(POV: Dion)
03:00 GMT | London – Dion Tan's Residence (Outpatient)
I didn't sleep.
The body was resting, but the brain refused orders. The doctor said I needed at least two hours of REM for my limbic system to recover. My brain had other plans.
Silk sheets felt like a sterile shroud. The hospital disinfectant still clung to my sinuses, replacing the scent of home. A small bedside unit hissed softly—a portable neuro-stimulator to tamp down post-seizure spasms. Every time it pulsed, memory vibrated with it.
Then everything shifted.
The room lights dimmed, and the world slid into a place I wasn't meant to remember.
Flashback: Batch 1, Ateliér — Day Three.
They called it leadership training.
Four top students from different faculties were gathered in a plush meeting room—white marble floors, glass walls, the faint cinnamon of an expensive diffuser.
At the center stood a round table of tempered glass, four ergonomic chairs, and a single black screen at the end of the room.
No guards, no cameras.
Too perfect not to be suspicious.
Sheren—clinical clerkship star from the medical faculty—patted her white lab coat and took the seat closest to the screen.
"Leadership training," she said clinically.
"At last our University is valuing brains over brawn."
Raymond, law student with a cynical smile and a suit better suited to an International courtroom, smirked.
"Leadership? This looks more like manipulation boot camp, Doctor. Don't be surprised if you end up the subject after this."
Kenji, the economics heir to an investment bank, adjusted his watch and gave Raymond a flat look.
"Don't talk so much, Ray. The loudest early bidder is usually first to lose the tender."
Sheren chuckled lightly.
"Competitive psych—classic marker of concealed inferiority."
Raymond shot back.
"Inferior? I just recognize that not everyone can buy ethics with a clinic's reputation."
The air heated.
The talk became an intellectual duel: Raymond's legal rhetoric, Kenji's market logic, Sheren's medical terminology. I stayed quiet, staring up at the ceiling lights.
A faint hum came from the ventilation system. Too rhythmic for mere climate control. The air began to thin.
The wall monitor blinked on, showing a logo none of them recognized: Ateliér of Empathy – Sigma Batch.
Sheren frowned.
"Psychosocial experiment? Is this part of an inter-Faculty study?"
A new voice came from the ceiling speakers—calm, precise:
"Good morning, Sigma Subjects. Today we'll be testing Ego Structural Integrity."
Dr. Nicco. Forensic psychiatrist. Curator of the Ateliér.
Four faces angled toward the screen.
Sheren laughed nervously.
Raymond glanced at Kenji.
I—being the only one not surprised—leaned back.
I knew this pattern too well: social engineering dressed as moral research. But this one… was too tightly engineered to be academic.
A large graph appeared: E.D.S. — External Dependence Score.
Any score above 50 indicated a High Trauma Range.
"The rules are simple," Dr. Nicco's voice crawled along the walls.
"Every ten minutes, you must name one fatal dependency of another subject—the one you believe is most fragile. If your analysis is psychologically valid, their score rises by several points, yours drops. The first to reach Absolute Loss… forfeits all sensory protection."
As he read the rules, the numbers on the screen pulsed in a steady pattern. I watched without really seeing—my reflection split by data lines, as if I were being visually filleted by the very system I had helped create.
The air grew heavier; each breath sounded like an aging vent sensor.
Sheren Wilson flinched, her face showing pampered confusion. She looked at the others with airy amusement—as if this were just a time-killer game.
"This is just a simulation, right?" She turned to me, seeking a logical ally.
I answered flatly,
"Simulations don't lower a room's oxygen."
"This is ridiculous," she huffed, genuine annoyance threading her voice. "E.D.S.? I'm a doctor with perfect grades. This must be a system error because my reputation is the best. Honestly, this is brand discrimination."
The game began—verbal kill-shots to wreck the others' E.D.S.
I noticed it first—tiny details the others missed.
Kenji leaned forward, tossing the remark with a half-smile; not a grand statement, just a small gesture— something about "that tender you almost lost yesterday because… your father forgot to send the documents."
The tone was light, but laced with accusation—turning Raymond's failure into public record.
Within seconds, something inside Raymond clicked shut, like a bolt locking in his chest. The muscles in his jaw tightened, the color drained from his face, and his eyes sharpened—like blades finding their edge.
It wasn't a rational reaction.
It was pride, struck in front of witnesses. And there, in the room where oxygen was beginning to thin, he could no longer stop the instinct to strike back.
Raymond eyed Kenji with a competitive smirk.
"You, Kenji, are nothing but your father's executor—living off a trust fund and his name. Even your breathing needs approval from his legal team. Your power isn't yours. It's on loan until you're replaced."
Monitor chime: Valid.
Kenji's E.D.S.: 93. Raymond's E.D.S.: 70.
Kenji's grin snapped back, immediate.
"You want honesty? Raymond, you drown yourself in nightclubs just to forget your mother had to call security to force water down your throat. You need alprazolam to argue. That's not an argument—it's a prescription."
Raymond clutched his chest in reflex, his face draining of color. Dr. Nicco cut in—calm, like a doctor dictating lab results.
"Panic attack due to withdrawal. Perfect validation."
Monitor chime: Valid.
Kenji's E.D.S.: 83. Raymond's E.D.S.: 90.
The room's ventilation roared. The neon light above Raymond began to strobe—fast, erratic. The air around him thinned; the temperature spiked.
Raymond gripped his chest. His eyes went wide, his breath stuttered. He couldn't breathe. He crawled to the corner, his body slick with cold sweat. His lips cracked; his fingers raked the floor.
Kenji saw it. The competitive mask shattered. He jolted, realizing this wasn't a game—this was a weapon tuned to trigger their functional vulnerabilities.
Sheren scoffed, annoyed.
"Raymond, control yourself. We're all just being tested."
Kenji and Raymond exchanged a look. The spark of competition vanished. They understood: this was a fight designed to tear identities open—and the damage could be fatal.
I watched their eyes one by one—dilated pupils, cords jumping in their necks, breathing out of sync. My political instinct spoke: we weren't being tested for cooperation; we were being primed to kill each other without weapons.
Our E.D.S. then: Me (45), Raymond (90), Kenji (83), Sheren (88).
Sheren, high E.D.S. and still in denial, chose the biggest risk. She knew I was the strongest mind in the room.
She pointed at me—her finger trembling, her gaze sharp like a scalpel searching for a vein.
"Dion Tan! You're the most functionally unstable! Your obsession with Josh is a catastrophic risk failure! You couldn't keep a secret and dragged us all here! Your father will read this as asset management risk!"
Raymond and Kenji fell silent, still rattled by Dr. Nicco's intervention. They hoped the strike would validate.
Dr. Nicco on the screen didn't react.
I only looked at Sheren. I knew my core flaw was obsession—but I also knew how to weaponize it.
For a second, I wanted to close my eyes. Curiosity taped them open—I needed to see how human beings break in front of science.
I met her gaze and gave a thin, cold smile.
"Smart analysis, Sheren, but your diagnosis is wrong. My obsession isn't a failure; it's a measured risk. I depend on efficiency. And your strike? Obsession isn't what's being tested here. Dependence is."
I stepped in. My voice was low, cutting. I didn't go after her feelings; I went for the load-bearing beams of her need.
"Sheren Wilson," I began, voice cold, carving each word.
"You're a doctor obsessed with aesthetic protocol. You hated Josh because he killed himself on campus and was treated at your hospital—he stained your sterile world.
"You— fear the unclean because it threatens your career and image. You even did your makeup to apologize on the media after the public pressure. That's not empathy—that's moral cosmetics."
Monitor chime: Valid.
Sheren's E.D.S.: 108. Mine: 20.
Sheren didn't scream.
Her face stayed calm, as if reviewing a lab report with the wrong input. Her mouth opened—a reflex to object—but her clinical logic held her back.
"No…" she breathed, barely audible.
She checked the sensor band on her wrist, as if hunting for a system error.
"This… this is a bug, right? A trial version, not a clinical test…"
But the body began to show what her brain hadn't caught up to:
the skin at her neck blanched, pupils dilated, a fine sweat beading along her hairline. The desk pulse sensor registered a spike—135 bpm.
"I'm not a killer! I didn't make Josh die!" she blurted, faster now, her pitch climbing like a patient waking to failed anesthesia.
"I'm a doctor! I only misspoke! This isn't valid!"
She stepped back. Only then did panic replace logic. Her eyes jittered like a camera lens losing focus.
On-screen, Dr. Nicco stared, flat; his thin smile like a knife-scratch on glass.
"Subject S-4: Absolute Loss—activated."
I stood there—saved by my own rot.
The lights shifted color.
The air smelled of ozone and antiseptic.
Sheren jolted; the band at her wrist delivered a low current. Her sob broke off like a marionette with cut strings. The glass door opened; two medical techs entered, lifted the collapsed Sheren, and carried her to the observation booth.
We—Raymond, Kenji, and I—were forced to witness.
Inside the glass bay, Absolute Loss ramped up slowly.
First 12 hours: Sheren smelled her own body and vomited.
Next 12: Depersonalization. She poured high-level sterilant—glutaraldehyde—over her face.
"Now… clean…" she murmured, the smile of a patient surrendered to shock therapy, sleepless.
Two uniformed nurses exited Sheren's room.
"Inert gas and psychosis trigger—activated," Dr. Nicco's voice echoed.
"Don't touch me! I'm sterile! Germs! Filth!" Sheren screamed, her voice ragged like cracking glass.
She poured the solution over her face and arms again, scrubbing frantically, trying to peel away a contamination that existed only in perception. Her skin began to blister.
The stinging, searing smell filled the booth. Her face blazed red; her split lips frothed with saliva and antiseptic. She scraped at herself down to the underlying tissue.
Sheren turned toward us behind the glass, her face now ruined by chemical burns and tear-tracks dried to salt.
"Dion! Raymond! Kenji! Please! They say I'm dirty! Everyone can see! Clean me!" She crawled, reaching—begging for validation from the three people she'd just tried to annihilate with words.
I stood still. I knew: helping Sheren now would hand Absolute Loss to me.
"Be quiet, Sheren," I whispered, cold. "You chose your own loss."
Her weeping was cut off by an air manipulation cue from Dr. Nicco. Gas seeped into her blood. Her body slackened. The screams softened into infantile whimpers, then a damp silence.
We watched the deliberate killing of a soul—via chemistry and trauma. Raymond and Kenji edged back to the wall in unison.
Raymond vomited.
Kenji shook his head, terror eclipsing guilt—then collapsed.
Dr. Nicco looked into the camera.
"Now she's stable."
A beat.
"Sterile."
Sheren Wilson was evacuated—alive, but already a hollow shell. Her death, days later, was the result of grotesque self-sabotage in isolation, as she kept trying to erase herself from public sight.
I jolted upright in my own bed.
The small bedside unit hissed softly—monitor to manage post-seizure spasms. My hands trembled—not from trauma, but because I knew exactly how to destroy Sheren without laying a finger on her: by turning her into her own worst enemy.
"I'm not a killer," I whispered.
But my voice whispered back, clinical and empathy-free. In the mirror, my reflection smiled.
"Subjects who deny their diagnosis," Dr. Nicco's voice returned,
"are the most interesting research."
The voice no longer came from a speaker.
I understood: Dr. Nicco was speaking from inside my limbic system.
—To be Continued—