blinked, confused, because for some strange reason, my head felt too light… like someone had just scooped a piece out of my memory.
It felt like I had become blank all of a sudden.
“When did you get here, Kai?” I asked softly, turning to him.
His eyes widened in alarm before he schooled his expression into calm.
Something was wrong. I could feel it in the tension radiating off him and the rest of my friends too.
“Zara…” he began.
But my vision blurred. The cafeteria dissolved. Noise disappeared.
And suddenly....
I was somewhere else.
The battlefield stretched endlessly. It appeared to be an ocean of bodies, broken armor, and scorched earth.
The air tasted like the sharp edges of a knife… sharp… alive with power.
My breath fogged before me, though the scene was blazing hot.
I stood in the center of it all, barefoot, my skin glowing faintly like molten starlight.
All around me… wolves lay dying.
Not just wolves.
Creatures.
Beings.
Soldiers of different worlds.
Their souls flickered like candles in a storm.
And then… their flickers turned toward me.
Like they were being drawn to me.
Hungry.
No.
Not them!
I was hungry.
I felt every heartbeat, every dying breath, like a pulse calling me forward.
I opened my mouth to scream, but what tore out was power, not sound.
My body shivered.
The ground cracked.
Bodies rose into the air as if gravity had surrendered.
Their souls ripped free, streams of pure energy, light, memory, pain, blood.
They rushed toward me in spirals.
Filling me.
Drowning me.
I devoured an entire battlefield.
Not with teeth.
Not with hands.
With something inside me that was barely wolf… and completely wrong.
I tasted galaxies.
I tasted endings.
I tasted myself.
A voice whispered behind me, calm and ancient:
“Devourer… awaken.”
I spun....
But before I could see who spoke, the world shattered.
How?
How could this be happening?
I couldn't be a killer. No, never!!!
My body jerked violently. I couldn't breathe well. My chest tightened within me.
I gasped.
And I woke up.
I wasn’t in the cafeteria anymore.
I was lying on my bed in my dorm, sweat soaking my shirt and clinging to my spine.
My throat burned like I’d swallowed fire.
My hands were shaking uncontrollably.
What… what was that?
I pressed my palms to my face and exhaled shakily.
That wasn’t a dream.
It felt like a memory.
Or a warning.
My door creaked open.
“Zara?”
Mira walked in, her eyes darting around like she was expecting shadows to jump out at her. She held her tablet close to her chest, her fingers gripping the edges hard.
“You fainted,” she said.
“Kai carried you here before Dr. Voss could show up.”
I swallowed.
“Did anyone else… see what happened?”
“No.” Her voice was tight.
“But, Zara... I fear that something is happening to you.”
She sat beside me and pulled up a holographic screen.
Lines of shifting symbols hovered in the air, way too sharp to be human, too smooth to be wolf.
“They’re signals,” Mira whispered.
“Signals from where?” I asked.
She hesitated.
“I should call Kai.“ She said.
"No... Not yet. Show me!" I said.
Then she zoomed out the map.
My breath stopped.
“These… aren’t coming from Earth,” she said.
“They’re transmissions. Triangulated from multiple relay points… orbiting above us.”
Orbiting.
Above us.
Like...
“Zara… someone off-planet is monitoring the academy.” Mira’s voice shook.
“And the timing of the signals matches your power surges exactly.”
Her eyes met mine.
“You’re connected to something… not from here.”
A cold, prickling sensation crawled up my spine.
I hugged my knees to my chest, suddenly feeling too small for my own skin.
“What kind of signals?” I whispered.
Mira turned her screen toward me again.
The hologram changed....
Now showing pulses, steady and rhythmic, like a heartbeat.
But not a human one.
Not a wolf one either.
“They’re not messages,” Mira said.
“They’re… scans.”
“Scans?” I echoed, my voice barely audible.
“Yes. Something is scanning your energy levels. Tracking them.” She swallowed.
“Every spike. Every drop. Every… abnormality.”
My chest tightened.
My throat closed.
“Mira… what if that dream wasn’t a dream?” I whispered.
“What if it was something watching me? Or remembering through me?”
Her face paled.
“I thought of that too.”
The room felt too small.
The air too thick.
My skin prickled with static energy, buzzing beneath the surface like electricity trapped inside my bones. The dream still clung to me... the battlefield, the souls, the voice.
Devourer.
My heart thudded painfully.
“Mira,” I said slowly.
“What if… I’m the reason they’re watching the academy?”
She didn’t answer immediately.
Her eyes dropped to the glowing symbols floating above her tablet.
“Zara…” she whispered at last.
“I think they’re not just watching you.”
She turned the screen again.
Multiple signals began to light up but only one pulsed brighter than all the rest.
Mine.
“They’re looking for you.”
Her words fell like stones in my stomach.
I stared at the glowing pulse on the hologram... It felt alive and something inside my mind trembled.
The battlefield.
The souls.
The hunger.
What if that wasn’t a glimpse of the past or future?
What if it was a glimpse of what I really am?
I shivered violently.
“Mira… I’m scared,” I whispered.
Mira squeezed my hand tightly.
“And that,” she said softly.
"Is why we’re going to figure this out together. Before anyone else does.”
"We're going to protect you from whatever you were in Luna's planet."
"How... They destroyed their world." I said.
"What makes you think that they'll be able to protect me from myself?"
"You just have to trust Zara. Trust." She stated.
But outside my window, the sky flickered faintly.... as if something far, far above the clouds had just blinked back.
And for the first time…
I felt it watching.