The dream was a vise, tightening with each familiar, horrifying detail. The cold, sterile warehouse floor. The metallic tang of blood. Nightingale's voice, a smooth caress laced with venom, "A shame, Karl. Truly. You were the best." The glint of the syringe, the icy burn flooding his veins, the descent into oblivion, the crushing weight of the coma.
Then, the flicker. The faintest whisper of something else, a fractured memory, just beyond the edge of his consciousness.
...A beeping. Slow, rhythmic. The sterile scent of antiseptic, potent and sharp. A woman's voice, frantic and laced with urgency, "He's crashing! Get the—"
The jolt of electricity, a shocking return to the edge of life. His body arching, and then, a gasp—his first breath. Light. A harsh, white glare.
But this time, a flicker of defiance. He fought the dream, clawing at the memory, desperate to see past the blinding light, to the face attached to the voice. The light transformed, the harsh glare softening into the soft, warm glow of a bedside lamp.
The face swam into view, hovering over him. Worried eyes, wide with panic and determination, framed by a tangle of dark hair escaping a surgical cap. A small, silver cross hung on a chain around her neck. Her lips moved, but the sounds were muted, muffled by the fog of the dream. She was saying something, reaching for his hand, but her touch was barely perceptible.
Karl woke with a choked sob, the air knocked from his lungs. He was sitting bolt upright in the narrow bed, his body drenched in a cold sweat. The apartment, usually a haven of controlled shadows, now felt oppressive, suffocating. His heart hammered against his ribs.
The woman. He'd almost grasped her face, but the image dissolved, leaving behind a gnawing emptiness. He'd seen her. He could almost feel the ghost of her hand on his.
He fumbled for the SIG on the nightstand, the weight grounding him, bringing him back to reality. He was here, safe, in his small apartment. Alive.
He took several shuddering breaths, his chest still aching with the dream's impact. He didn't know what she was saying. She was an enigma. A ghost in the machine, a fragmented memory.
His eyes adjusted to the pre-dawn gloom, finding the digital clock on the bedside table.
5:08 AM.
He let out a slow, ragged breath. The witching hour. The time when the veil between worlds seemed thinnest.
He didn't try to go back to sleep. It was useless. He swung his legs out of bed, the wood cold beneath his feet. He walked to the sink, icy water splashing against his face, staring at his reflection. The same haunted eyes.
The woman. The doctor, or nurse. The key, perhaps, wasn't Nightingale's intricate web. It might be the subtle threads of his past. She was the reason, or at least the instrument, that Nightingale's meticulously planned assassination had failed. A tiny breach, a subtle imperfection, that had shattered his perfect plan.
The silver cross. A silent symbol. A silent thread connecting him to a memory he'd tried so desperately to bury. He didn't know her name, or anything more about her, but he could feel her presence. It was enough. A thread to follow. A new lead. A pathway into a forgotten corner of his past. This was the new start that he'd craved for so long. He was no longer running from it. He was ready to confront it.