Makun felt her hand through his shirt. It was cold.
If her hands were not on his body, he would not have believed a human hand could have reached such a state. The cold was clean. It felt practiced.
He sat there motionless, waiting for her instructions. His shoulders stayed loose on purpose.
He had no idea what memory reading or memory exchange entailed, so he needed guidance. He also did not want to pretend he understood.
"Close your eyes," she said.
Makun obeyed. He saw no reason not to.
"What we are doing is memory reading," she said. "That means you keep information related to that particular thought in your head instead of separating yourself from it."
She did not rush. She did not try to sound kind. She spoke like someone who had done this enough times to know what people feared.
"The technique I am going to use is called Resonant Recall."
"Memory is not a picture stored in your head," she continued. "It is a pattern. When you recall something real, your body returns to that pattern for a moment. Your nerves, your spine, your mind. That is what I follow."
Her fingers pressed slightly higher along his back, closer to his upper spine. The touch was precise.
"This is why I touch you here," she said. "The spine carries everything. If I touch the right point, I can move with your recall without ripping you apart."
She watched him as she spoke. She waited for any flinch.
"If I do it wrong, you fragment. If you fight it, you fragment."
Makun stayed still. He swallowed once and stopped.
"And you need my consent," he said.
It came out flat. Not a question. A requirement.
"Yes," she replied. "You must recall it on purpose. When you remember, the memory loosens. It becomes touchable. That is when my energy can align with yours."
She paused, letting the words sit in the space between them. The pause was part of the procedure.
"I do not overwrite you," she said. "I do not steal thoughts. My energy behaves like a carrier. It synchronizes with what you are already recalling and reproduces it inside me."
Makun swallowed again. His throat felt dry.
She continued.
"The reason I am telling you this is so you stay at ease. So you open your mind to me. So my energy can flow into you and reach that thought."
Then she started channeling.
Icy energy.
Makun shivered when he felt the energy pass through him. It moved through his body like cold water under skin.
He forced himself to relax. He understood what she had asked. He was repaying his debt.
"Now think," she said. "Remember what happened."
Makun reached for it.
Bathroom. Cold tiles. His hand shaking. The taste. The swallow.
The moment the decision stopped being a thought and became action.
Then the pull came.
He felt himself being dragged into The Deep, deeper and deeper, through layers he could not name. It happened at a speed that made reality feel thick and endless.
Chains tightened around him, biting and resisting. They tried to drag him back even as the descent forced him down.
He remembered the crack.
One link shattering.
Not strength flooding him, but wholeness. Like a missing part of him snapped back into place.
He remembered the Veil becoming clearer. Reality gained depth for the first time.
He remembered the pressure after that. The darkness. The voice.
It told him his poor luck was not random. It told him people had been feeding on him. It told him that now a link was undone, they would come after him.
The lady could see it through the Resonant Recall.
Contrary to what one could think, the memories were not as fragmented at the start. They held. They played clean.
She could see Makun in his bathroom ending his life. She saw the pills. She saw the moment he crossed the line and could not take it back.
She then saw him being pulled into The Deep, then dragged deeper. She saw the layers he traversed and the speed with which he traversed them.
Then it changed.
Boom.
A pressure she never felt before descended in the room. Not even from her most powerful superior.
Her chest tightened. Her teeth clenched without permission.
Ghluh.
She gulped down a mouthful of blood as the pressure threatened to throw her out of the recall. The blood was warm. Metallic.
She focused.
Here it was. What he promised.
It was stronger than she thought. Her earlier doubt died fast.
Makun was recalling everything in a cycle. The memory looped like a ritual. He probably was in a trance.
He could not think of anything else except that descent.
The lady tried to observe where the pressure was coming from. She pushed her perception forward. She reached.
But darkness answered.
It was all dark.
She could not see anything. Not even Makun.
Before, she had access to sound. Now there was silence.
Then she got swallowed.
Swallowed by the darkness.
She could not feel anything. She could not feel her own body. The absence held her in place.
Fear crept up her spine anyway. Slow. Uninvited.
Blood leaked out of her mouth. Enough that it would have filled a bowl.
She felt like she was in nothingness.
Then the impact came.
Thud.
Her knees failed. Her body collapsed.
Makun stayed seated. He stayed in trance. The recall did not stop.
.