The Residue

They said the soul was myth.

We proved otherwise.

In the recesses of a cadaver—

Long cold, long dry—

We found a trace.

It was not visible to the naked eye,

But our lenses and sensors saw

A disturbance.

Something small.

Something dense.

Something wrong.

There,

In a sliver of tissue

No larger than a coin,

Was a smear of darkness

That drank in light

Like a dying star.

We peeled back layers:

Leathered skin,

Stringy muscle,

Thickened sludge in the vessels,

Cracked cartilage,

Calcium dust of bone.

And there, deeper still—

At the core—

We found it:

A presence.

Not dead.

Not alive.

Just… remaining.

It was twisted in on itself,

Shrunken

Like a recluse in a crumbling manor,

Barricaded in a basement room.

It curled like a mollusk

Sealed behind a heavy lid,

Hiding

From mold,

From collapse,

From time.

And yet—

It felt.

As we cut,

As we drilled,

As we probed its prison of meat and marrow,

It twitched.

It recoiled.

It shuddered.

We knew then

This was no echo.

No remnant.

No trick of decay.

It was aware.

We had touched

Something sacred—

Or profane—

And it had felt the touch.

But science does not stop.

What is knowledge

If not pursued to the edge of madness?

The next phase begins:

Living hosts.

Open bodies.

Monitored pain.

We seek to catch the soul

Before it flees,

To witness its shape

In motion.

Before it hides.

Before it shrinks.

Before it remembers

What it means

To be.

Alone..