"Don't move, or I paint the wall with your brains," the double whispered.
Her voice was mine, but stripped of everything human. Glass grinding on glass. She had the gun pressed so hard into my temple I could feel the cold metal biting into my skin.
Dax didn't even look at me. His eyes were locked on the woman who looked exactly like me. He looked shaken—not by the gun, but by what she’d just said.
"Answer her, Riven," the double hissed. "Tell her about the marbles. Tell her why you erased it."
"I don't know who the hell you are," Dax spat. He shifted his weight, a predator hunting for a gap in the armor. "But if you don't take that gun off her head, I'm going to rip your throat out with my bare hands."
"So protective." She mocked me, leaning closer. Her breath smelled like ozone and old paper. "Is it because you love her? Or because you're terrified of what happens when she remembers everything?"
I couldn't breathe. My heart hammered against my ribs like a trapped bird. "Dax, what is she talking about?" I gasped. "The marbles—the playground—what the hell was that?"
"Shut up, Mara!"
Dax lunged.
It wasn't a move; it was raw, desperate violence. He didn't care about the gun. He threw his entire weight forward, slamming the double against the concrete pillar.
*Crack.*
The gun went off. The bullet screamed past my ear, missing by an inch and burying itself in the drywall.
They hit the ground in a tangle of limbs. Dax didn't play fair. He slammed his elbow into her jaw and pinned her wrist to the floor, fingers digging in deep enough to bruise.
"Who sent you?" Dax snarled, his voice a low, dangerous vibration. "Who's playing this game?"
The double just laughed. A wet, rattling sound. She didn't even struggle. She looked up at him with my eyes, but there was something hollow behind them.
"You can't kill a memory, Dax. You can only delay the inevitable."
Then she glitched.
One second she was there, bleeding from the lip; the next, she snapped into a thousand shards of white light and evaporated. The gun clattered to the floor. Empty.
Silence rushed back in. Heavier than before.
I slid down the pillar, legs giving out. My head was spinning. The contract on my wrist started humming—a dull heat that felt like a warning.
"You're lying to me," I said, my voice trembling. "You know exactly who she was. You know about the playground."
Dax stood up slowly. He didn't look at me. He picked up the gun and checked the chamber, his knuckles white.
"I don't remember any playground," he said. His voice was too flat. "And if you keep digging into things that don't belong to you, you're going to get us both killed."
"I saw it!" I screamed, standing up and stepping right into his space. "I saw us! We were kids, Dax! You had a blue marble, and you gave it to me because I was crying! How do you erase that? How do you just... forget a person?"
He turned then. His eyes flashed with a sudden, violent intensity. He stepped forward, closing the gap until I could feel the heat radiating off his chest. He didn't touch me, but he loomed, his presence a physical weight.
"Listen to me, Mara," he whispered, his voice dangerously soft. "Some memories aren't gifts. They're infections. If I told you what actually happened on that playground, you wouldn't be looking for the truth. You'd be running for the hills."
I didn't flinch. I hated how my pulse quickened when he got this close. How my skin buzzed where his shadow touched me.
"Try me."
He stared at me. His gaze dropped to my lips, then snapped back to my eyes. The tension was a wire stretched to the breaking point. For a second, I thought he might actually tell me. Or shake me. Or kiss me just to shut me up.
Instead, he stepped back. The coldness returned instantly.
"We're leaving. Now."
He grabbed my arm—not gently, but not enough to hurt—and dragged me toward the exit. We needed the Vault. If there was any record of the 'Other Mara,' it would be in the memory market's deep archives.
We hit the streets of Veyra. The city felt like a graveyard. Blackout still holding, the only light coming from flickering neon signs in the lower districts.
"Nessa's going to help us," I muttered.
"Nessa is a fixer," Dax replied, scanning the rooftops. "Fixers don't give away secrets for free. What are you offering her? Your soul? Or maybe another ten seconds of someone's death?"
"I'm not like you," I snapped. "I don't treat people like data points."
"And that's why you're still alive," he said, a hint of a smirk touching his lips. "Mostly."
We reached the Vault—a reinforced basement beneath a dead clock shop. Nessa was already there, face pale under humming fluorescent lights. She didn't say hello. She just pointed to a heavy iron door.
"It's inside," Nessa said. "The memory core you asked for. But Mara... be careful. This isn't a clean rip. It's a raw echo. If you dive too deep, it might not let you come back."
"I can handle it."
I stepped into the core, a shimmering pool of liquid silver. I reached out, fingers brushing the surface.
*Zap.*
I wasn't in the Vault anymore.
I was in a room of mirrors. Thousands of them. In every one, I saw a different version of myself. One was older, scarred. One wore a dress I'd never owned. One was screaming.
Then, a voice whispered in my ear. Soft. Almost kind.
*"You're looking for the wrong ghost, Mara."*
The mirrors shattered.
I felt a violent pull, like a hook in my gut, dragging me backward. The silver liquid surged, wrapping around my ankles, pulling me under. I gasped, lungs filling with the metallic taste of old memories.
"Mara! Get out of there!"
Dax's voice sounded a mile away. I saw him diving into the silver, arm outstretched. He didn't care about the evidence. He didn't care about the mission. He grabbed my waist and hauled me backward with a guttural shout, ripping me out of the echo just as the core imploded.
We crashed onto the concrete, panting, drenched in silver residue.
I was shaking. My mind felt like it had been scrubbed with sandpaper. I looked at Dax. He was staring at me, expression unreadable, but his hand was still gripped tight on my hip, refusing to let go.
"You almost drowned," he rasped.
"I saw... I saw things," I whispered. "Dax, there are others. Not just one double. There are versions of me... from different times."
He didn't answer. He just pulled me up.
Nessa was staring at the shattered core, her eyes wide. She reached down and picked up a small, charred piece of paper that had been ejected from the machine.
"What is it?" I asked.
Nessa looked at the paper, then at Dax. Her face went completely white.
"It's a sales receipt," Nessa whispered. "From the black market. Someone just put a new item up for auction."
I leaned in. The ink was faded, but the description was clear.
*Item #709: The Death Memory of Dax Riven.*