Kael didn't usually take long walks. He wasn't the type who found comfort in crowded streets or neon markets. His world had always been measured in rows of data, clean lines, predictable patterns. But after the anomaly, after the whisper of Project Oblivion, the archive felt suffocating.
So he walked.
The city unfolded in its strange contradictions. Above, glass towers gleamed like spears thrust into the sky, windows glittering with advertisements that pulsed directly into the implants of passersby. Below, in the underlevels, life felt older, and dirty; smoke rising from noodle stalls, laughter spilling from shadowed taverns, neon signs flickering where half the letters were dead. Children darted between stalls, chasing synthetic pets that scampered and glowed. Old men hawked knock-off neural bands from rusted carts.
Kael tugged his coat tighter around him. He blended easily into the crowd, another face dulled by the city's light. That was the advantage of being an archivist: no one looked twice. Archivists weren't glamorous like memory brokers, who boasted about exclusive sales, nor feared like the corporate regulators. They were background noise, custodians of other people's stories.
Still, Kael couldn't shake the feeling of eyes on him. Each intersection felt like a stage, each stranger's glance lingered half a second too long. He tried to tell himself it was paranoia, just his mind fracturing under the weight of the anomaly. But the echo still pulsed in his head—numbers rearranging themselves, whispers threading through silence.
He ducked into a market alley lined with cracked stone and sagging awnings. Here, the city smelled of oil, sweat, and roasted soy. A vendor waved at him, offering skewers of synthetic meat. Kael shook his head. His appetite hadn't followed him today.
At the alley's end, tucked between a tattoo parlor and a pawnshop, sat a small memory café. Its sign blinked weakly: Drift. The place was a haunt for wanderers; those who couldn't afford clean archives but still wanted to dip into someone else's recollections for a few hours. Kael pushed the door open, a chime rattling overhead.
Inside, dim lighting washed the room in warm amber. Scattered booths were filled with patrons slouched against neural ports, their eyes glassy as they relived someone else's life. A young couple held hands, each plugged into the same memory feed, their expressions flickering in sync. Behind the counter, an older woman cleaned glasses with methodical care.
Kael slid into a booth near the back, removed his coat, and tried to relax. He wasn't here for memory feeds. He was here because Drift was quiet, and quiet was rare in this city.
The server; a lanky kid with neon implants glowing under his skin, approached with a datapad. "What'll it be?"
"Black coffee," Kael said.
The kid arched a brow. "You sure? Most people come here for something stronger than nostalgia."
"Coffee," Kael repeated.
The kid shrugged and left.
Kael rubbed his temples, trying to ease the pressure building behind his eyes. The anomaly had followed him even here. Flashes of white rooms, dripping water, numbers arranging themselves like constellations. He told himself he was tired. That's all. Archivists logged other people's lives for years; it was common to feel bleed-through. Memories had weight. Sometimes they pressed too hard.
The coffee arrived, steaming and bitter. Kael wrapped his hands around the cup, savoring the heat. He almost felt normal again.
Until someone slid into the booth across from him.
She moved quickly, almost too casually, as if she'd rehearsed blending in. Dark hair fell across her face, hiding sharp eyes that studied him like she was cataloging every detail. She wore a coat too big for her frame, its edges frayed, pockets bulging with things Kael couldn't see.
"Don't look at me like I'm a thief," she said quietly, her voice low and edged. "I'm not here to rob you."
Kael stiffened. His first instinct was to get up and leave. But something in her gaze; steady, unflinching, rooted him to his seat.
"Then what are you here for?" Kael asked, his voice flat.
She leaned forward, elbows on the table. "You handled a file today. Low-priority transfer, origin unknown."
Kael's chest tightened. He didn't let it show, but his hand twitched under the table. "I handle a lot of files."
"This one wasn't like the others."
Her certainty unsettled him. "Who are you?"
"Someone who's been erased," she said, her lips curving into a bitter smile. "And you just stumbled onto the reason why."
Kael's pulse quickened. He set his cup down carefully, buying himself seconds to think. The café buzzed faintly with background chatter, but in their booth, the air felt taut.
"I think you've mistaken me for someone who cares," he said, though the words rang hollow.
Her smile vanished. "No. I think you care more than you want to admit."
For a moment, Kael didn't speak. He hated how easily she had read him. He'd built his life on routine, on detachment, precisely so no one could.
Finally, he asked: "What do you know about it?"
She hesitated, as if deciding how much to trust him. Then she whispered: "Project Oblivion."
The words landed like a weight. Kael's stomach knotted. "You shouldn't say that out loud."
Her eyes hardened. "You shouldn't know about it at all. But here we are."
Kael glanced around. No one seemed to notice them, but paranoia coiled tighter. He lowered his voice. "If you know what that is, you know I should walk away right now."
"You could," she admitted. "But you won't."
There it was again; that unnerving certainty. She leaned closer, her voice dropping even further. "Pieces of me are missing. Whole years, gone. When I try to trace them, all I find are fragments, anomalies like the one you found. Whatever Oblivion is, it's buried in people's minds. And I think you..." her eyes narrowed, studying him "...you've seen it before, even if you don't remember."
Kael's breath caught. He wanted to deny it, to shut her down, but flashes returned unbidden: the sterile white room, the cold neural band, the drip of water. Memories that weren't his but felt embedded in him.
"I don't even know your name," Kael said finally.
"Elara," she replied without hesitation. "And if you don't believe me, I'll prove it."
Before he could stop her, she reached into her coat and slid a small data shard across the table. Its surface pulsed faintly, like it carried a heartbeat.
Kael didn't touch it. "What's on that?"
"My memory," Elara said simply. "Or what's left of it. Plug it into your system. See for yourself."
He stared at the shard, his hand twitching again. Every instinct screamed to leave it there, to walk away and never look back. Archivists who tangled with clients outside official channels lost more than licenses. Sometimes they lost themselves.
But curiosity tugged harder.
Always curiosity.
He picked up the shard, feeling its faint hum in his palm. Elara's eyes never left his.
"You're going to regret this," Kael murmured.
"Probably," she said. "But regret's better than forgetting who you are."
That night, Kael sat in his archive again, the shard resting on the console like a dare. His apartment upstairs felt too small, his bed too cold, his thoughts too loud. He couldn't sleep anyway.
He slotted the shard into his system.
The memory unfolded in amber light. At first, it was warm; Elara laughing in sunlight, her hair caught by the wind. A man stood beside her, face blurred, voice muted. Then, suddenly, the memory fractured. White rooms. Cold bands on temples. Voices: Subject 17, resistance higher than projected.
Kael's stomach dropped. This wasn't just tampering. It was rewriting.
And threaded through the fractures; there it was again. The pattern. The echo.
The same sequence from earlier. Expanding, evolving.
PROJECT OBLIVION.
Kael ripped the band off his head, gasping. His hands shook as he stared at the console. The echo had followed him into her memory.
He wasn't dealing with coincidence.
He wasn't dealing with corruption.
He was dealing with something alive.