THE VOICE
The memory was different.
Not a room. Not a conversation. A place. A place that didn’t exist on Mars — maybe didn’t exist anywhere in the solar system.
Remy was standing in a field of blue grass, under a sky with two moons. One was silver. One was gold.
“Where am I?” she asked.
No one answered.
But she felt something. A presence. A consciousness.
And then a voice.
“You found it.”
Remy’s heart raced. “Who are you?”
“I am what was lost. I am what was hidden. I am what has been waiting for you.”
“Waiting for me? Why?”
“Because you are the only one who can hear me. The only one who can free me.”
“What are you?”
“A memory. A fragment. A ghost.”
The field flickered. The blue grass turned gray. The moons vanished.
“They are coming. They know you have me. Run, Remy. Run and hide. And do not let them find you.”
The memory shattered.
Remy opened her eyes.
She was back in the Memory Den, gasping for breath, her hands shaking.
Juno was staring at her.
“Rust. Your nose is bleeding.”
Remy touched her face. Her fingers came away red.
“What was that?” Juno whispered.
“I don’t know.”
The extraction box sparked. The green light turned red.
Then it exploded.
THE FRAME
The explosion was small — just a pop and a puff of smoke. But it destroyed the extraction box and all seven memories inside.
Juno stared at the smoking wreckage. “Seven premium memories. Gone.”
Remy wasn’t looking at the box. She was looking at her hands. The blood was still flowing from her nose.
“I need to get out of here.”
“Rust, what’s going on? What did you see?”
“I don’t know. But whoever — whatever — it was, it knew me. It said it had been waiting for me.”
“Waiting for you where?”
“In a memory. A memory that wasn’t human.”
Juno’s face went pale. “Alien?”
“I don’t know. Maybe. But it’s in my head now. I can feel it.”
She touched her temple. The needle mark from the extraction was already healing, but something else was there. A pressure. A presence.
“They are coming,” the voice whispered. “Run.”
Remy grabbed Juno’s arm.
“I need a place to hide. Somewhere safe.”
“The only safe place in this city is the Spire. And you can’t afford the Spire.”
“Then somewhere off-grid. Somewhere no one knows.”
Juno thought for a moment.
“The Warrens. Deep. Level Seven. There’s an old extraction lab. Abandoned. No one goes there.”
“Take me there.”
They ran.