Emma stared at Dave's outstretched hand, her own trembling above it. The idea of returning a memory—it wasn't something she had ever tried before. Absorbing memories came naturally, an involuntary gift—or curse—that had always just… happened. Giving one back? She did not know how.
"You sure about this?" she asked, voice barely above a whisper.
Dave nodded. "I need to know what happened to me. You saw something. Please."
Emma closed her eyes, took a breath, and touched his hand.
The world fractured.
A strong feeling rushed through her. In an instant, Emma was no longer in the abandoned train station. She was inside the memory.
The crash came first.
Screeching tires. Shattered glass. A man's scream.
Emma was standing in the middle of a street, rain falling in slow motion. The impact sent shards flying past her, though none touched her. She wasn't really there—only watching.
Inside the car: a young man— it was Dave—blood streaming down his temple. In the passenger seat: someone else. Unseen. Unclear.
Then came the attacker.
A figure emerged from the shadows, face covered by a hood. They moved with precision, checking the man's pulse, then looking through the wreck. Their gloved hand pulled out something small—a rectangular metal object—slipped it into their coat, and vanished before the sirens arrived.
The scene shifted.
Now Emma was in a room—dim, cold. Hospital? No. It was cleaner but very cold. A chair sat beneath a single bulb, and on it was…the object.
It wasn't a phone. Not quite. It looked like a keycard but thicker, metallic with detailed writings. A symbol was burned into one side—an hourglass inside a circle, crossed out.
She tried to focus, but everything blurred.
A flash—Emma saw her own face reflected in a mirror, younger, confused, wearing a pendant she'd never remembered owning. A hand reached out for her, not Dave's, but familiar.
Then—darkness.
Emma gasped awake.
She was lying on the cold floor of the train station, heart pounding in her chest. She smelled rust and wet wood. Her head spun as she sat up. Her body ached.
"Dave?"
No answer.
She scrambled to her feet. The bench where Dave had been sitting was empty. The bag beside him was gone. No sign of a struggle—just...absence.
Something shiny caught her eye. A folded piece of paper.
Hands shaking, she opened it.
Not all memories should be returned.
The words were written in thin, careful strokes. On the back of the paper was something else—a symbol. The same one from the memory. The crossed-out hourglass.
Emma's breath caught in her throat.
She suddenly felt sick. She held on to a column to keep her from falling. That memory—it wasn't just a vision. It felt like it had changed something inside her. Like a missing puzzle piece had snapped into place, but the picture it formed made no sense.
She stuffed the note into her coat pocket and glanced around. Still no sign of Dave.
Something told her he hadn't just walked away. Someone had taken him—or he'd remembered something too dangerous to share.
Emma didn't know who the hooded figure was, what the object truly did, or why she was in that memory as a child. But she knew one thing now:
This wasn't just about Dave anymore.
It was about her.
And the truth was buried somewhere deep in the memories she had never asked for.