I noticed the heavy chain for the first time. It was wrapped tightly around my left ankle and fastened with a padlock. It snaked across the concrete six feet or so, where the other end was locked to a floor drain.
“Hello?”
The room was dimly lit, but I could still see. I saw boxes and furniture and old crates. These things triggered memories. From that sea of tiny lights within the void, certain points rose to the surface and I saw that the things around me were things I once knew.
Past a stack of crates, I saw electric light. I stepped toward it, dragging the chain behind me. It was a lamp on a box. It sat next to an old water-stained sofa. Lying on top of the sofa was a man.
A memory, brighter than the rest, swam up. I knew that man, and when I saw him, I froze. When I saw him, it hit me.
That was my name; I was Faye Dasalia. The vibrations in my chest seemed to grow. Who was this man, and why was he here with me?
His face was handsome, but it had been beaten. His Roman nose had been broken at least once, and his face was freshly bruised. He wore slacks and a sleeveless white undershirt. A scar stood out on the left side of his neck. I followed it to the meat of his shoulder, which was pocked with thick white scars.
I stepped closer, and glass crunched under my foot. A jar had broken, littering the concrete. I saw coins and a toothbrush. Off to one side was a pair of sharp scissors. I skirted the glass and took another step. The chain pulled taut as I knelt down beside him.
As his chest rose and fell, I felt warmth from him. As I watched, hot orange light pulsed at his neck, a thick branch on either side. I could see them, coursing there under his skin. They came from his chest, where a fiery coal pulsed.
As I watched it slowly beat, more words appeared.
More messages scrolled by, but they were too fast. After a few seconds, they stopped and vanished. A new message appeared there.
(1)Communication(s) pending. Displaying. Database synchronization pending. Updating …Header mismatch: Valle, Rebecca. Murder. Header mismatch: Craig, Harold. Murder. Header mismatch: Shanks, Doyle. Murder. Removing …Removing …Removing …Header mismatch: Ott, Zoe. Experimentation. Adding …Database synchronization complete. (0)Communication(s) pending.
The words faded as I watched the sleeping man. Those thick scars covered his neck, shoulder, and chest. There was a pattern to them. I leaned over him, moving my face closer. My breath made the hairs on his chest stand on end. Up close, I could see what it was that caused the scars. They were teeth marks, many sets of human teeth marks.
Something cold and hard pressed underneath my jaw. I heard a metallic click, and knew that sound; it was a pistol’s hammer. I raised my hands, my face still near his chest.
“Back away,” he told me. His eyes had opened. I hadn’t seen the gun or noticed him move. I moved back from him slowly. He forced my chin toward the ceiling with the gun. I sat back on my heels while he held me there and sat up on the sofa.
“You don’t have to be afraid,” I said.
“I’m not afraid,” he said, but the pulsing in his chest said otherwise.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I don’t know where I am.”
I looked at his face, and thought he would shoot me. His eyelids drooped, but there was fear in his eyes, like he had lost his senses.
A memory swam up from the sea of lights; it opened like a portal to show the inside, where this man knelt over me. Blood dripped from his hand as he held something sharp. A pair of scissors was pointed at my chest. The portal went dark, and shrank to a point of light that flew back to join the rest.
“I wasn’t doing anything,” I told him.
He stared at me until his eyes seemed to clear. He eased the pistol’s hammer back with his thumb and then moved the gun away.
“What are you going to do with me?” I asked. He didn’t respond to that.
“Do you remember me, Faye?”
Points of light sparkled through the memory field. I’d known him for a long time, and very well, though he seemed like a stranger. One light displayed our fingers, laced together. I remembered the warmth of his palm in mine.
“Yes, I know you. You’re Nico.”
His heart sped up and he said, “Do you remember what happened?”
I scanned the sea of lights, but I wasn’t sure. It was difficult to make sense of them all. He watched me, waiting.
“I don’t know how I got here.”
“It’s okay,” he told me after a while. “Someone is coming to help you retrieve them.”
“What do you mean? Retrieve what?”
“Your memories. You learned something …just before. You were in your apartment. You thought our cases were related …do you remember that?”
I did remember. Spots had formed on the floor, like blood but darker. They dripped down from the thin air. The air rippled, and a dark figure appeared. It had been right there, watching us the whole time. It raised the pistol it held in its right hand …
“It killed him first,” I whispered.
“You weren’t the target. It was your partner. You just got in the way.”
Doyle had been about to tell me something…. What was he going to say?
“How can you be sure that’s true?”
“We recovered a partial list of names from an illegally trafficked revivor. The list contained four names: the victims of the last three murders, and that of your partner, Doyle Shanks. I’m sorry, Faye. I didn’t know who he was.”
“But why was he on the list?”
“I was hoping you could tell me. What do you remember about him? Who was he?”
Again, light sparkled through the field of memories. I had known Doyle Shanks for a long, long time. I worked with him every day. We tracked the killer who finally killed us both. He was with me the night before Mae Zhu’s death, and dropped me off at my place. The next morning he’d called to—
The associated memory had come forth. It hung suspended over the rest of them, opened up like a portal. The images from that night were beyond it. He dropped me off; then I saw a distortion, like a glitch left by a splice. I slept, then was awakened by the strange call.
“What’s the matter?” Nico asked.
“The memory,” I said. “It’s wrong.”
“Wrong?”
I focused on the memory distortion. The glitch tied the two memories together, concealing a missing piece. I concentrated, peering through the strange gap. I saw Shanks drop me off at my place, and then …
Shanks sat on the edge of my bed, getting dressed. I lay on my stomach, nude and still sweaty.
When I said it, I was upset. I felt sick. He was rough and left me feeling sore and used. He smiled, though, like I had just agreed with him.
