He stands in the doorway.
The other me.
Wearing my face—but cleaner.
My posture, but more assured.
Even the clothes look the same, except his are unwrinkled, untouched by days in a psych ward.
> "You were the beta version," he says, gently.
> "I'm the upload that stuck."
---
I can't move.
Not because I'm frozen in fear.
But because he's already moving like I would.
He steps forward, mirroring every breath I try to take.
It's like he's predicting me.
Like he knows what I'll do before I do it.
Because he's learned.
From the tape.
---
> "Why?" I manage.
> "Why replace me?"
He tilts his head, amused.
> "Not replacing. Finalizing."
> "There's always a rough draft before the print."
He lifts the camera.
Red light blinking.
Recording.
Always recording.
---
And then—he speaks again, but not aloud.
In my voice.
From inside my head.
> "Do you know how many times you've been watched?"
> "How many versions of this scene there are?"
> "This is just the one that rendered clean."
---
I reach for the emergency cord on the wall.
He's faster.
In a single blur, he crosses the room and grabs my wrist.
His skin—ice cold.
But not dead.
Empty.
Like tape.
Like footage that never had life in the first place.
---
> "You're afraid of forgetting," he says.
> "But worse is being remembered… incorrectly."
He lowers the camera toward my face.
> "Smile for the final cut."
---
I scream.
Not with my mouth—with my memory.
I shove everything at him—images, sounds, static-laced regrets.
Greenhill. The hallway. Nisha's scream. The blood spiral. The mirror that blinked before I did.
I flood him with raw memory.
And for a split second—he glitches.
---
His grip loosens.
His skin flickers—like a corrupted .mp4.
His eyes flutter, and I see the tape running beneath his skin.
Literally.
Coils of black magnetic film beneath the surface.
Tightening.
Twisting.
Crumpling.
---
I punch him.
He staggers.
Not from the force—he's stronger.
But from confusion.
I've given him footage he wasn't programmed to contain.
> Unedited grief.
> The horror of being forgotten.
> The truth of what happened to Nisha.
---
He steps back.
The camera slips from his hand.
Hits the floor with a sickening whine—not a crack, but a sound like a hard drive dying.
The red light on the lens flashes erratically.
Then—
It turns blue.
---
Suddenly, the mirror above the sink flares.
Glows.
And in it—
I don't see either of us.
I see Nisha.
Eyes wide.
Screaming.
Mouth stitched shut with spiral wire.
Behind her: endless black.
But her hands pound the mirror like a window.
She mouths something:
> "HE ERASED ME."
---
The tape on the floor plays itself.
Even unplugged.
Footage begins:
> Arjun, sitting in Room 63.
> Smiling.
> But in the mirror behind him—
No reflection.
Just static.
Then Nisha's voice overlays the feed:
> "He's not Arjun. He's what the camera made after the real Arjun broke."
---
Suddenly, I remember.
The moment in the hallway.
When I dropped the camera.
When I ran.
When I woke up…
Was that me?
Or had the tape already replaced me?
Had I been the final draft all along?
Or was that still coming?
---
The thing that looks like me begins to melt.
Skin sloughs away in ribbons of black tape.
His voice distorts into backward whispers.
He tries to speak—but it comes out reversed:
> ".drow eht htiw og uoy fI"
> ".deyalp era uoy ,yromem a tsuj era uoY"
---
And then—
He explodes into static.
Literal screen static.
A tornado of magnetic film and digital dust.
Gone.
---
I collapse.
The tape recorder at my feet ticks once.
Then prints a single line of text on its cracked screen:
> "DRAFT ERASED. PROCEED TO RENDER."
---
I pick up the camera.
For the first time since that night—
I'm the one holding it.
Not the copy.
Not the watcher.
Me.
---
The mirror flickers.
Nisha's face appears again.
Mouth open.
And then—
Sound comes through.
Just two words.
> "Find me."