From "The Unknown in Dark"
Night devoured the city like a living creature, swallowing the last traces of light.
On the seventeenth floor of the Onyx Tower, Zach sat before a pale green monitor, his eyes locked on streams of code that pulsed like veins beneath glass.
He wasn't a technician in the usual sense — he was a memory engineer.
One of the best at MemoraTech, the corporation that had turned memories into a commodity.
In this city, people didn't chase happiness anymore — they paid to forget their pain.
His supervisor's words echoed in his head:
> "What keeps the world running isn't joy, Zach. It's the hunger to forget."
Zach adjusted the metallic headset on a middle-aged woman trembling in the chair before him. Her voice cracked like glass.
"Take it all," she whispered. "Just… make me forget his face."
He pressed the blue key.
The room filled with white light.
Machines hummed, and the woman's breath turned into quiet sobs — then silence.
When it was over, she opened her eyes.
Empty eyes. Calm eyes. The look of someone who had traded a piece of her soul for a moment's peace.
She signed the papers and left without another word.
Zach stayed behind, staring at his reflection in the screen.
He wondered how many faces he had erased — and whether parts of them still lived somewhere inside him.
Routine followed.
Every week, employees at MemoraTech ran a personal memory scan to ensure their neural stability.
He started the diagnostic program, expecting the usual set of reports.
But tonight, the system displayed something different.
A video file.
Timestamped years ago — a date he didn't remember living through.
He clicked play.
The screen flickered, showing a dim room.
Himself — tired, unshaven, staring straight into the camera.
> "If you're watching this," the recording said, "it means they've started erasing you too, Zach.
Don't trust anyone at MemoraTech.
Memories aren't for sale.
They're the trap."
His pulse spiked.
He tried to delete the file — Access Denied.
Then a line of text appeared on the screen:
> "File protected by The Unknown."
The words froze him. He'd never heard that name before.
Another message followed:
> "Memory access initializing… Target: ZACHARY COLE."
The lights in the lab dimmed — one after another, like dying stars.
Outside, the city blurred, its towers fading into shadow.
Zach stood in the dark, feeling a pressure crawl through his skull,
and in that instant, he understood —
The game had begun.
And someone — or something — was searching through his memories,
just as he had searched through everyone else's.