The wind carried the taste of smoke and sadness. It tore at my old, patched-up coat as I looked at the distant city. What was left of it, anyway. The tall buildings were damaged and rough, like the ruins of a forgotten past.
The world they once represented was gone, a memory fading away.
My name is Vasco, and the world I knew was dying. Not in a bang, but a fade. They called it the Fading. Memories blurring, history dissolving, reality itself becoming…unreliable. Nothing felt solid anymore.
Beatriz's voice broke the quiet, asking, "Anything?" She was the practical one, always. Strong and solid, with sharp eyes that could find food anywhere.
I sighed and put down the old binoculars. "Just illusions. More of the same empty space."
Cesar, our tech expert, sat across from me. He was focused intently on an old, damaged datapad, his face creased in concentration. "Still nothing on the Archive, Vasco? The signal's weak."
The Archive. People talked about it – a safe place in this ruined world. They said it was a place resistant to the Fading, a vault where history and knowledge were preserved. It was a place of hope, a chance to reclaim who we were.
Finding the Archive was incredibly tough. We struggled to survive every single day. We had to constantly search for food and water, while also trying to keep our memories alive.
We'd seen countless groups, each with their own unique and often damaged ways of response to the Fading.
Some, the "Acceptors," welcomed the amnesia. They liked the idea of being free from the past's troubles. They moved through the destroyed city happily, looking like they didn't know anything, chanting about liberation from the "tyranny of memory." They sometimes made strange art, using bones. They didn't care about anything, they were dangerous, like a wildfire.
Others, the "Preservers," fought desperately against the oblivion. They collected artifacts, thoroughly piecing together historical records, obsessed with the details in a world where details were becoming meaningless. Obsession, we learned, could be another kind of poison. They were dangerous in their paranoia.
Today, we were in what used to be a great metropolis, now a wasteland of rust and broken lives.
The air smells of rot and a strange, bioluminescent fungus that bloomed in the dark corners. Glowing, pulsing, these fungi, fed on the lost memories of those who had died here. It was beautiful in a horrific way.
"I swear, the signal is stronger near that old power plant," Cesar announced, pointing. "Think we can risk it?"
"Risk is our middle name," I smiled and made a joke, but I was really nervous. The power plant was known to be a hotspot for "Acceptor" activity.
We moved cautiously with our guns ready. Our boots crunched on the broken ground.
As we approached the colossal, skeletal structure of the power plant, I felt sick. It wasn't just the smell of rot; it was a feeling of… death. A sense that something was watching, waiting.
And then, we saw them. A strange figures, their faces covered with a pale, almost luminescent substance, their eyes held no emotion. The Acceptors. They began to chant, their voices a humming chorus of oblivion.
"Liberation…Release…Forget…"
They started to form a group, and they blocked our way.
Beatriz cursed under her breath. "Looks like we're not getting past this without a fight."
Everything happened so fast; it was pure adrenaline and urgent fighting.
We fought desperately, but they wouldn't give up. They attacked us again and again, their eyes wild with a strange excitement.
We pushed them back, but more just kept coming, a never-ending wave of people who had been left behind.
Bullets flew, and the acceptances were just crazy and just wanted to consume, like a plague of the undead.
Cesar was injured, he had a big cut on his arm. Beatriz was holding her own, but I could see the exhaustion in her eyes.
I saw them.
"We need to fall back," I shouted, trying to be heard above the noise. "Now!"
We were retreating when a blinding light exploded from the power plant. The Acceptors screamed, their bodies convulsing. And then, they stopped. Their faces froze, and their eyes showed nothing but a deep emptiness.
A figure appeared from the blinding light. It was tall. Imposing. Cloaked in an advanced metal armor. And had the same pale, luminescent substance on their skin. He approached me.
"You seek the Archive," the figure spoke, its voice a flat, synthesized sound. "We can provide assistance. But first, you must… accept. Accept the freedom of forgetting."
I looked at him, my mind spinning. What was this? Were they part of the Archive? Or something completely different? "What do you mean… accept?"
The figure tilted its head. I can see the same insanity in his eyes as the Acceptors. "The Archive is not a place, Vasco. It is a state of being. It's a choice. A liberation. You cannot hold onto the old world, Vasco. It is gone. You must let it go."
It offered a hand. In it was a vial, full of luminescent fluid. "Drink. Forget. And be free."
I looked from the vial to my friends, their faces, worn down by hardship, reflected my own exhaustion. I could feel the Fading already destroying something inside me, memories disappearing like dying embers.
"Is this real?" I barely breathed the words, asking.
"Perhaps," it replied. "But does it matter?"
I looked into the cold, empty eyes of the figure, and for a split second, I truly understood.
Perhaps all the struggle, the refusal to let go of what was, was all for nothing. The world was already gone. There was no changing what would happen, just how I'd respond.
My hand trembled. I wanted to fight. I wanted to rage. I wanted to remember. But a sense of calmness took over, and clearing my mind.
I grabbed the vial.
"The past… is a trapped," I said, the taste of the liquid was sweet. I wanted more.
The figure looked, and a slight smile appeared on his face. Like a sign of approval.
I drank.
The world went white.
I woke up in a room. The walls were smooth and white. There was nothing. No memories. Just a sense of… nothing.
"Welcome," a voice said. The voice gave me a small jolt as I forgot.
Slowly, the memories I had as Vasco, they were gone. The struggle, the pain, the fear. Gone. I think I smiled.
"You have chosen well, Vasco," the voice repeated itself. "You are now… free."
The figure was standing over me, his face… I couldn't remember. I was here.
I felt... I felt the need to go to the entrance. I went through the doorway.
Beatriz. Cesar. They were sitting there. Their faces were blank. They smiled. They were here in the new reality.
It was a new world. No past. No scars. Just a pale in the abyss.
I can already feel the need to forget again.
I smiled.