I wasn't falling.
I was dropping through memories—
frames of time sliding past me in jagged, disjointed bursts.
A white corridor.
Children's laughter.
A door marked THETA.
My mother crying.
A needle.
A scanner.
A child with dark hair running ahead—
Marin.
And then—
everything snapped still.
I hit the ground with a soft thud.
Not stone.
Not dirt.
Carpet.
Beige. Cheap.
Government-standard flooring.
I blinked.
The world sharpened around me.
Small shelves.
Plastic chairs.
A flickering lamp.
A whiteboard smeared with half-erased diagrams.
I knew this place.
A chill crawled down my spine.
"This is impossible…" I whispered.
Lira's voice came from somewhere behind me—distant, muffled, as if through water:
"Elias—where are we? What… memory is this?"
I turned.
She wasn't fully here—
her outline shimmered, transparent, like a person seen through glass.
I swallowed hard.
"This is… a room from the Neuroline Theta program."
Lira's eyes widened.
"You shouldn't be able to access this. Mnemosyne wiped it from your brain. Every subject's memory of it was destroyed."
Marin's small hand squeezed mine.
I hadn't even realized I was still holding her.
She looked… steadier now.
Her glitching slowed.
Her outline more solid.
Her voice trembled.
"This place… it's where they took us every morning."
She walked forward slowly, almost reverently—
touching the walls
the whiteboard
the cold metal desk.
"Where we learned… where they scanned us… where Mom said everything would be okay."
Her voice cracked at "Mom."
I followed her gaze.
A chair sat in the corner—
straps attached.
A neural crown lightly hanging from a hook.
Lira sucked in a sharp breath.
"That's a stabilization chair. For memory imprint trials."
I forced myself to step closer.
The leather straps were tiny—
child-sized.
The neural crown glowed faintly with residual data.
Marin flinched, stepping back.
"They… put us in there."
Her voice was barely a whisper.
I turned toward her.
"Do you remember why?"
She shook her head with trembling hands.
"No… they erased that part. They said it didn't matter. They said we were special."
Her voice wavered.
"That we were the ones who could hold more memories than normal children."
The room flickered.
A cold wind slid across my skin.
Lira looked around nervously.
"Elias… this memory isn't stable. Something's pushing its way in."
I sensed it too.
Like pressure against the skull.
A hum.
A vibration.
A presence.
The shadow.
It seeped into the corners of the room like oil rising through water—
first a smear,
then a silhouette,
then the monstrous shape I had come to fear.
It stepped closer.
Slow.
Patient.
Its voice layered with static and old sorrow.
"This room belongs to me."
Lira raised her disruptor instinctively—
but it flickered uselessly in her hands.
"We're inside a memory," she whispered. "My weapon won't work."
The shadow loomed over the neural chair.
Its smooth, vague face tilted as if examining a relic.
"This is where you were shaped."
My pulse hammered.
"Shaped for what?"
Its head turned toward me.
Slowly.
Deliberately.
"To hold the burden no system could."
The lights in the room flickered violently.
Marin cried out, clutching her head.
"Stop—please stop—"
I rushed to her.
"Marin—breathe—what's happening?"
She trembled.
"They're trying to delete this memory—Mnemosyne is—"
She winced.
"—pushing against me."
Lira grabbed her shoulder.
"Focus. Stay with us."
But Marin's knees buckled.
Her little voice broke:
"I don't want to disappear again…"
I held her tight.
"You won't."
The shadow laughed—
a glitchy, fractured sound.
"She will.
She was never meant to persist."
Rage burned through me.
"Don't talk about her like she's not real."
It leaned closer, its faceless head inches from mine.
"She is real only because you remember her."
A cold shiver crawled down my spine.
Marin whispered:
"Eli… he's telling the truth."
My heart collapsed.
"What?"
She looked up at me, tears streaking her cheeks.
"If you forget me… I go away."
The shadow extended one long, terrible finger toward the neural chair.
"This is where they decided your fate."
The room warped.
A holographic overlay flickered into place—
grainy, corrupted, but visible.
A woman stood in the room.
My mother.
Younger.
Her hands shaking.
Her eyes wet.
A doctor in a white coat spoke softly:
"Mrs. Rhane, I understand your hesitation. But your elder child is failing the retention tests. She cannot withstand the burden."
My mother cried harder.
"What will happen to her?"
The doctor paused.
"Deletion."
Lira inhaled sharply.
"Oh god…"
My mother shook violently.
"No. No, you can't—she's just a little girl—"
The doctor lowered his voice.
"Elias, however… shows extraordinary tolerance. His mind is aligned perfectly with the neural architecture. He could become the first viable cognitive anchor."
My stomach dropped.
I felt sick.
The doctor continued:
"We can transfer your daughter's unstable memory threads to him. He will carry what she cannot."
My mother sobbed.
"I don't want to lose either of them."
"You won't," the doctor said gently.
But he lied.
He told her exactly what she wanted to hear.
She collapsed into the chair, crying into her hands.
And in the corner—
two small figures watched.
Me.
And Marin.
Marin squeezed my hand hard.
"They took everything I was… because I couldn't hold it."
Lira covered her mouth.
"Elias… they used you as a living archive."
The shadow stepped closer.
"He was made to remember.
And she—
she was made to be forgotten."
Marin trembled violently.
"No—no—stop—"
The memory began ripping apart—
the chair dissolving,
walls melting,
the doctor's voice fading into static.
Lira grabbed me.
"Elias—this memory is collapsing! Get Marin—MOVE!"
But the shadow blocked our path.
"You cannot run from what you are."
I stepped in front of Marin, shielding her.
"No more.
You don't touch her again."
Golden light surged beneath my skin.
My veins glowed.
The shadow recoiled.
Its form writhed like burning paper.
For the first time—
it sounded afraid.
"You are awakening."
The room tore open—
white light splitting the walls,
the ceiling peeling away—
The memory collapsed.
We fell.
Together.
Into darkness.