Chapter 182: Vale's Explanation

Nathan Vale finally agreed to a formal interview.

His lawyers negotiated every condition.

Freya was not present.

She watched the recorded portions investigators later cleared for her.

Vale was in his late fifties, composed, silver-haired, and annoyingly calm.

He admitted creating Observer_0.

That ended one mystery.

He admitted designing WAKE's unknown-endpoint experiments.

He admitted using Eliza's branch requests without her knowledge.

He denied causing Freya's transmigration.

"I don't know what happened to Ms. Stone," he said. "Anyone claiming certainty is lying."

Freya disliked him slightly less for that sentence.

Vale explained his theory.

Crosswind had accidentally discovered a channel through which structured narrative data could appear in an unrelated information environment.

He believed similarity acted as an address.

A story describing Louis, Serena, Freya, and others could connect to another environment containing sufficiently similar identity patterns.

The theory sounded impossible.

Vale acknowledged that.

He had spent years trying to falsify it.

He failed.

Investigators asked why he continued without consent.

Vale paused.

"Because discovery is difficult to stop once you know it exists."

That answer made Freya dislike him again.

He claimed WAKE could exchange information, not people.

When asked about Freya awakening with memories from another world, he had no explanation.

He suggested three possibilities.

Coincidence.

A phenomenon beyond WAKE.

Or Freya's interpretation of her memories being incomplete.

Louis became angry at the third.

Freya did not.

It was scientifically fair to question her interpretation.

She knew what she remembered.

That did not require everyone else to accept it without evidence.

Then investigators showed Vale OPEN_PAGE_BRANCH_001.

For the first time, his composure broke.

He recognized the format.

Crosswind's adaptive engine generated branch-range files exactly like it.

But the engine had been shut down years ago.

"Could Eliza recreate it?"

"Yes."

"Could you?"

"Yes."

"Did you?"

"No."

Vale asked where the file appeared.

Investigators did not tell him.

He then said something unexpected.

"If the range ends at 740, find the start value."

Everyone had focused on the ending.

The file began at 171.

Why?

Chapter 171 was when the second book copy was examined.

But the file existed months earlier.

Before the books were printed.

Freya felt cold again.

Vale suggested that 171 might not refer to Freya's life.

It could be an internal branch identifier coincidentally matching the chapter sequence.

Possible.

Or someone had planned the books months in advance.

Also possible.

The interview ended without solving it.

But Vale had given them one useful shift.

Stop staring only at 740.

Ask why the system began counting at 171.

Vale also emphasized that his theory had never passed ordinary replication standards. Unknown packets were rare, equipment changed over time, and several early logs were incomplete. Freya appreciated hearing the limitations. A strange hypothesis became more trustworthy when its advocate admitted where it could fail.

Freya recorded the facts separately from her assumptions and continued with the next practical step. That habit had become one of the strongest protections she possessed. A dramatic explanation could wait; evidence could not. Louis understood the difference, and together they refused to let uncertainty turn ordinary decisions into reactions to a story neither of them had chosen.

Freya recorded the facts separately from her assumptions and continued with the next practical step. That habit had become one of the strongest protections she possessed. A dramatic explanation could wait; evidence could not. Louis understood the difference, and together they refused to let uncertainty turn ordinary decisions into reactions to a story neither of them had chosen.

Freya recorded the facts separately from her assumptions and continued with the next practical step. That habit had become one of the strongest protections she possessed. A dramatic explanation could wait; evidence could not. Louis understood the difference, and together they refused to let uncertainty turn ordinary decisions into reactions to a story neither of them had chosen.