Author's POV
The base had been quiet for almost an hour.
Jay was asleep upstairs.
For the first time since returning from the hospital, she had finally managed to rest.
Nobody wanted to disturb her.
Downstairs, Alex sat alone in the operations room, going through the files recovered from Kyle's compound.
Most of them were useless.
Old names.
Old locations.
Old reports.
He opened another folder.
Nothing.
Another.
Still nothing.
Then he noticed something written near the bottom of one document.
An old property reference.
A neighboring house.
Alex frowned.
He opened the attached archive.
There were several old security recordings.
Most were corrupted.
One wasn't.
He checked the date.
His expression immediately changed.
It was the exact date.
The day Jay had been five.
Alex stared at the screen.
For several seconds, he didn't press play.
Then he did.
The footage appeared.
Grainy.
Old.
Taken from the neighboring house.
The camera faced toward one of the windows of Jay's home.
Alex leaned closer.
And froze.
A little girl appeared in the frame.
Jay.
She was tiny.
A doll rested in her hands.
She stood near the room while her mother quietly folded clothes.
Alex's expression softened.
Then the door opened.
Jay's father walked inside.
And behind him—
Kyle.
Alex stopped breathing for a moment.
He immediately grabbed his phone.
Within minutes, the room was full.
Keifer.
Angelo.
Aries.
Percy.
Cora.
Luna.
Denila.
Everyone stood around the screen.
Nobody knew why Alex had called them.
Alex didn't explain.
He simply pressed play.
The footage continued.
Little Jay was still holding her doll.
She looked completely unaware of what was about to happen.
Her mother continued folding clothes.
Then Jay's father began speaking.
The audio was too unclear to understand everything.
But the argument was obvious.
The atmosphere inside the room changed.
Everyone became completely still.
Keifer's eyes remained fixed on the little girl.
She looked so young.
So unaware.
Then Kyle moved closer.
The argument became more intense.
And suddenly—
the footage showed enough.
Kyle was the one who attacked Jay's father.
Nobody moved.
Nobody spoke.
The video continued for several seconds.
Little Jay remained there with her doll.
She hadn't done it.
She hadn't even understood what was happening.
Keifer stepped closer to the screen.
His face had gone completely blank.
"No…"
The footage continued.
He watched it again.
Then again.
As if somehow the answer would change.
It didn't.
His eyes remained fixed on little Jay.
That tiny girl.
The doll in her hands.
The same girl who had spent the last day crying because she believed she had killed her father.
Keifer's jaw tightened.
"She didn't do it."
His voice was barely audible.
Nobody answered.
Cora slowly covered her mouth.
Luna stared at the screen in disbelief.
Denila's usual expression had completely disappeared.
Aries looked like he couldn't process what he was seeing.
Percy remained silent.
Angelo—
Angelo couldn't move.
He stared at the screen.
At little Jay.
His eyes slowly filled.
"I thought…"
His voice broke.
"I thought she…"
He couldn't finish.
Percy looked at him.
Angelo lowered his head.
"I spent years thinking I was protecting her from what she had done."
His voice became quieter.
"But she didn't do anything."
Keifer didn't hear the rest.
He was still staring at the screen.
And suddenly—
everything Jay had said at the hospital came rushing back.
I'm a murderer.
Mom took the blame.
I killed him.
The words hit him one after another.
His hands slowly curled into fists.
Not because he was angry at Jay.
Because he finally understood.
She had been punishing herself.
Crying herself to sleep.
Refusing to speak to anyone.
Looking at the people she loved like she no longer deserved them.
All because she believed a lie.
Keifer's eyes hardened.
"He made her believe she was a murderer."
Nobody spoke.
Keifer looked toward the hallway leading upstairs.
His voice dropped.
"She was five."
That sentence seemed to break something inside everyone.
Cora's eyes filled with tears.
"He let her carry that all these years…"
Luna shook her head slowly.
"Why would he do that?"
Alex looked at the screen.
"Because he knew she wouldn't remember everything."
Keifer looked back at him.
"He knew."
Alex nodded.
"He knew her memories were fragmented."
Keifer stared at the footage again.
Kyle had known exactly what he was doing.
He had taken the missing pieces of a child's memory and filled them with a lie.
And Jay had believed him.
For years.
Keifer looked toward Jay's room again.
"I'm going to tell her."
Angelo immediately stopped him.
"Keifer."
Keifer turned.
"She's finally sleeping."
Keifer's expression softened slightly.
His anger didn't disappear.
But Jay came first.
He looked at the closed door upstairs.
After a long moment, he nodded.
"Then when she wakes up…"
He looked back at the screen.
His voice was quiet.
"…she's never going to believe that lie about herself again."
Percy placed a hand on Keifer's shoulder.
Nobody said anything after that.
The footage remained frozen on the screen.
Little Jay stood there with her doll.
Completely unaware that decades of guilt would someday be built around something she had never done.
And upstairs—
Jay slept peacefully for the first time in days.
Unaware that the truth had finally been found.
And that the people who loved her were waiting to give it back to her.