He gasped like a drowning man breaching the surface.
Clyde jolted upright, lungs on fire, heart jackhammering. For a moment, he couldn't tell if he was screaming or just hearing echoes ricochet through his skull.
Then silence.
Real silence.
No static.
No rain.
No glitching hum crawling under his skin.
He sat in a room.
Dim light. Familiar walls. The faint whirr of an old ceiling fan. His apartment.
Except…
His breath caught. Something was off.
The shadows were too still. The air too clean, like the scent had been scrubbed down to something manufactured—fresh linen with a faint undertone of bleach and sterility. His coffee mug sat perfectly centered on the table. No crumbs. No mess. No clutter.
His place was never this clean.
The floor creaked softly as he stood. A weak ray of daylight filtered through the blinds, cutting the room into rigid lines of light and dark. He stepped into one—and paused.
No dust motes.
Not one.
His fingers curled slowly. That wasn't right.
His legs felt unsteady, like he'd just reinstalled them. He stumbled toward the window, pulled the blinds open.
Cityscape.
Familiar, yes. But…
No movement.
No cars.
No pedestrians.
No wind.
Just a static skyline under a sky too blue, too solid, like someone painted it and called it done.
Clyde swallowed hard.
He looked down at the street below—and frowned.
Every person on the sidewalk was walking the same direction. Same pace. Same distance apart. Like code running a loop.
Then, as if they heard him watching, they all stopped.
Turned.
And stared straight up at his window.
His blood turned to ice.
He jerked back—too fast—stumbled and crashed into the bookshelf. Books clattered to the floor.
The thud echoed unnaturally long. Too long.
And then—click.
A faint sound. Behind him.
He froze.
Slowly—so slowly—he turned his head.
The television had turned itself on.
Static fizzled on the screen, then resolved into a single glowing cursor blinking in a black terminal window.
> [ WAKE_SEQUENCE_COMPLETE ]
Clyde's breath hitched.
Another line appeared.
> [ OBSERVATION MODE DISABLED ]
Then—
> [ SUBJECT A-01, CLYDE ERENHART: ] ACTIVE
The screen flashed. White. Then black again.
And then…
His reflection.
On the screen, not in the glass.
But it wasn't his face. Not exactly.
It looked like him, yes—but different. Eyes slightly off. Smile too sharp. Head tilting slowly, mechanically, like a puppet learning how to move.
The screen-Clyde raised a hand.
Clyde stepped back.
The screen-Clyde whispered:
"You're still inside."
The power went out.
Darkness swallowed the room.
And from somewhere inside the walls came that sound again.
The hum.