Chapter 11 · Reset Protocol - Chapter 11: Lucas Remembers the Wrong Station

"Mark. Mark, stop."

Lucas grabbed my arm before I could shake Vera again. The convenience store lights flickered overhead. Vera's left eye glowed faint gold in the stuttering fluorescent glare.

"Let go," I said.

"She's at twelve percent. You shake her like that, you might spike it."

I shoved him off. "How do you know the percentage?"

Lucas didn't answer. He stared at Vera's face like he was reading something I couldn't see.

"Lucas."

"I remember this," he said quietly.

"You remember what?"

"This exact moment. You, her, the lights. I remember you shaking her. I remember her eye lighting up to fifteen percent right after."

Vera blinked. Her hands came up slow, touching her own face. "What are you talking about? What percentage?"

I stepped back. My claws itched under the skin of my right hand. "Lucas, you told me you don't remember the loops."

"I don't. Not all of them." He looked at me, and his eyes were wrong. Too focused. Like he was seeing through me into something else. "I remember pieces. Stations. Moments. This one, I've seen before."

"How many times?"

"Three. No. Four."

Vera's voice cracked. "What loops? What are you two—