You wake to silence that doesn't feel empty - it feels held. Like someone is pressing their palm over the mouth of the world.
The room is bright white. Not clean, not sterile. Just white, like someone erased everything that was supposed to be here. No windows. No doors. No seams between floor and wall and ceiling. You are inside a thought that hasn't been finished.
And then you notice the envelope.
It lies flat on your chest, sealed with red wax that bears no mark. No name, no address. Only a single line printed across the front:
"YouhavebeenassignedMemory#311. Returnittoitsrightfulowner. Orcease."
You don't remember falling asleep.
You don't remember waking up.
You don't remember who you are.
Your hands shake as you peel it open.
Inside: a single sheet of paper, yellowed and curling at the corners. Water damage warps the ink. But you can still read it.
"Iwassix. Idrownedinthebathtub. Thewaterturnedred, eventhoughtherewasnoblood. Mymotherscreamedbutnosoundcameout. ThenIsawtheshadowinthemirrorsmile."
Your eyes sting. There's no sound, but something behind your ribs shifts, like a string being plucked.
You don't remember this. You shouldn't remember this. But something in it feels lived. Not yours - but close. Like someone else's dream bleeding through your skull.
You fold the paper. Try standing. Your legs hold, barely. The room is too quiet. You press your hand to the wall - it's warm. It pulses once.
Then a voice hisses from nowhere and everywhere.
"Memory: 1. Time: Unknown. Begin."
The walls vibrate. A faint click. You spin around just in time to see the wall behind you folding away like paper under fire, revealing a hallway that shouldn't exist.
The light outside the room is darker. Tinted yellow, like it's been aged. You take a step. The floor beneath your foot changes texture - tiles giving way to smooth concrete.
You hear something.
Breathing.
Not yours.
You turn.
There's a mirror in the hallway now.
But the person staring at you isn't breathing.
They don't blink.
And they're not you.
They look like you. Same clothes. Same face. But their eyes are wide, staring. Their reflection is delayed by just a second. It smiles after you do.
You look down. In your hand, the paper is gone. You never let go of it. You check your pockets. Nothing.
The mirror is still smiling.
And behind you, something wet and invisible drips onto your shoulder.
You don't run.
Running feels loud, like an admission. Like prey.
Instead, you walk - fast, quiet steps down a hall that bends before you reach the end. The mirror is behind you, but the sound of dripping is not.
You don't look back.
The hallway warps as you move. The air thickens. Doors appear on the walls - old, wooden, numbered with rusted plates. Some have names scratched into them. Some are cracked open. All of them hum.
You stop in front of one marked Room17–Kael.
Something about the name stops you. Your hand rises to knock - and freezes.
A voice inside says, "I didn't do it."
You push the door open.
Inside is a child's bedroom, walls painted with stars. A nightlight glows in the corner. On the bed sits a man in his twenties, knees drawn up to his chest, whispering over and over.
"I didn't do it. I didn't. I didn't."
He looks up.
You know him.
No. You don't.
But your throat still tightens like you're supposed to.
His eyes flick to yours, then to your hand. "You… have one."
You glance down. The paper's back in your hand.
"I was six. I drowned in the bathtub. The water turned red, even though there was no blood…"
He flinches. "That's not mine."
"I don't think it's mine either," you say quietly.
He laughs, short and hollow. "Welcome to the club."
You sit across from him on a floor covered in toy blocks and teeth.
"I'm Kael," he says. "I think. It was on my door, so I guess that's who I am now."
You nod. He gestures at you.
"And you?"
You open your mouth, and nothing comes out.
Kael studies your silence for a moment. Then nods, like he's seen it before.
"I remember stabbing someone," he says casually, picking up a toy truck and rolling it between his fingers. "My sister. I remember the blood, the scream, the look in her eyes. The knife was orange. Like the ones you use for pumpkins. But I don't have a sister. I don't remember having one."
He looks at you, eyes a little too still. "So is it my memory? Or is the game trying to make it mine?"
You don't know. But the room is growing colder.
The walls flicker. Not lights - images. A woman's face. A submerged hand. A bathtub.
The same memory. Your memory.
Kael sees it too. He stands slowly. "Someone's about to remember."
The walls shift. A new door appears - fresh, unmarked, still wet with white paint.
The doorknob turns on its own.
It creaks open.
A little girl stumbles in, barefoot, soaked to the skin. She's sobbing. Trembling. When she sees you, she screams.
"That's mine!" she shrieks, pointing at the paper in your hand.
Kael steps back. "Give it to her. Do it."
You hold it out, unsure, your hand shaking.
She snatches it, crumpling it in her fists.
The moment she touches it—
She freezes.
Her mouth opens, then closes.
And then—
She vanishes.
No scream. No collapse. Just - gone. Like someone turned off a light that was never supposed to be on.
And with her, half the room fades. The stars on the walls vanish. The nightlight goes out.
You and Kael stand in silence.
"…Was that the right thing to do?" you ask.
He doesn't answer.
Instead, he looks at you and says:
"Next time, try keeping it."
Kael doesn't speak after the girl vanishes.
He just stares at the wall where she stood, hands twitching like he's memorizing the space she left behind.
You don't ask what he's thinking. You're not sure he knows.
Instead, you both step into the hallway again.
This one's different.
The lights above are flickering in patterns - Morse code, maybe. One flicker, two short. Long pause. Three. Four. Backward.
You try not to look up.
The hallway is lined with mirrors now.
No doors. No walls. Just mirrors on either side, stretching endlessly like two rivers made of glass.
You try not to look.
But then one of them moves.
Not a reflection - a delay. A lag in the mirror, a breath too late.
You raise your hand. The reflection copies you.
Then it smiles.
You didn't.
You freeze.
Kael sees it too. "Keep walking," he mutters. "Don't talk to them."
You don't ask who them is.
You walk.
But the mirrors keep multiplying. At first, it's one per wall. Then four. Then eight. Until your reflection becomes a crowd, an echo, a swarm of almosts.
And they're all smiling.
Some blink too late. Some not at all. One has eyes that are completely black.
Then you see it.
A version of you… slipping through one of the mirrors. Just a flash. Gone again.
But it moved first. Before you did.
You spin. Nothing. Kael grabs your shoulder, his voice sharp: "You saw it too?"
You nod.
He swears under his breath.
"We need to find a door," he mutters. "This place isn't for people. It's for watchers."
You don't ask who's watching. You just keep moving.
Then - without warning - a light explodes above. Sparks rain down. The floor trembles beneath your feet.
The hallway ends in a door shaped like an archway made of rib bones.
There's a sign carved above it:
"THEARCHIVISTWAITS."
Kael hesitates. "I'm not going in there."
You are.
Because you don't know why - but you have to.
The Archivist is waiting.
It doesn't have a face - just a black, mirrored mask, like a screen that reflects you in real time, only slightly off. Its suit is charcoal grey. Its hands are gloved. Everything about it screams: human once. Not anymore.
"Sit," it says.
You do.
Across from it is a desk stacked with papers, boxes, vials of black ink.
A single phrase is carved into the wall behind it:
"To know is to vanish. To forget is to live."
It gestures to a box.
Inside it- another memory.
You pick it up.
"Iwas13. Iburiedabodybehindmyschool. Inevertoldanyone. ButeverytimeIblinked, Isawdirtonmyhands."
You look at The Archivist.
"That's not mine."
"No," it agrees. "But it could be."
"What happens if I keep it?"
It leans closer.
"You become."
You frown. "Become what?"
Its mask flickers.
Your reflection in the glass… doesn't blink with you.
"Someone else," it says. "Or someone more."
You glance back at the memory in your hand. Your heartbeat echoes in your teeth.
You don't remember your name. You don't remember who you were.
But this memory feels heavy. Real.
You pocket it.
The Archivist doesn't stop you.
As you turn to leave, its voice follows you like oil down your spine.
"There are no truths here. Only what you believe hard enough to survive."
Back in the hallway, Kael's gone.
You check the mirrors.
In one of them - he's still standing there. Waiting. Staring.
But he's not in the hallway anymore.
And the version of you next to him is holding a knife.
Smiling.
You don't find Kael.
Not in the mirrors. Not in the hallway. Not in any of the rooms you try. But every time you turn a corner, you hear his voice. Soft at first. Then louder.
"You're lying to yourself."
You freeze. You know that voice.
You're not sure which version of you is saying it.
Your feet take you back down the hall, though your heart is already pounding. Each step echoes. Hollow. Like you're not alone, but someone is too quiet to catch.
The mirrors seem to distort now - wider, stretching, becoming doorways to other spaces, other lives. Some reflections are new faces. Some are familiar. Some are…
Not human.
There's a long stretch of dark hallway ahead, and something cold brushes against your skin - like the hairs of another, unseen presence.
The voice comes again, sharper now: "You're lying to yourself."
This time, it's not Kael's voice. Not your own. It's someone else entirely. Someone who has always been here. Watching.
But when you reach the end of the hall, you find yourself standing in front of a new door. One with no number, no name. Just a stain of red on the floor.
You can almost hear it pulsing.
You don't know why - but your hand is on the doorknob.
The air smells different - heavy, like ash.
The room is a circle. In the center, a chair.
On the chair - you.
It's you, but not. The eyes are a little too wide. The posture a little too stiff. The expression on your face too vacant. A faint reflection of a person who could have been you. A version who's forgotten what it means to be.
"You see?" a voice whispers, so close you could swear it's in your ear. "This is what you could be. This is what you were always meant to be."
The figure in the chair doesn't move. It doesn't blink.
But it smiles.
A sound like a scream bubbles in your chest.
"You're not real," the figure says, its lips curving with your voice. "You're just a memory. Like all of them. Just a piece of something someone else created."
It's wearing your skin. Wearing your thoughts. Wearing your life.
You stagger back, your heart thudding in your throat.
"Lie," it says, its voice soft and low, mocking. "Lie. Lie to survive. Lie long enough, and you will become real again. Like me."
The door behind you slams shut.
It's darker now.
The figure in the chair starts to stand, jerking in place like it's held together by strings.
But its smile doesn't fade.
You're back in the hallway, heart pounding. There's no sound now - just the whispering of the walls, like they're breathing with you.
You glance around, trying to find Kael.
But he's not there. Not in the mirrors, not in the corners of the hall.
Something shifts behind you.
You spin around, your breath catching.
A new door has appeared.
You hesitate, unsure. Then, something pulls you forward, and you reach for the knob.
Inside, the room is filled with chairs, all facing a single, large mirror.
You sit.
The chairs are empty.
Your reflection stares back at you from the mirror, but something's wrong. It's not quite you. Not the version you were just looking at. Not the person who stepped into this room.
A new figure appears in the mirror. Behind your reflection. Watching.
"Lie," it whispers.
You don't know if you should answer. Shouldn't answer.
But you do. "I'm real."
The figure laughs. It sounds like your voice, but distorted. "Lies make you real."
The reflection steps forward. It looks exactly like you now, down to the smallest details. Same clothes, same hair, same expression. It's you - but it isn't.
Your reflection's lips curl into a smile.
And then - without warning - it shatters.
The pieces of the mirror explode outward, cutting the air like knives.
The world darkens.
And you hear Kael's voice, distant and hollow.
"You should've lied harder."