Glass burst outward in a rain of shards and wire. The bat shivered in Kye's hands, its head cracked from the impact, but it had done its job. The window gaped open—jagged and bleeding around the edges.
Luca stood still, face pale in the flickering red light that poured through the breach. "What did you see?" he asked quietly.
Kye didn't answer.
He climbed onto the window ledge.
And leapt.
For one second, he was airborne, freefalling into the red-lit unknown.
Then the world caught him.
Not the ground. Not air.
A memory.
---
He was five again.
Sitting on his mother's lap, warm and sleepy. She was humming softly, some lullaby he'd long forgotten. The sun outside was golden. The house smelled like toast and floor polish. Everything was safe.
Then she said:
"They're going to take you one day, you know."
He blinked up at her. "Who?"
But her face had changed.
No longer his mother.
It was Miss Nare. Again.
Smiling.
"And you'll be so brave when they do."
___
Kye slammed into the dirt with a grunt.
Pain spiked through his side. He coughed and rolled, heart hammering. The memory haze cleared.
He was lying in the woods again.
Back. Outside.
Night had fallen. The trees stretched like silhouettes against a deep crimson sky, stars hidden, moon nowhere.
Branches snapped behind him.
Luca dropped down beside him, landing harder than Kye did.
"You okay?" he asked between gasps.
Kye nodded slowly, still dizzy. "I think we skipped the stairs."
Luca gave a breathless laugh, then winced and clutched his ribs.
"Okay," Kye said, standing shakily. "We need to move."
"Where to?"
"Anywhere but here."
They started walking. Each step made Kye's body scream, but he pushed through it. His thoughts wouldn't stop spinning.
Why was Miss Nare in all his memories? Why did she keep asking who he was?
More importantly, what the hell had he said back in that chair?
He couldn't remember the word. But he remembered the feeling.
Like tearing something open inside himself. Like saying his real name, one that didn't exist in any language.
And the world had listened.
"Kye?" Luca said suddenly.
Kye looked up.
They were no longer alone.
Ahead of them, half-submerged in the dirt, was a building.
A tall, narrow cabin. Black wood. Windows glowing faintly from the inside.
There was no path leading to it. No sign of life.
Just that oppressive glow.
"I don't trust it," Kye whispered.
Luca didn't answer. He was already walking toward it.
Kye caught up and grabbed his arm. "What are you doing?"
"I know this place," Luca said.
His voice was strange, calm, faraway.
"You don't," Kye insisted. "It's bait."
Luca turned.
His eyes weren't his anymore.
They were mirrors.
And in them, Kye saw himself, alone, afraid, breaking.
Luca smiled. "You have to see the Archive."
Then he walked inside.
---
Kye followed.
Not because he trusted him.
Because something inside pulled him.
The cabin was much larger inside than it should've been. The walls stretched up and up, stories high, packed with shelves. Hundreds of books. Thousands. Scrolls. Files. VHS tapes. Tattered photographs hanging like laundry from wires.
The air smelled like burnt paper and old breath.
In the center of the room stood a single figure.
An old man, hunched over a podium, flipping slowly through a book with blank pages.
He didn't look up as Kye entered.
But he spoke.
"Ah. The one who doesn't know who he is."
Kye stepped forward, fists clenched. "Where's Luca?"
The man ignored the question. "This place," he said, tapping the podium, "is called the Archive. It remembers what you forget. Everything the dream eats, we keep here."
Kye's mouth went dry. "You're not real."
"Neither are you," the man said. "Not in here."
Silence stretched.
Then Kye pointed at the book. "What's in there?"
"Everything that's ever happened to you," the man said. "And everything that hasn't yet. We only show you what you're willing to lose."
Kye stared. "What does that mean?"
The old man finally looked up.
His face was stitched together from dozens of others, old, young, male, female, all melted into one expressionless mask.
"It means," he said slowly, "you need to stop lying to yourself. Or the dream will keep writing your story for you."
Behind him, Luca stood, watching silently.
And behind Luca
A door.
Kye moved toward it.
The old man didn't stop him. "That one leads to your next truth," he said. "But be warned."
Kye paused.
"Sometimes," the old man continued, "the truth hurts more than the lie."
___
The door swung open.
And Kye stepped through.
____
He was in the dorms.
But wrong.
Beds stretched forever in all directions, like a hospital ward. Sheets were white, too white, blood-spotted. Each bed had a body, but none of them moved.
He walked between the rows slowly.
Some of the faces he recognized.
Classmates.
Teachers.
People he'd seen once in a store or maybe in dreams.
All sleeping.
All still.
Then, one of them sat up.
It was him.
Another Kye.
Paler. Thinner. But his face.
The doppelgänger turned to look at him and smiled softly.
"I remember everything," it whispered.
Kye stepped back.
"You left me here," the other him said. "To survive. While you ran."
Kye opened his mouth to speak, but no words came out.
The other Kye stood.
And his shadow was alive.
It stretched out, crawling across the floor toward Kye's feet like a pool of oil.
"You want to wake up?" the doppelgänger asked. "Then take it back."
Kye's eyes widened. "Take what?"
"Everything."
The shadow lunged.
The door didn't creak when Kye pushed it open. It sighed, like something old and tired finally giving in.
Inside, the small storage cabin smelled like dust and rusted iron. Broom handles leaned in one corner like sleeping guards, and cracked shelves lined the walls with jars of what looked like beetles, tiny bones, and… fingernails?
He stepped cautiously, nose wrinkling at the sour stink wafting from the back wall. A broken window let in a shard of cold light that caught a glimmer of red, dry, flaked, and smeared along the floor.
Blood.
His throat tightened.
Not fresh. But not that old.
He glanced behind him. Empty hallway. Silent trees. The cabin squatted on the edge of the woods like a forgotten memory, and something about its isolation made it worse than the crowd.
Worse than the hunters.
Worse than his friends.
He closed the door.
It clicked shut like a lid sealing over his world.
___
He didn't notice the figure until it was already seated.
Kye spun, his back pressing hard against a cabinet, nearly knocking over a glass jar full of what looked like dried-out spiders. The figure, no, boy sat cross-legged in the darkest corner of the cabin, head tilted, eyes open far too wide.
"You're new," the boy said softly.
Kye's mouth dried up. "What?, who?"
The boy smiled. It was too clean. Like he'd been practicing in a mirror and still hadn't gotten it right.
"They always come through here before they break," the boy said. "You're not broken yet. You're early."
Kye edged to the side, eyes scanning for a weapon. The boy didn't move. He looked about Kye's age, but his clothes were wrong, too clean, like they'd been stolen off a mannequin. He wore a school uniform from another place entirely, unfamiliar colors, an alien logo stitched over the breast pocket.
"Why are you here?" Kye asked, finally.
The boy's head tilted the other way, neck cracking audibly.
"Because you are."
Kye's grip tightened around a rusted mop handle he found propped nearby. He didn't want to fight this kid. He didn't want to know him. He just wanted to be gone.
The boy didn't seem to care.
"You think it's just a dream," he said, standing slowly. "But what if it's a net? What if every time you sleep, it just pulls you deeper?"
Kye's stomach churned.
The boy stepped closer.
"You're already forgetting pieces. Names. Times. Colors. Do you even know what day it is?"
Kye blinked. "It's Friday. I think."
"It's always Friday. That's the trick. They loop it. Keep you here. Until you crack."
And then, the boy's face changed.
It didn't melt or shift, it snapped. One blink, and his smile had become a cavernous thing stretching nearly ear to ear, teeth too many, gums too raw. His eyes rolled white, pupils thinning into insect pinpoints.
Kye struck with the mop handle.
It passed through the boy.
No resistance. Like swinging through fog.
The boy laughed. "You haven't earned blood yet."
Kye ran.
___
Outside, the cold had changed. It wasn't just night anymore, it was void. The sky above was a mass of swirling grey and blue, like a bruise forming on the heavens.
He didn't stop until he hit the admin block.
Or what used to be the admin block.
The building had grown stretched, its roof twisted upward like a scream frozen in architecture. Windows blinked open and shut as if breathing, and a tall bell tower now loomed in the center, though no bell rang.
He hesitated at the steps. Then heard it again.
Laughter.
Real laughter.
Not distorted. Not echoing.
Kids.
Kye crept closer. Through one of the warped windows, he saw them: three of his classmates sitting on chairs around a table in a bright-lit room. They were playing cards. Laughing. Drinking sodas.
Luca.
Arun.
Celia.
He could cry. He could scream. He could burst in.
But something was wrong.
Their faces never blinked.
Even as they laughed, eyes stayed wide and unmoving. Smiles too wide. Teeth too neat.
He took a step back.
Celia turned her head unnaturally fast, eyes snapping to the window.
Their smiles grew.
They all stood.
He ran again.
___
Kye dove behind a bush, heart beating so hard he could taste blood in his mouth. Leaves scratched his arms, dirt pressed into his knees.
He didn't move. Didn't breathe.
Until a new voice spoke, right beside his ear.
"You need to wake up soon. Or you won't."
It was her voice.
The girl with the scarred lip.
She crouched beside him, her face splattered in dried blood, a knife clutched in her palm. Her breathing was ragged, eyes wild but human. Not a smile in sight.
"Do I know you?" Kye whispered.
She nodded. "You did. Before they turned us into masks."
Kye wanted to ask what that meant, but a loud clang rang out from the building.
A bell.
The bell tower had begun to toll.
"Run," she said.
"What"
"Run. It's time for The Ones Who Smile."
And as they stood, the world behind them lit up, figures with perfectly symmetrical faces, mouths stretched into endless grins, marching out of the admin building in rows, heads twitching, arms swinging in unison.
A thousand smiles.
Marching.
For him.