The first sign of the burn was the sky turning red.
Not sunset red—
error red,
the color screens flashed when memory data corrupted beyond salvage.
Lira grabbed the back of my jacket.
"They've initiated Sector Burn. Elias—if we're still above ground in two minutes, there will be nothing left of us."
Her voice shook.
Not with fear—
with certainty.
This was the protocol Mnemosyne used when containment failed.
When a rogue anomaly (me) threatened system stability.
The ground rumbled.
The air thickened with static.
Above us, the grid pulsed.
Red light bled through cracks in the sky.
SECTOR 12 PURGE PROTOCOL:
ENGAGED.
My skin prickled.
Something inside my skull sparked—
a flicker of static across thought.
Lira saw me stagger.
"Elias—your bleed just spiked again."
My vision rippled.
The world doubled—
two overlapping images sliding across each other.
I blinked.
In one reality, Lira was standing to my right.
In another… to my left.
Both breathed.
Both spoke.
Both existed.
"You're splitting perception," Lira said urgently. "We have seconds."
I tried to answer—
but words broke apart in my mouth.
"Lira, I— I think— I'm… remembering wrong."
She didn't waste time.
She grabbed my wrist.
"Move."
We ran.
My legs stumbled from the shifting world.
Every shadow had teeth.
Every sound had an echo that wasn't sound.
We reached the edge of a broken stairwell—
descending underground.
Lira pointed.
"That way. The tunnels. They're off-grid. Mnemosyne can't burn what it can't map."
Another tremor shook the street.
A building folded in on itself—
not collapsing
but vanishing—
like a thought forgotten.
I hesitated at the stairwell.
Something felt wrong there.
Like walking into a memory I didn't want to remember.
Lira tugged me forward—
But a long dark shape rippled across the ground.
Then the shadow stepped between us.
Its form had changed.
It was no longer just a smear on the wall.
It had mass now.
Arms.
A torso.
Long legs bent at impossible angles.
A face… smooth, like melted wax.
Lira raised her disruptor.
"Back off!"
The shadow didn't move.
It turned its featureless face toward me.
A soft whisper, layered with many voices, drifted out:
"You are losing yourself."
I stepped back.
"What are you?"
Its head twitched.
"I am what remains when memory dies."
Another boom echoed overhead.
Sector Burn creeping closer.
Lira shouted:
"We don't have time for this!"
She fired.
The disruptor hit the shadow—
and this time, it felt it.
Its form rippled violently, distorting into black tendrils.
A sound like shrieking static tore through the alley.
But the shadow didn't fall.
It regrew.
Faster.
Stronger.
And now—
with a spine.
Lira swore under her breath.
"Elias—run. Run NOW!"
But I couldn't.
Because behind the shadow—
I saw something forming.
Something small.
Flickering.
Barely human.
Marin.
Her outline appeared like a corrupted hologram, glitching in and out—
a little girl this time.
Seven at most.
Bare feet.
Trembling.
Her voice was faint, fragile:
"Eli… it hurts…"
My chest split open.
"Marin—"
She lifted her small hand—
And screamed.
The sound wasn't loud.
It was wrong.
A trembling, broken noise that cracked the world around her.
Memory dust rose from the ground.
Walls vibrated.
Even the shadow recoiled.
Lira's hands shook.
"She's destabilizing… Elias—she's tearing herself apart trying to reach you."
I took a step forward.
But the ground beneath me flickered—
like a corrupted file trying to blink out of existence.
I stumbled.
My hand passed through a wall that wasn't there.
Then through the air that wasn't air.
Lira grabbed my shoulders.
"Elias! Focus! You're losing spatial anchoring!"
I blinked.
But the world blinked with me—
frames missing—
streets jumping—
Lira stuttering like a glitching video.
I gasped:
"Lira… I don't know which world is real."
She cupped my face, forcing me to hold her gaze.
"This one," she whispered fiercely. "Right here. Right now. Stay here with me."
My heart slammed.
Her voice tethered me—
for one breath.
Then the shadow moved.
Fast.
Too fast.
It lunged toward Marin's small glitching form.
A twisted arm reached for her chest.
Marin screamed, stumbling backward.
"No—NO—NOT AGAIN—"
And something in me broke.
The bleed exploded outward.
This time not light—
but darkness threaded with gold, sharp like fractured glass.
It ripped through the air—
shattering concrete, splitting the pavement.
The shockwave struck the shadow.
It screeched.
Its limbs twisted.
Its torso buckled inward—
like folding paper.
It stumbled back—
but didn't fall.
Didn't die.
It straightened, regaining shape.
Slowly.
As if taunting me.
Lira dragged me toward the stairwell.
"Elias—they're going to burn the whole sector in seconds!"
But I couldn't leave Marin.
She was collapsing again, collapsing small—
a glitch child crying into her hands.
I reached for her—
But the world shook violently.
A red flare shot upward.
A voice thundered through the air:
"SECTOR 12 PURGE: FINAL INITIATION."
The ground brightened, splitting with searing heat.
The burn was starting.
Lira grabbed my arm and screamed:
"ELIAS—MOVE!"
But something strange happened.
Marin's little body jerked—
and her form flickered into two.
One Marin screamed.
One whispered.
One reached for me.
One dissolved.
Two versions of her—
a broken timeline converging on me.
My mind reeled.
My voice cracked:
"Which one is real?!"
Lira answered with raw fear.
"Both—NEITHER—Elias, your memory bleed is creating branching echoes! You're collapsing the sector!"
The shadow roared.
The sky roared back.
The world caught fire.
And in the middle of that blazing collapse—
Marin whispered one word through glitching lips:
"…Help…"
That was enough.
I grabbed her hand.
Lira shrieked:
"ELIAS, DON'T—"
Too late.
The world inverted.
Everything went white.
Everything went silent.
Everything went inside-out.
I felt my mind peel—
as if the bleed reached stage four.
When I opened my eyes—
I was no longer standing.
I was falling.
Into someone else's memory.
Into my own.
Into something Mnemosyne never wanted me to see.