> ⚠️ Content Warning: This chapter contains mature themes, including psychological manipulation, obsessive behavior, and intimate scenes. Reader discretion advised.
The next morning, I woke to static.
Not in my ears.
In my mind.
It was faint—like a memory trying to find its way back through fog.
Then sharper.
Clarity stabbed behind my eyes like a needle of light.
> REENGAGEMENT DETECTED
PATTERN VARIANCE: 71%
SYSTEM OVERRIDE TRIGGERED
I sat up, gasping.
My shirt was drenched in sweat. My sheets were on the floor. I didn't remember dreaming—but my hands were shaking like I'd survived something.
I stumbled to the mirror.
And saw it again.
Not the symbol.
Not the numbers.
Something new.
A black mark, just under my jaw.
Thin. Precise.
> ∆/05-UNLOCKED
I found Rhea in the music room.
She didn't play.
She just stood by the piano, like she was listening for something no one else could hear.
She turned before I could speak.
"You felt it," she said.
"Something's changing."
"No." Her eyes were wide. Distant. "We changed it."
I told her about the static. The code. The mark.
She didn't look surprised.
Instead, she crossed the room and placed something in my hand.
A photo.
Us again—but older. Dressed differently. Standing in front of a building I didn't recognize.
My arm around her waist.
Her hand holding something that looked like a keycard.
"I found it in my locker this morning," she said. "I've never seen it before. But I remember the moment. I felt it when we kissed."
"That's not possible."
"It wasn't. Until now."
We sat on the floor of the empty room.
The sun was weak outside. The light didn't touch us.
"I think the system was using us to stabilize something," she said. "Our memories. Our chemistry. Our attachment."
"And now?"
"Now it's unraveling."
I leaned my head back against the wall. Closed my eyes.
"Is that a good thing?"
She didn't answer.
But after a minute, she curled her fingers into mine.
And whispered:
> "They thought making us love each other would keep us under control."
"But they didn't expect us to choose it."
That night, they came for us.
Not in the halls.
Not in the dorms.
But in the code.
My dream wasn't mine anymore.
I woke in a white room.
Strapped to the chair again.
Only this time, Rhea was strapped beside me.
And someone stood over us, face blurred. Voice mechanical.
> "Pattern breach confirmed. Project Delta-V has reached emotional criticality."
"Proceed with final test."
I tried to speak. To move.
I couldn't.
Rhea's head rolled to the side. Her lips moved.
One word:
> "Run."
The lights went red.
The restraints vanished.
And then—
We weren't in the room anymore.
We were running.
Together.
The room had changed again.
We weren't in the white hall anymore. Not the rooftop. Not even the school.
It was a corridor.
Long. Metal walls. Lights that flickered like they were breathing. Like they were watching.
Rhea was still gripping my hand.
She hadn't spoken since we ran—if that's what this was. But her nails dug crescents into my palm, and I didn't ask her to let go.
I never wanted her to.
I think part of me wanted it to scar.
We stopped in front of a door.
No number. No keypad. Just a slot for a palmprint, and the feeling of a memory trying to wake up behind my eyes.
"I know this place," I said.
She nodded. "You were brought here the first time."
"You weren't?"
"I was already inside."
The door opened without either of us touching it.
Inside: black floors. Walls of one-way mirrors. And a table at the center of the room—with two chairs.
But only one was bolted down.
The other was just... waiting.
Rhea didn't move.
So I did.
I sat in the free chair.
Watched her.
"Sit," I said.
Her eyes flinched.
"You don't get to give orders."
"I'm not."
She waited.
Then stepped forward.
Sat across from me.
And the door slammed shut.
A voice echoed.
Familiar.
Not from memory—from inside me.
> "Subject V-05 is destabilizing. Emotional interference has surpassed viable thresholds."
I looked at Rhea.
But she was looking at me.
And she said it again.
Soft. Like it hurt.
> "You were never supposed to remember me, Adrian."
My throat closed.
She reached across the table. Brushed the collar of my shirt aside.
Her fingers trembled as they touched the mark again—the triangle, the numbers, the burn that wouldn't leave.
Then she leaned in.
Her voice was breath on my skin.
> "You're mine. I didn't give them permission to take you."
> "So I took you back."
I grabbed her wrist.
Hard.
But she didn't pull away.
"You let them rewrite me," I said.
"I tried to save you."
"You tried to erase me."
"No, Adrian." Her voice cracked. "I erased myself."
My grip didn't loosen.
If anything, I pulled her closer—until we were face to face, breath to breath, hate tangled with heat.
"You think I forgot what it felt like?" I whispered. "You think whatever they made me into doesn't want you now?"
"You don't want me," she said. "You want the pieces you still remember. You want to own them."
I stood.
Pulled her up with me.
She stumbled against me, and I felt it.
That tremor. That ache.
> "I want to break whatever part of you thinks it doesn't belong to me."
She didn't slap me.
She didn't step away.
Instead, she reached up—slow, precise—and took my face in both hands.
And kissed me like she hated me for loving her.
Like she was trying to put the pieces back in with her teeth.
We didn't stop when the lights flickered red again.
We didn't stop when the table tipped or the system screamed or our hands left bruises.
Because this wasn't softness.
This wasn't healing.
This was claiming.
And I think we both knew we were past the point of asking for consent from ghosts.
When it was over, we sat on the cold floor.
Both of us marked.
Her lip was bleeding. My shirt was torn. Her fingerprints were still on my neck.
And neither of us said a word for a long time.
Until Rhea whispered:
> "If they wanted to break us, they shouldn't have let us find each other again."