Darkness wasn't the absence of light.Not in here.
It felt conscious. Like something with breath and hunger.Elara woke to it breathing down her neck.
But her hands weren't bound.
And her cell—was gone.
She sat in a dimly lit corridor, sterile white turned a sickly yellow by flickering overhead bulbs. It stretched on endlessly in both directions, no doors. No windows. Just walls that pulsed like skin.
Footsteps echoed—not hers.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
She turned. Nothing.
Then again.Tap. Tap. Tap.
She ran.
Each footstep was a scream on linoleum. Her lungs burned, her throat raw.
Until she hit the wall.
Except—it wasn't a wall.
It was a mirror. Full-length. Floor to ceiling. Her reflection stared back, glassy-eyed and… off.
Her head tilted slightly. Her reflection didn't.
Elara's breath fogged the glass. The reflection smiled.
"You're getting close."
Then—
CRACK.
A fist—not hers—shattered the mirror from the inside.
ROOM 17
When Elara blinked, she was somewhere else.
A number painted on the wall in bleeding red: 17.
Fluorescent light buzzed above like a dying insect.
This room wasn't sterile. It was… lived-in. Or died-in.
Scratches on the floor. Dried blood on the vent. Broken fingernails embedded in the doorframe.
In the corner, a figure sat.
A man. Pale. Barefoot. In a hospital gown. A thousand-yard stare in eyes that hadn't slept in years.
He didn't react to her presence.
She stepped forward, heart pounding.
"Hey…""Can you hear me?"
Nothing.
She knelt.
"What is this place?"
He looked up.
And smiled.
"You're the last one, aren't you?"
"What?"
"Thirteen failed. You're Fourteen. The Observer. The Archive."
She stepped back. "No. I'm Elara. Dr. Elara Myles."
"They told you that. It's a script. We all start there. Until we start remembering the cuts."
"Cuts?"
He rolled up his sleeves.
His arms were covered in numbers—carved into skin. Dates. Equations. Coordinates.
"They edit us. Recode us. Cut pieces out of our minds and leave scars in their place. But the memories bleed back. Eventually."
He grabbed her wrist suddenly—cold fingers like bone.
"You remember dying, don't you?"
Elara froze.
A flash of an image hit her like a freight train—her face, blood-soaked, gasping for air.
"That's impossible."
"No. That's history."
He leaned closer.
"Do you want the truth?"
She nodded slowly.
"Then find the one who doesn't blink."
She stared.
"The one in the mirrored room. She never blinks. Because she was made to watch us all die."
The man suddenly convulsed, seizing. Blood poured from his nose. His back arched like a bowstring. His eyes rolled back—
He whispered one last thing:
"Don't trust the voice in your head."
Then he collapsed. Lifeless.
Behind her, the mirror on the wall shimmered.
THE MIRRORED ROOM
The glass wasn't a wall. Not anymore.
Elara reached forward and—to her horror—her hand passed through it like liquid.
The reflection grinned and beckoned her inside.
She stepped through.
And everything turned upside down.
The room was mirrored, yes—but not just in visuals. It felt… inverted. As if time ran sideways and sound echoed before she heard it.
Across the room stood another her.
Not smiling. Not mocking. Just… watching.
Silent.
Still.
Not blinking.
Elara stepped forward. Slowly.
The double stared at her, unmoving.
Elara tried to speak. No sound came. Like the room had swallowed her voice.
Suddenly, the walls shifted. Screens emerged, lighting up in sequence. One by one, recordings of her life played.
But not just memories—variations.
One screen showed her living as a teacher.Another: a soldier.Another: a mother with a dead child.
Each version ended the same.
With her face. Dead. Empty-eyed.
She turned back to her double.
"What is this?!"
"Reality. Raw and unrendered."
The voice came not from the double—but from above. From all around.
It was her voice—but ancient. Corroded by time. Cold.
"You were not built to survive. You were built to observe the failures."
"What failures?!"
"The others. Every version that tried to escape. We needed one that would watch long enough to learn."
Elara screamed. "I'm not your experiment!"
The walls shifted again. Now: files. Project Eidolon. Classifications. Testing phases.
Subject 01 – collapsed due to reality leakage.Subject 07 – went homicidal after memory bleed.Subject 12 – self-terminated after mirror event.Subject 13 – unstable. Lost distinction between 'self' and 'observer.'
Then—
Subject 14 – ACTIVE."THE LAST PROTOTYPE."
The mirrored double suddenly moved. Stepping closer.
Elara backed away.
"You don't understand." the double whispered."You're not the scientist. You're the footage."
Elara froze.
"You were recorded. Spliced. Repurposed. Every thought you've had—was programmed to make you watch them die again."
The mirror behind her cracked.
Elara screamed—turning, she saw the walls bleeding now—liquid silver streaming down like mercury tears.
The double leaned in, whispering in her ear.
"You never had a life. You had a role.""And it ends… in Room Zero."
Elara ran. Through the corridor of bleeding reflections, echoes of past versions whispering her name.
She reached a steel door at the end of the hallway: ROOM ZERO engraved in rust.
No lock. Just a handle.
She turned it—
And found herself standing in a pristine lab.
Monitors blinking. Data streams running. Tubes filled with liquid.
Inside the tubes?
Clones.
All her. Thirteen of them. Sleeping. Some—deformed. One—missing its face.
On the table in the center:
A birthday cake.
Lit candles.A note beside it.
"Happy 1st birthday, Elara."
Confused, trembling, she picked up the note.
There was more written on the back.
"You've done well observing the others. Now, it's time to watch yourself."
The lights shut off.
A monitor blinked on.
LIVE FEED: ROOM 17.
It showed her.
Standing. Holding the note.
Exactly what she was doing right now.
Then—The figure on screen turned to face the camera.
But her face was completely different.
And it spoke, in her voice.
"You're in the wrong body, Elara."