The first thing she noticed was the sound.
Not loud. Not sharp. Just… persistent.
A low hum, vibrating through the walls, as if the room itself had a pulse. It wasn't steady—it wavered, dipping and rising like breath caught in a dying throat. The kind of sound that sank beneath the skin, that made silence feel impossible.
Her eyes opened to darkness broken only by a dim bulb overhead, swaying slightly as though disturbed by invisible hands. The light flickered every few seconds, forcing her into an uneasy rhythm of shadow and glare.
The air was heavy, stale, and metallic, carrying the tang of rust and something faintly sweet—like spoiled fruit. She drew in a breath too quickly and gagged, the taste clinging to the back of her tongue.
Her body ached. Limbs stiff, skin clammy. She realized she was lying flat on the floor, the concrete biting into her shoulder blades. When she shifted, the grit beneath her palms scraped her skin raw. Slowly, she forced herself upright, her movements unsteady, as if her bones had forgotten how to hold her.
Where am I?
The thought cut through the fog in her head, but the answer refused to surface. She tried to piece together fragments—anything before this moment—but her memory was a blank sheet with only a faint, mocking outline.
Her name arrived eventually, slow and fragile, like it had been dragged from the bottom of a well. Elena. That much she knew. Beyond that, nothing. No faces. No places. Just the gnawing emptiness of forgetfulness.
Her chest tightened. She pressed her fingers to her temples, trying to massage memory into being. But every time she grasped at something—an image, a voice—it slipped away like water. The harder she tried, the emptier she felt.
"Hello?"
The word left her lips cracked and dry. It sounded foreign in her mouth, small and trembling.
The reply came instantly, carried back from the walls:
Hello… hello… hello.
Her echo. But wrong.
Each return was warped, pitched lower, stretched longer, until the final repetition sounded like something else entirely. Something not her.
Her breath quickened.
"No," she whispered, shaking her head. "That's just me. Just me."
But even as she said it, her voice shook.
She turned in a slow circle, scanning the walls. They were smooth, seamless, a dull gray that swallowed what little light the bulb offered. No seams. No door. No window. The room was a box, and she was the thing trapped inside.
Her pulse began to thrum in her ears. Panic threatened to claw up her throat. She staggered to the nearest wall and slapped it with her palm.
Bang.
The sound rang out—and then came back.
Bang. Bang. Bang.
Each echo sharper than the last, splintering into jagged layers until it no longer sounded like her strike but like something alive answering from the other side. She recoiled, pressing both hands over her ears. The noise didn't fade. It built. The echoes swelled into whispers, dozens of voices tumbling over one another in a dizzying, incomprehensible chorus.
She dropped to her knees, pressing her forehead against the cold concrete, praying it would stop.
But the voices grew louder. Some laughed. Some hissed. Some wept in long, ragged sobs. She caught fragments—"remember," "blood," "never"—but they slipped away before she could piece them together.
Her nails dug into her scalp. "Stop! Please stop!"
And then—silence.
Not gradual. Absolute.
The kind of silence that felt unnatural, heavy enough to press against her chest. For a long moment, she didn't dare breathe.
When she finally opened her eyes, the bulb still flickered overhead, swaying gently though the air was still.
The silence seemed worse than the noise.
She forced herself to her feet again, though her legs trembled with the effort. Her chest rose and fell in shallow gasps, as if the room had stolen half her breath.
"Okay," she muttered to herself, voice barely audible. "Okay. Think. Just think."
But thought was dangerous here. Thought meant remembering that she had nothing to hold onto.
Her gaze drifted across the floor—and froze.
Something small. Pale. Just at the edge of the room.
A piece of paper, folded in half, lying flat against the concrete.
Her heart stuttered. She had scoured the floor when she woke. She was certain it hadn't been there before.
The silence pressed closer as she crossed the room, each step echoing too loudly, bouncing back at her in strange, drawn-out delays. By the time she crouched to pick it up, her hands were shaking so badly she almost dropped it.
The paper was creased, the edges smudged with fingerprints that weren't hers.
She unfolded it slowly.
Scrawled across the page in uneven, desperate handwriting were the words:
Do not trust the staff. Do not trust the patients. Do not trust yourself.
Elena's breath caught in her throat.
She read it once. Twice. The third time, the words blurred, not because they had changed but because her vision had. Her eyes stung with sudden heat, though she couldn't name the feeling—fear, or anger, or the simple collapse of hope.
The note trembled in her hand.
"Who…?" Her voice barely rose above a whisper.
Her gaze darted around the room, but nothing stirred. No one was there. She was still alone.
Yet the weight of the note burned in her hand like proof of another presence. Someone had been here. Someone knew she was trapped.
And worse—they knew her well enough to write that last line.
Do not trust yourself.
Her fingers clenched until the paper crumpled. Her pulse roared in her ears.
The silence held, thick and waiting.
Her thoughts spiraled. What if I wrote it? What if I've been here before? What if I'm not remembering because I'm not supposed to?
Her stomach twisted. She wanted to scream, but the thought of hearing that echo—distorted, mocking—froze the sound in her throat.
Instead, she backed against the far wall, sinking down until her knees touched her chest. She clutched the note in her fist like a talisman, though its words offered no comfort.
Her eyes stayed fixed on the bulb.
It flickered once.
Twice.
The shadows warped, stretching long across the walls, twisting into shapes that seemed to move on their own. She blinked, and they froze—but not fast enough.
Her breath quickened.
She closed her eyes. Opened them again. The shadows were still.
And then—
From the corner of the room, where the darkness gathered deepest, a voice rose.
Not hers. Not an echo.
Low. Calm. Unhurried.
"You shouldn't have come here."
The bulb sputtered once, flared—and went out.
The darkness swallowed her whole.