I awoke. I could hear nothing and see nothing.

My head throbbed as my panicked heart pulsed. My wrists were tied behind my back. I was sitting in an uncomfortable chair, possibly metal. The only source of sound was my own struggle.

I knew nothing about myself. Amnesia. I have my headache to thank for that.

I felt powerless, nearly deprived of all strength.

Within a few moments of waking up, I drifted off to sleep again. A sudden noise jolted me from my slumber. I heard light footsteps, then the shutting of a door.

Awaiting a voice to speak, my heart raced, afraid of who my captor was and why they had captured me.

A faint glow bled into the darkness—so dim I thought at first it was a trick of my aching mind. But no, it pulsed softly, like a dying ember, somewhere beyond the black veil covering my eyes.

I tried to speak. My throat scraped like sandpaper, producing only a hoarse croak. The footsteps stopped. A presence lingered just out of reach. I felt it more than heard it: the subtle shift of air, the warmth of someone standing close enough that their breath might have brushed my skin if they leaned in.

My pulse hammered. I tugged at the restraints again, uselessly. The chair groaned beneath me.

Then—fingers. Light, deliberate, brushing the side of my face. I flinched, but the hand didn’t withdraw. It traced the line of my jaw as though confirming something. As though comparing me to something.

“You’re awake,” a voice murmured at last.

It was soft. Too soft.

I swallowed, forcing out a single word. “Why?”

The hand paused. A faint exhale—almost a laugh, but not quite.

“You’ll remember soon enough.”

Remember. The word struck something deep inside me, a submerged shape shifting beneath murky water. I tried to grasp it, but it slipped away, leaving only the headache’s dull roar.

The blindfold loosened. Light stabbed my eyes, and I recoiled, blinking rapidly as the world swam into view. A small room. Concrete walls. A single bulb dangling from the ceiling, flickering like it was afraid of the dark too. And in front of me—A figure wearing a mask. Smooth, featureless, like a blank face waiting to be written on.

They tilted their head, studying me with an unreadable stillness.

“You’ve been gone a long time,” they said. “Longer than you think.”

My mouth went dry. “Gone from where?”

The masked figure stepped back.

“You don’t remember your name,” they said. “You don’t remember mine. But you will. And when you do…” They let the sentence trail off, letting my imagination fill the void.

I wished they had finished it.

The bulb flickered again, plunging the room into momentary darkness. When the light returned, the figure was already walking toward the door.

“Wait!” I shouted, the word tearing from me with more desperation than I intended.

They paused with their hand on the handle.

“Rest,” they said without turning. “Your mind is fragile. We can’t afford another break.”

Another break.

The door shut with a soft click, far too gentle for the terror it left behind.

Another break.

The phrase gnawed at me. I tested it in my mind, rolling it around like a loose tooth. Had I broken before? Had something inside me fractured so completely that this—this blankness—was the safest version of me they could tolerate?

My wrists throbbed. The rope bit deeper each time I shifted, but I needed to move, to feel something other than fear. I twisted my hands, searching for slack. There was none.

The bulb flickered again.

For a moment, the room dimmed enough that I could see the shadows more clearly—long, spindly shapes cast across the concrete. One of them didn’t look like it belonged to the chair or the table or the pipes overhead.

It looked like a person.

I froze. The shadow didn’t move.

“Hello?” My voice cracked, barely audible.

Nothing.

But the shape remained, stretched across the far wall like a stain. I blinked hard, trying to force my eyes to adjust. When the bulb steadied, the shadow dissolved into the ordinary geometry of the room. A hallucination, maybe. Or a memory trying to claw its way back. I closed my eyes, searching for anything—an image, a name, a feeling. Something flickered at the edge of my mind: a corridor lined with mirrors. My own reflection fractured into a dozen versions of myself, each one staring back with a different expression.

The memory—or whatever it was—vanished as quickly as it came, leaving me breathless.

The door clicked as if someone had pressed their weight against it from the other side. I held my breath, waiting for the handle to turn.

It didn’t.

Instead, a faint scraping sound drifted through the gap beneath the door. Metal on concrete. Something was being slid toward me. A moment later, a small rectangular object nudged against my foot. I nudged it closer with my toe, heart pounding. It was a photograph—face down. My fingers twitched uselessly behind my back. I leaned forward, awkwardly lowering my head until I could grip the edge of the photo between my teeth. I lifted it, letting it fall into my lap.

The image stared up at me.

A person. Unmasked. Eyes hollow with exhaustion. A bruise blooming across their cheek. A cut on their lip. Their expression was caught between defiance and despair.

It was me.

My stomach lurched. I didn’t remember the bruise. I didn’t remember the person I was looking at. Behind the photographed version of me stood the same masked figure—hand resting on my shoulder in a gesture that looked almost affectionate. On the back of the photo, a single sentence was scrawled in jagged handwriting:

“This time, don’t run.”

The bulb flickered again, plunging the room into darkness.

And this time, the darkness felt like it was waiting.