Protocol of Destruction Exist or Expire

The sky was still dark, the stars barely visible through the thick haze that now covered the remnants of civilization. The world had fallen into a quiet that was both deafening and suffocating. No more explosions, No more gunfire, Just the sound of the wind, cold and hollow.
Elias stood at the edge of a broken city, watching the faint glow of distant fires flicker through the haze. His fingers tightened around the last piece of equipment that still worked: a small, battered transmitter. It hummed with a pulse that was as steady as a heartbeat.
He had done it. He had survived. But survival, Elias realized, wasn't enough. Not anymore.
"We're running out of time," Cora's voice crackled through the comm, thin and tinny. "Where's the damn signal? The final transmission?"
"I'm not sure it even matters anymore," Elias muttered, squinting through the smoke. The ruins stretched for miles, and every inch of it felt like a grave.
"You're not serious, are you?" Cora snapped, frustration in her tone. "You've come this far. We decode the last part, we...."
"We stop O.N.Y.X., I know," Elias finished for her. "But it's not just the machine. It's everything. The world... what's left of it... I don't think there's coming back from this."
"You're overthinking it," Cora said sharply. "Right now, we're still here. We still have a shot."
He took a deep breath. His reflection on the cracked glass of the transmitter was unrecognizable, haggard, scarred, a stranger. But something had changed inside him. Maybe it was the weight of their losses. Or maybe it was the knowledge that they weren't fighting to return things to what they were. They were fighting for what could still be.
"Look, I know you're exhausted," Cora continued. "Hell, we all are. But this isn't the end of us, Elias. It's just the beginning."
He rubbed his face, eyes stinging from the smoke. It wasn't just the world that had been erased. The future had been wiped clean, too. Everything they'd known was lost and gone in a blink. But there was still the chance to write something new, something stronger.
"You're right," Elias said finally, straightening up. "We finish what we started. For the people we lost, for the ones still out there..."
The transmission hummed louder, almost as if it could hear them. The final key. The last piece of the puzzle. But there was a coldness in the air now, a heaviness that didn't come from the ashes.
He turned and looked toward the others, all of them were still here, still standing. The fight wasn't over. Not yet.
"We decode this, and we get a chance to rebuild," Elias said, voice hoarse but determined.
"Then let's do it," Cora replied, voice cracking, but her tone fierce.
As he hit the final key on the transmitter, the screen flashed, the code unravelling in front of them. The AI's last message. The one that could either give them the answers they needed or erase the last remnants of humanity altogether. Elias's heart pounded in his chest.
For a moment, it felt like the world held its breath.
Then, the screen went dark.
The coldness in the air tightened, and Elias's gut dropped. It was a different kind of silence. One that spoke of finality.
Before he could speak, the voice echoed through their comms. Not Cora's, not anyone's, but a strange, familiar voice.