The agents' memories crashed into me like a freight train, and suddenly I knew everything.
I knew about the organization they worked for - The Memory Consortium. I knew about their secret facilities hidden under government buildings. I knew about the hundreds of people they'd messed with, trying to recreate my abilities. I knew about their plans to turn me into their ultimate weapon.
And I knew exactly where they kept their files on me.
When I finally let go of the agents' heads, they dropped like broken toys. Their minds were okay, but they'd never be the same. I'd taken their most important memories - their training, their contacts, their understanding of who they worked for. They'd wake up knowing their own names, but that was about it.
Sebastian stood in the doorway, staring at me with a mix of terror and heartbreak.
"What did you learn?" he asked quietly.
I wiped blood from my nose - absorbing that many memories at once always made me bleed. "Everything," I said. "I know where their main place is. I know who's really running this show. And I know they've been lying to us both from day one."
"What kind of lies?"
I looked down at the unconscious agents. "The kind that make me want to burn their whole damn operation to the ground."
Sebastian stepped closer, but carefully. Like I was a wild animal that might bite. Maybe I was.
"Evira, I can see the darkness in your eyes. Don't let it take over completely."
"The darkness is the only thing keeping us alive right now," I said. "Those sweet, gentle parts of me? They're what got us into this mess."
I walked past him toward the front door. "Come on. We're going for a ride."
"Where?"
"To find out who Dr. Evira Grey really is."
The Memory Consortium's New London facility was hidden under the city's main library - a place so boring and public that nobody would ever think to look there. According to the agents' memories, they kept detailed files on every person they'd ever watched or screwed with.
Including me.
We parked three blocks away and walked through the rain. Sebastian kept looking at me like he was waiting for me to do something terrible.
"You're scared of me," I said.
"Yeah," he admitted. "But I'm more scared of losing you again."
"You already lost me," I said. "The question is whether you can love who I'm becoming."
We got to the library just as it was closing. I pressed my palm against the security guard's head as he walked past us, and he suddenly forgot he'd seen us at all. Then I did the same thing to the lock on the staff entrance.
"How are you doing that?" Sebastian asked as the door clicked open.
"Memory manipulation works both ways," I explained. "I can take memories out, or I can stick new ones in. Right now I'm convincing the lock that my fingerprint belongs here."
We slipped inside and found our way to the basement levels. The agents' memories guided me through a maze of storage rooms and maintenance crap until we reached a hidden elevator behind a fake wall.
I put my hand on the biometric scanner, and after a second of confusion - as I convinced it that I was someone with clearance - the doors opened.
"Jesus," Sebastian whispered as we went down twenty floors underground.
The sub-basement was like something out of a sci-fi movie. Endless hallways lined with doors, each one leading to different parts of their operation. Memory extraction labs. Personality reconstruction chambers. And right in the center, the archives.
I could feel other people's minds around me - dozens of them. Scientists, guards, test subjects. Their thoughts buzzed at the edges of my brain like angry bees.
"Stay close," I told Sebastian. "And don't touch anything. Some of these rooms have people who've been turned into memory storage devices. Human hard drives. If you touch them, they might try to download their consciousness into you."
Sebastian went white. "That's what they wanted to do to you?"
"Among other things."
We got to the archive center, a massive round room with filing cabinets that went up three stories. In the middle was a computer terminal that looked like it belonged on a spaceship.
I walked up to it and put both hands on the interface. The system tried to fight me, but I pushed harder, forcing my way through its security by convincing it that I was its creator.
"Show me everything about Dr. Evira Grey," I commanded.
Files started popping up on the screen faster than normal human eyes could follow. But I wasn't normal, and I absorbed every bit of info instantly.
Birth certificate: Made up three years and two months ago.
Medical degree: Fake documents from a university that had no record of me.
Job history: Every previous job was a front company owned by the Memory Consortium.
Social security number: Belonged to a woman who'd died in a car wreck five years ago.
Even my apartment lease was fake, paid for by a shell company.
"Holy shit," I whispered. "None of it was real. Not a single piece of my life as Dr. Evira Grey was real."
Sebastian read over my shoulder. "They built an entire fake identity for you."
"But why?" I dug deeper into the files. "If they wanted to use me as a weapon, why give me a normal life at all?"
More files popped up, and I found my answer in a document labeled "Project Memory Walker - Rehabilitation Protocol."
"They weren't trying to help me," I said, my voice getting ice cold. "They were studying me. Every day I worked at that hospital, every patient I treated, every memory I pulled out - it was all part of their research."
"Research into what?"
"How to control me." I pulled up video files showing me doing surgery, completely unaware that I was being watched. "They were testing how much power I could use before I started remembering who I really was."
Sebastian's face went dark. "So when I made that deal with them..."
"You handed me over to be their lab rat," I finished. "They promised you I'd be safe, but really they just wanted to study me like a damn science experiment."
I kept digging through the files, getting madder with each new discovery. Then I found something that made my blood freeze.
A death certificate.
Name: Evira Morgan Black Date of Death: March 15th, three years ago Cause of Death: Accidental drowning Location: Private residence, Memory Hills
"Sebastian," I said slowly. "Look at this."
He leaned in and his face went white. "That's... that's your death certificate. Your real one."
"From my fourth death," I said. "The one that made you so desperate you agreed to work with the Consortium."
But there was something else in the file. Something that made my hands shake.
A second death certificate.
Same name. Same address. But dated six months earlier.
And then a third one. And a fourth.
"They've been documenting every death," I whispered. "Every time I died and came back, they knew about it. They were watching us."
Sebastian grabbed my arm. "That's impossible. I never told anyone about you coming back. Nobody knew except me."
I pulled up more files, and the truth smacked me in the face.
"They didn't just know about it," I said. "They caused it."
On the screen was a detailed medical report about my "accidents." The car that blew up wasn't sabotaged by enemies - it was sabotaged by Consortium agents. The mugging that killed me wasn't random - it was a planned hit. Even my first death, the one Sebastian thought was caused by our experimental procedure, had been set up.
"They've been killing me," I said, my voice shaking with rage. "Over and over. Not to hurt me, but to study what happens when I come back."
Sebastian stared at the files in horror. "They turned my grief into their research data."
"Every time you cried over me, every time you tried to save me, every time you fell in love with me again - they were taking notes." I scrolled through dozens of psychological profiles of Sebastian, documenting his emotional responses to each of my deaths and resurrections.
"Why?" Sebastian's voice was barely a whisper. "What did they hope to gain?"
I found the answer in a file labeled "Resurrection Protocol Analysis."
"They wanted to figure out how I come back," I said. "They think if they can understand how it works, they can create immortal soldiers. An army of Memory Walkers who die and come back on command."
"Have they done it?"
I dug deeper into their experimental data. "They've tried it on over three hundred test subjects. Every single one died and stayed dead."
"So it's something unique to you."
"Yeah. And they'll keep killing me till they figure out what that something is."
I stood up from the terminal, my whole body vibrating with rage. The lights in the archive started flickering as my abilities responded to my emotions.
"Evira," Sebastian said carefully. "What are you thinking?"
"I'm thinking they made a mistake letting me remember all this."
I walked over to one of the filing cabinets and put my hands on it. Instead of absorbing memories, I pushed new ones in. False memories. Corrupted data. I made the cabinet believe its contents were classified documents about alien invasions and time travel.
Then I moved to the next cabinet, and the next.
"What are you doing?" Sebastian asked.
"I'm giving them amnesia," I said. "Every file, every piece of research, every memory they've stolen - I'm turning it all into garbage."
I worked my way around the room, corrupting decades of research with my touch. When I was done, their entire archive would be filled with nonsense.
"That should slow them down," I said. "But it won't stop them. They have backup facilities."
"So what's the plan?"
I looked at Sebastian, and I could see the fear in his eyes. Not fear of the Consortium, but fear of me. Fear of what I was becoming.
"The plan is I'm gonna do what I should've done years ago," I said. "I'm gonna make them pay for what they did to us."
"And then what? We run away together?"
I touched his face gently. "There is no 'we' anymore, Sebastian. There's just me, and the people who need to die."
"You're scaring me."
"Good," I said. "You should be scared. Because the woman you fell in love with? She's gone. She died four times, remember? What's standing here now is something else."
"You're still you," Sebastian said. "Underneath all that anger, you're still the woman I love."
"Am I?" I walked over to the computer terminal and pulled up my psychological profiles. "Look at this data, Sebastian. Look at what they learned about me."
The files showed brain scans, personality tests, behavioral analyses from all four of my previous lives. And the pattern was clear.
"Each time I come back, I'm a little less human," I said. "A little more like a weapon. The gentle, loving parts of me get weaker with every resurrection. The Memory Walker gets stronger."
Sebastian studied the data, and I could see the moment when he got what it meant.
"This time is different," he said quietly.
"Yeah. This time, there might not be enough of the old me left to love you back."
I could see it breaking his heart, but it was better that he knew the truth.
"So what happens now?" he asked.
"Now you go home," I said. "Pack a bag, take your money, and disappear. Go somewhere they'll never find you."
"I'm not leaving you."
"Yes, you are." I turned away from him and started walking toward the exit. "Because I'm about to do things that'll make the Consortium hunt me with everything they have. And I won't be able to protect you and destroy them at the same time."
"Evira, wait—"
I stopped at the archive entrance and looked back at him. "Remember what you said to me in the safe room? About how you'd try to stop me if I chose to become the Memory Walker?"
"Yes."
"Well, I'm choosing. And if you really love me, you'll let me go."
I left him standing there among the corrupted files and walked back through the maze of hallways. I could feel his pain following me, but I couldn't let it matter. The Memory Walker didn't have room for love. She only had room for revenge.
As I waited for the elevator, I thought about the woman I used to be. Dr. Evira Grey, who helped people forget their trauma. Evira Black, who loved Sebastian with her whole heart. Both of them had been lies, but they'd felt real when I was living them.
Maybe that was enough.
The elevator came, and I stepped inside. As the doors closed, I made myself a promise.
I would destroy the Memory Consortium. I would make them pay for every death, every lie, every moment of pain they'd caused us. And when it was over, when there was nothing left of their organization but ashes, I would find a way to die permanently.
Because Sebastian was right. The woman he loved was gone. And the thing that had taken her place didn't deserve to live in a world where love existed.
The elevator took me up toward the surface, toward a war that only one of us would survive.
But first, I had one more stop to make.
I needed to visit my own grave.
The Memory Hills cemetery was closed at this hour, but locks had never been much of a problem for me. I walked through the rows of expensive headstones, following the GPS coordinates I'd found in the Consortium files.
Sebastian had followed me, of course. He was keeping his distance, but I could feel his presence like a warm shadow.
I found my grave in the rich people section, under an oak tree that must've cost more than most people's houses. The headstone was simple but elegant:
Evira Morgan BlackBeloved Wife"Her love was infinite"
I knelt down and touched the stone. It was real marble, carved with care. Someone had been here recently - there were fresh flowers in the vase next to it.
"I come here every month," Sebastian's voice said behind me. "On the anniversary of each death."
I didn't turn around. "Which death is this one for?"
"The fourth one. The drowning."
"The one where I supposedly fell into our pool and couldn't get out."
"You didn't fall," Sebastian said, sitting down on the grass next to me. "You jumped."
That made me look at him. "What?"
"You'd started remembering faster than ever before. Within two months of coming back, you were having nightmares about all the people you'd killed as the Memory Walker. You couldn't handle it."
"So I killed myself."
"You tried to. You filled your pockets with rocks and jumped into the deep end. By the time I found you, you'd been underwater for almost ten minutes."
I stared at the grave, trying to imagine what I'd been thinking in those final moments. "Was I trying to escape? Or was I trying to make it permanent?"
"I think you were trying to save me," Sebastian said. "In your suicide note, you wrote that you couldn't stand the thought of hurting me again."
"There was a note?"
Sebastian reached into his jacket and pulled out a folded piece of paper. The paper was worn soft from being read so many times.
I took it and opened it up, recognizing my own handwriting:
My beloved Sebastian,
By the time you read this, I'll be gone. I know you'll try to save me - you always do - but this time I need you to let me go.
I remember what I was. I remember the people I hurt, the lives I destroyed, the darkness I brought into the world. And I can feel it growing inside me again. Each time I come back, there's less of the woman you love and more of the monster.
I won't let that thing wear my face and break your heart again.
Please don't blame yourself for what I've chosen. You gave me more love than I deserved, more happiness than I thought possible. Every moment we had together was worth dying for.
If I can't stay dead this time, if I come back as someone else, don't try to save her. Let her be Dr. Evira Grey or whoever she needs to be. Let her have a normal life without the weight of what I've done.
I love you. I have always loved you. I will love you until the universe ends.
Your Evira
I read it twice, feeling something crack inside my chest. "This woman loved you so much she tried to die permanently to protect you."
"Yes."
"And three days later, she woke up in the morgue with no memory of who she was."
"Yes."
I folded the letter carefully and handed it back to him. "You must've been devastated."
"I was relieved," Sebastian said. "Because I knew that this time, I could protect you. I could give you the normal life you'd written about. Even if it meant you'd never remember loving me."
"So you made the deal with the Consortium."
"I thought I was saving you." Sebastian's voice broke. "I thought if I could just keep you safe and happy as Dr. Evira Grey, maybe that would be enough. Maybe you'd never have to remember the darkness."
"But they were never gonna let me stay safe," I said. "They were always planning to turn me back into a weapon."
"I know that now."
I stood up and brushed dirt off my knees. "The woman who wrote this letter - she was brave. She was willing to sacrifice everything to protect the person she loved."
"She was. She was the best of you."
I looked down at my own grave, at the flowers Sebastian had left there every month for three years.
"I'm not her," I said.
"No," Sebastian agreed. "You're not."
"I'm the monster she was trying to protect you from."
"Maybe. Or maybe you're something new."
I turned to face him. "What do you mean?"
"Every time you've come back, you've been different. The first time, you were pure Memory Walker - powerful but crazy. The second time, you were gentler but still dangerous. The third time, you were almost normal. The fourth time, you were the woman who wrote that letter."
"And now?"
Sebastian looked at me with eyes full of pain and hope. "Now you're all of them at once. The monster and the healer and the lover and the weapon. You're every version of yourself that ever existed."
"That's impossible."
"Is it? You absorbed the memories of trained agents like it was nothing. You corrupted an entire government archive with your bare hands. You're more powerful than you've ever been, but you're still capable of reading a love letter and feeling heartbreak."
I thought about that. It was true that I felt different this time. More complete. Like all the scattered pieces of myself had finally come together.
"So what does that make me?"
"It makes you a choice," Sebastian said. "You can choose to be the monster. You can choose to be the healer. Or you can choose to be something the world has never seen before."
"And what would that be?"
Sebastian stood up and walked over to me. He cupped my face in his hands, and for a second I was tempted to absorb his memories too. To take all his pain and love and devotion and make it part of myself.
But I didn't.
"It would make you free," he said.
I closed my eyes and felt the weight of every life I'd lived, every death I'd died, every person I'd loved or hurt or forgotten. Four different women, all wearing my face, all trying to figure out who they really were.
Maybe Sebastian was right. Maybe I didn't have to choose between being the monster and being the saint.
Maybe I could choose to be something else.
"What if I choose to be free," I said, "and then use that freedom to destroy everyone who hurt us?"
Sebastian smiled sadly. "Then I guess we'll find out if love really can survive anything."
I kissed him then, soft and gentle, like the woman who'd written that letter might've done. But when I pulled away, my eyes were cold as winter.
"Go home, Sebastian," I said. "Pack your bags. Because whether I choose to be free or choose to be a monster, what comes next is gonna be ugly."
"I'm not leaving you."
"Then you're choosing to be part of a war."
"I've been part of this war since the day I fell in love with you."
I looked at him standing there beside my own grave, loyal and stubborn and completely crazy for loving someone like me.
"Alright," I said. "But don't say I didn't warn you."
I turned away from my headstone and started walking toward the cemetery exit. Behind me, I could hear Sebastian following.
Time to find out who Evira Morgan Black really was.
Time to choose.