The Van
Rain hammered against the windows.
Ethan blinked hard.
The underground hospital ward vanished instantly.
Now he sat inside the transport van again.
Dark mountains stretched beyond the rain-covered glass while tires hummed softly beneath the vehicle exactly like the beginning of the experiment. The overhead cabin lights glowed dim yellow across the passengers seated around him.
Nobody looked panicked.
Nobody looked exhausted.
Everything appeared normal.
Too normal.
Ethan Vale stared forward breathing unevenly while his mind struggled to process the sudden shift.
The van.
The orientation.
This was the first night.
Wasn’t it?
Then Mira smiled from the seat across from him.
“You okay?”
He froze.
She looked different.
Rested.
No dark circles beneath her eyes. No fear. No exhaustion.
Like none of the events inside Somna Labs had happened yet.
Daniel sat farther ahead laughing quietly with another participant Ethan barely recognized now.
Leah slept beside the window near the back.
Sleeping.
Ethan’s stomach tightened instantly.
No.
That wasn’t possible.
Nobody was supposed to sleep during the experiment.
Then the driver spoke through the front divider window.
“We’ll arrive at Somna Labs shortly.”
A chill crawled through Ethan’s chest.
He remembered this exact moment.
Every word.
Every movement.
The realization hit hard enough to make him dizzy.
He had already lived this.
Then slowly—
he looked toward the front passenger seat.
Aaron sat there.
Facing forward silently.
Wearing the same brown coat.
Ethan physically stopped breathing.
Aaron turned his head slightly toward him without surprise.
“You’re drifting deeper.”
The words sounded muffled somehow, like hearing someone speak underwater.
Ethan immediately stood from his seat. “This isn’t real.”
Nobody reacted.
Not Mira.
Not Daniel.
Not even the driver.
It was like they couldn’t hear him anymore.
Aaron slowly nodded.
“Memory loops stabilize after the Seventh Night.”
Ethan grabbed the seat beside him hard. “We’re not on the Seventh Night.”
Aaron looked tired beyond human exhaustion now.
“You still believe time passed normally.”
Rain thundered harder outside the van.
Then Ethan noticed something horrifying.
The road ahead no longer moved.
The van continued driving—
but the scenery outside repeated.
The same broken road sign.
The same dead tree.
The same curve in the mountain road.
Over and over again.
They weren’t traveling anywhere.
The realization made his stomach twist violently.
“This is a memory.”
Aaron nodded once.
“A constructed transition memory.”
Ethan’s thoughts raced wildly now.
The facility.
The Ninth Floor.
Claire.
Had any of it physically happened?
Or had they been trapped inside layered memory states since arriving?
Then Aaron quietly asked:
“What’s the last thing you remember before the van?”
Ethan opened his mouth to answer—
and froze.
Nothing.
He remembered seeing the Somna Labs recruitment email.
Packing his bag.
Then suddenly being inside the van already.
No memory of traveling there.
No memory of entering the mountains.
Just the transition itself.
Aaron saw the realization immediately.
“They sedated participants before arrival.”
The sentence hit hard.
“You said the experiment cycles micro-sleep.”
“Yes.”
Ethan slowly sat back down again while the endless rain outside repeated against the windows.
“So we never fully know when we’re asleep.”
Aaron looked toward the road ahead.
“That’s the real experiment.”
Silence filled the van afterward.
Then Ethan noticed something worse.
The passengers were changing slightly now.
Mira’s face flickered older for a split second before returning normal.
Daniel’s reflection in the window lagged behind his movements.
Leah no longer appeared breathing.
The memory itself was destabilizing.
Then the van radio crackled softly.
Static filled the cabin.
And Claire’s voice whispered through it gently.
“He remembers now.”
Every passenger except Ethan slowly turned their heads toward him simultaneously.
Smiling.
The exact same smiles from the lounge staff.
Ethan’s pulse exploded.
“No.”
The passengers rose together from their seats unnaturally slowly while the van interior stretched longer around them.
Aaron stood immediately.
“You need to wake before the loop closes.”
Ethan stared at him desperately. “How?”
Aaron grabbed both sides of Ethan’s face hard.
And suddenly another memory slammed violently into Ethan’s mind.
A laboratory.
White lights.
Participants asleep inside medical pods.
Dr. Mercer speaking to researchers behind glass.
Then Ethan himself lying unconscious inside one of the pods.
Current Ethan.
Connected to machines.
The vision disappeared instantly.
Ethan gasped sharply.
Aaron looked directly into his eyes.
“You’re still inside Somna Labs.”
The smiling passengers moved closer down the van aisle.
Too many now.
Their faces distorted subtly between different identities as they approached — staff members, participants, strangers Ethan had never seen before.
All smiling.
All wearing exhausted hollow eyes.
Claire’s voice echoed softly through the van.
“You don’t want to wake up.”
The windows suddenly blackened completely.
No mountains.
No road.
Only darkness outside now.
Then Ethan noticed the digital clock above the driver’s seat slowly flicker into visibility.
3:17 AM.
Aaron whispered urgently:
“If she convinces you this is reality, you stay here permanently.”
The smiling passengers stopped inches away from Ethan now.
And one of them—
wearing Mira’s face—
softly asked:
“Are you sure you ever left the Ninth Floor?”