Scene: Mark's Room — Late Night
The photograph smolders faintly in his hand. He doesn't drop it.
Outside, the city breathes in long, mechanical sighs — sirens in the distance, the low hum of Reconstruction drones overhead.
Mark (internal):Every time I blink, I lose something. A face. A smell. A name I swore I'd never forget.
He finally opens his phone. Kim message reads:
They came back last night. They were inside* the dream this time. Are you still safe?
Inside* the dream?
Scene: Dawn — Rooftop
Mist clings to the horizon like hesitation.
Kim stands with a makeshift transmitter — pieced together from an old ham radio and something glowing faintly blue.
She turns. Relief flickers across her face.
Kim:You're late. I was worried they'd found you too.
Mark:Who's *they*, kim? You and Amari keep talking in riddles.
Kim:Not riddles Warnings They're called The Witnesses. The ones who enforced The Ruling. They don't erase you all at once. They start with memory.
Mark:Why not just erase me outright?
Amari (appearing behind them):**
Because you're connected to something older. Something that survived before the rewrite.
Kim nods grimly.
Kim:We think you were part of the failed resistance. Before the world...spiraled.
Scene: Flashback — Fragmented
Mark sees flickers:
Underground tunnels a symbol drawn in ash an eye with no pupil kim, amari, and two others holding hands a swear spoken.
Then screaming. Bright light.
A voice:"You will forget, and the world will forget you."
Scene: Present — Rooftop
The transmitter buzzes violently. Keira shields her ears.
Kim:It's starting again. They've found a way in through the *static layer. That's what your glitches are — their scouting paths.
Mark grips the transmitter. It burns like memory.
Mark: Then it's time we go deeper.
Kim:To where?
Mark:To where I was erased.
Scene: "The Edge" — A Forgotten Metro Station Beneath Liamson
Amari leads them down rusted stairwells. The world above peels away, literally — paint curling from walls, gravity shifting subtly with each step.
Mark:This place... it's humming.
Keira: It's the last place untouched by the Rewrite. Time doesn't work here the same way. Neither do memories.
A flickering sign above a locked gate reads:
Kim produces a relic — a keycard fused with what looks like a vein.
The gate groans open.
Scene: The Static Layer — Inside the Forbidden Memory
Suddenly, the environment collapses into raw data. The world becomes stuttering images, half-sounds, voices overlapping.
Mark floats — no ground, just thoughts manifesting into shapes.
He sees *himself* as a child, holding a crystal pendant.
He sees *her*.
The one who ran into the black.
Her face is clearer now.
Mark (whispers):
I knew you. I loved* you.
But then, the static *screams* —
An inhuman silhouette breaks through. All jagged limbs and shifting eyes.
A Witness.
Amari (yelling):Mark, get out!
But Mark doesn't run.
He reaches for the child version of himself — who stares up and simply says:
"Remember me."
Everything explodes into white.
Scene: Reality — Rooftop
Mark gasps awake, drenched in sweat. Keira and Lara are beside him.
Kim: What did you see?
Mark:My name. Not the one they let me keep.
Amari:What is it?
Mark:I am not Mark. That was the name they gave me.
My real name was…
[TO BE CONTINUED]