Long-press a paragraph to send danmaku
"Don't move." Her voice is steady, but the gun shakes in her hands.
I freeze halfway through the doorway. Iris stands five feet away, both hands wrapped around a Glock I must've dropped two loops ago. The barrel's aimed at my chest. Her eyes are wrong. Glassy. Like she's watching something I can't see.
"Iris."
"Shut up." She takes a step back. "You don't get to say my name."
"Put the gun down."
"Why?" Her finger moves to the trigger. "So you can do it again?"
"Do what?"
"Leave me there." Her voice cracks. "You left me in that room and you locked the door."
I raise both hands, slow. "I never locked you anywhere."
"Liar."
She's not seeing me. She's seeing someone else. Something Noah fed her, or something the loop's doing to her head. I take one step forward.
"Stay back."
"Iris, listen to me."
"I said stay back!"
The shot cracks the air before I can move. Pain punches through my ribs, white-hot and immediate. I stagger, hit the wall, slide down. Blood spreads fast across my shirt. I look up and she's still holding the gun, staring at me like she just woke up.
"Cade?"
I try to answer. Can't. My chest is on fire and my lungs won't pull air. She drops the gun. It hits the floor with a clatter that echoes too long.
"Oh god. Oh god, Cade, I didn't—"
She's on her knees beside me, hands hovering over the wound like she can undo it. Her face is white. Tears stream down and she's saying my name over and over, but the sound's already fading.
Then I'm in the elevator again.
Doors still closed. The counter on my wrist burns: 25.
I lean against the wall and breathe. My chest doesn't hurt. No blood. Just the phantom echo of it, sharp enough to make me flinch. I've died six ways now. Bullets, blades, a fall from the 18th floor. But this one's different.
This one was her.
The doors slide open. I step out into the lobby. It's empty. No gunmen, no bodies. Just the hum of the air system and the faint smell of cleaning solution. I check my watch. 9:47 AM. Same as always.
Something's smeared on the elevator panel behind me.
I turn. It's blood. Fresh. Still wet. My blood, maybe, or hers. But the loop reset. There shouldn't be anything left.
I step back inside and touch it. Warm. Sticky. Real.
"What the hell?"
A voice crackles from the intercom overhead. "You're slow today, Mercer."
Noah.
I hit the button for the 12th floor. Nothing happens. I try again. Still nothing. The elevator stays put, doors open, blood on the panel.
"She remembers now," Noah says. "Took a while. Had to dig deep. But she knows what you did."
"I didn't do anything to her."
"Not to her. To me."
The lights flicker. When they come back, Iris is standing in the lobby, ten feet away. She's holding the Glock again. Her hands aren't shaking this time.
"Iris, don't."
She walks toward me. Slow. Deliberate. Her eyes are still wrong, but there's something else in them now. Recognition. Anger.
"You left him," she says. "You left Noah in that building and you walked out."
"That's not what happened."
"Then tell me what did."
I step out of the elevator. She stops, gun still raised.
"We were extracting a target," I say. "Hostile territory. The intel was bad. We got pinned down. I had to make a call."
"And you left him."
"I got three men out. He told me to go."
"Liar."
She fires.
I dive left. The round sparks off the elevator frame. I roll, come up behind a concrete pillar. She fires again. The shot chips the edge, sprays dust.
"Iris, stop!"
"He was your friend!" Her voice echoes through the empty lobby. "He trusted you!"
"I know."
I risk a look around the pillar. She's moving closer, gun up, arms steady now. Whoever's in her head, they trained her. Or the loop did.
"Then why?" she shouts. "Why did you leave him there?"
"Because he was already dead!"
The words come out raw, louder than I meant. She stops. The gun wavers.
"The building was coming down," I say. "He took a round through the spine. He couldn't walk. Couldn't move. He looked at me and he said go. So I went."
Silence.
She lowers the gun halfway. "You left him to die."
"I left him because he was dying. There's a difference."
"Not to him."
She raises the gun again. I step out from behind the pillar, hands up.
"If you're going to shoot me, do it. But do it because you want to. Not because he's in your head telling you to."
Her finger tightens on the trigger. I watch her face. The tears are gone. Her jaw is set. But her hands are shaking again.
"I don't know what's real anymore," she whispers.
"I know."
"Every time I close my eyes, I see you walking away. I see the door closing. I hear him screaming."
"That's not your memory. That's his."
"How do you know?"
"Because you weren't there."
She blinks. The gun drops an inch.
"What?"
"You weren't in that building. You've never been in a war zone. You build software. You've never even fired a gun before today."
She looks down at the Glock in her hands like she's seeing it for the first time. Her breathing speeds up.
"Then why do I remember it?"
"Because Noah wants you to."
The intercom crackles again. "Smart, Mercer. But not smart enough."
Iris's eyes go blank. Her hands snap back up, rock steady.
"Iris, no—"
She fires. The round catches me in the shoulder, spins me around. I hit the floor hard. Pain floods my arm, hot and immediate. I roll onto my back. She's standing over me now, gun pointed at my face.
"I'm sorry," she says.
Her voice is hers again. Tears stream down her face. But her hands don't move.
"Iris, listen to me. You don't want to do this."
"I know."
"Then don't."
"I can't stop."
Her finger tightens. I see it happening in slow motion. The trigger moving back. The hammer falling. The muzzle flash.
Then I'm in the elevator.
Doors closed. Counter at 25.
I slump against the wall and press my hand to my shoulder. No wound. No blood. Just the memory of it, sharp and cold.
The doors start to open.
I look down at my hands.
They're covered in blood.
Not mine. Hers.
I turn them over. The blood is wet, fresh, spreading across my palms like it's still pumping out of her. But she didn't bleed. I'm the one who got shot.
The doors finish opening.
Iris is standing in the lobby. Alive. Unhurt. But when I look down at my hands again, the blood is still there.
She meets my eyes.
"What did you do to me?" she asks.
I open my mouth to answer.
The counter on my wrist flashes: 24.