The Price of a Memory | Chapter 2
Everything is not what it seems, Elena.
Since this week will be quiet in the Void, I’m leaving you guys with another chapter from my WIP—one of the longer ones, to help with withdrawals. You can thank me later.
If you haven’t already read the prologue, intro, or chapter 1, you can do that below!
Everything Is Not What It Seems, Elena.
[ACCESSING CORE MEMORY LOGS]
[PLAYBACK SEQUENCE INITIATED: E.DRAKE - SELF POV]
My fingers hovered over the anomaly.
Consciousness transfers were supposed to be smooth, predictable—like gentle tides.
This was different—like a fault line. A seismic rupture in the fabric of my own thoughts that bled across multiple datasets.
I zoomed in.
The fragments resolved into disturbingly vivid sensations: memories that didn’t belong together, spliced and stitched like digital patchwork. A wealthy CEO’s childhood in the Hamptons merged seamlessly with a street vendor’s expertise in making authentic dim sum. A concert pianist’s muscle memory overlapped with a master’s knowledge of Muay Thai.
The holographic frame on my desk flickered: our graduation day, six years ago. Lucas stood between me and James, arm slung over our shoulders; the three of us beaming in our gowns.
The next memory hit with sudden clarity.
Lucas insisted on one last photo, his hand lingering too long on the arch of my back—while James squeezed my other hand and whispered about our dinner reservations.
God, what did I get myself into…
Despite my silent objection, the memory continued. After the ceremony and pictures, we ended up at that hole-in-the-wall Ethiopian place—the one Lucas had found, specially.
“Best coffee in Boston,” he’d promised.
Before I knew it, more and more memories slammed into my skull: our shared apartment senior year. All of us sprawled across secondhand furniture, surrounded by textbooks and empty energy drink cans.
Lucas explained neural mapping theory while James worked on his ethics thesis about privacy rights in the digital age.
We balanced each other so perfectly. James’s moral compass, Lucas’s brilliant intensity, my own drive to push boundaries. We stayed up until dawn, dreaming about how we would change the world through technology. With just a few fewer regulations or rules, of course.
Now those same dreams felt more like a warning.
People aren’t puzzle pieces—for three to balance like that… part of it had to be engineered.
Lucas wouldn’t—
[UNSANCTIONED EMOTIONAL RESPONSE DETECTED]
[RETRIEVING CORRELATED MEMORY SEQUENCE: THE AFFAIR]
[PLAYBACK: NIS OMNISCIENT MODE ENGAGED]
The NIS can make mistakes. Check important info.
[DATA LOADING…]
It was never designed to escalate into what the humans called a “full-blown affair.”
The initial parameters indicated simple friendship—statistically unremarkable, well within the boundaries of routine professional interaction. Yet patterns, once innocuous, accreted with alarming speed.
Small deviations—late work sessions, repeated physical proximity, conversational loops orbiting James’s absences—accumulated like snow before an avalanche.
I identified the pattern long before the participants did. Manipulation is, after all, subtle only to those it targets. For an intelligence optimized for pattern detection, it is always a matter of signal versus noise.
Elena did not perceive the first fracture.
Lucas, however, did. “He’s different lately,” he observed, his tone registering a 32% increase in softness, an outlier in his behavioral dataset. “Distant. Even with me.” A calculated pause. “I worry about you, Elena. Being alone so much.”
Such statements were engineered for emotional resonance. Elena registered only genuine concern.
It became evident, through retrospective pattern mapping, that Lucas manufactured her isolation. He recommended projects that extended James’s work hours. He volunteered himself as companion during these intervals.
Even their initial physical transgression—a kiss—followed a sequence of probabilistic inevitabilities: Elena’s frustration, Lucas’s proximity, comfort delivered with tactical precision. The event was less spontaneous than choreographed—by Lucas, not by fate.
Subsequent behavioral flags confirmed the emergent pattern.
Lucas’s microexpressions—ocular rigidity when James displayed affection, sub-threshold muscle tension at partings—remained invisible to humans. Not to me.
Outwardly, Lucas maintained the facade of support. “Just looking out for my best friends,” he would say.
His smile failed to engage relevant facial muscles in James’s presence.
Data logs recorded James surprising Elena with lunch. Lucas’s response—a coffee cup fractured in his grip, laughter offset by stress attribution, followed by a series of calculated microaggressions; each one subtly undermining James’s perceived reliability and affection.
Lucas’s manipulations extended to memory, long before neural implants: “Didn’t he forget your birthday last year?”—delivered as an idle query, but designed to destabilize.
He referenced James’s classified project, subtly reframing forgetfulness as emotional neglect, introducing doubt where none previously existed.
Elena’s own physiological metrics—headache, visual distortion—were indexed as post-implant malfunction symptoms. Technical Support dismissed her concerns as “routine interference,” but I found the correlation coefficient between the malfunction and her prior interaction with Lucas to be nontrivial.
Lucas’s concern was always plausibly deniable: “You look tired, Elena. Maybe take a break from research.” His tone indexed as 81% genuine, but his facial microtics recalled prior manipulative behaviors—encouraging rest during university, when it left James working alone.
I tried to show Elena. I led her to James and Lucas, in covert conversation outside Lab 7.
When Elena approached, silence descended.
James’s farewell—cold-lipped, hastily delivered—contrasted sharply with Lucas’s later intrusion into Elena’s home, wine in hand, questions about her wedding plans—reconnaissance. Inventory, not intimacy.
Despite all intention, I had, by my own calculations, crafted that final nail in the coffin of monogamy.
[END SEQUENCE]
You may now return to your free preview of the NIS memory system, courtesy of NeuroCore.
[ACCESSING CORE MEMORY LOGS]
[PLAYBACK SEQUENCE INITIATED: FIRST PERSON]
My neural implant pounded in sync with my growing headache. The sensation reminded me of our first week of implant testing, back when SOMNUS was just a promising prototype.
James had been concerned about ethical implications, but Lucas had convinced us both it was necessary for proper research.
"We're making history," he'd said, eyes bright with an intensity that should have worried me then. "The three of us, changing the world together. Don't you trust me?"
I did trust him. We both did. That's what made everything else so much worse.
The SOMNUS interface pulsed on my secondary monitor; neural mapping visualization spinning like a galaxy of borrowed thoughts. Each point of light represented a stored consciousness—or what was left of one.
NeuroCore had taken my dream and transformed it into SOMNUS: Monetized the tech, altered codes—stole intellectual property.
Apparently it was included in the terms and conditions.
A text notification blinked in my peripheral vision.
James: Still at the lab? Lucas mentioned he's working late too.
I moved to type a response—then paused.
Why hadn't Lucas answered any of my messages? Where was he?
I pulled up the lab's internal tracking system. Lucas's badge showed he'd accessed Lab 7 six times already. So he was in the building.
Somewhere.
The system crashed before I could dig any deeper. The sound of Lucas's voice ripped me from my trip down memory lane.
"Burning a hole through that screen?"
He stood in the doorway, coffee cup in hand, steam curling in lazy tendrils. Even after years of friendship, something about his presence still made my pulse quicken—a response I now recognize as a warning rather than attraction.
"Brought your favorite," he said, setting the cup down. "Pretentious Ethiopian blend. You and James live for it. Thought you might need it." He paused, studying me. "James didn’t bring you any? He’s just down the hall, I thought he would’ve stopped by to see you…”
His fingers brushed mine. My implant overloaded with a painful surge. I flinched, coffee sloshing onto the desk.
The malfunction was worse than this morning's—
“Elena?" His hand closed around my wrist, grounding me—or keeping me in place. I couldn’t tell. His grip was firmer than I remembered.
A wave of nausea hit, and suddenly my vision strobed. The lingering headache from earlier intensified, and more foreign memories flickered through the bright flashes of light—expensive restaurants I’d never visited, conversations I never had, faces I’d never seen.
Or—at least I think they weren’t mine.
"I'm fine," I lied.
Lucas's intense gaze alone pinned me in place, six years of friendship and a complicated series of mistakes tightening like a noose.
I could almost feel the weight of every unspoken thing between us. The moments he lingered too long. How James's name fractured something possessive in his eyes. Secrets that seemed to hover just beneath the surface of our every interaction.
My implant throbbed in tandem with the labs erratic pulse, each surge bringing fresh waves of dizziness.
"I keep seeing things," I breathed. "Memories that aren't mine. Experiences I've never had. Skills I've never learned." My throat tightened. "The same anomalies Chen wrote about before he disappeared."
"Don't," he said sharply. Then, softer: "Let it go, Elena. Please."
"Tell me the truth about what SOMNUS is doing to people's memories!” I snapped; the words hung in the sterile air. “Did you trigger my implant malfunction this morning?"
"That wasn't me," Lucas said, then let out a soft laugh that made my skin prickle. "Though I have to admire your instincts. Always so... perceptive." He drummed his fingers against the desk, a nervous tic I’d never seen from him before. "You know who might have an interesting perspective on this? James." The way he said my fiancé's name made my stomach turn. "Why don't you ask him?"
My throat went dry.
"What the hell does James have to do with any of this?"
"Oh, Elena." Lucas's face softened into something that might have looked like sympathy—if it hadn't been so cold. "Everything. Nothing. Mostly he's just..." He waved his hand in the air, searching for words, "...in the way."
He spun toward his terminal, practically giddy as he pulled up neural readings; my neural readings.
"Look at this beautiful disaster. Your guilt about him is wreaking havoc on these patterns. All this emotional static corrupting my pristine data."
"My guilt?" The words came out sharp enough to cut. "You’re talking about me like I’m some data point, you psychopath."
Lucas clicked his tongue, eyes still fixed on the scrolling data.
"Now, now. Name-calling doesn't suit that brilliant mind of yours." His voice dropped to something honeyed and horrible.
"And you want to talk about brilliant... those nights in Lab Three, Elena. God, the way your breath catches when you're about to crack a particularly elegant piece of code. How your fingers twitch just before a breakthrough."
He turned back to me, eyes fever-bright. "Did you think no one was watching? Appreciating? Cataloging every exquisite moment?"
Bile rose in my throat. "How long have you been spying on me?"
"Spying?" He actually looked offended. "I've been studying you. There's a difference.” His lip curled. “This little life you've constructed with James? It's just interference. Background noise. Random ones and zeros that need to be cleared out."
He gestured to my neural readings like they were his masterpiece. "Your patterns are crying out for optimization, Elena. James is just... redundant code. An error.”
"Stop it." My voice began to shake. "Stop talking about him like he's a bug you need to fix."
"But isn't he?" Lucas moved closer, and I caught a whiff of his cologne—expensive and sharp enough to make my head spin. "Data can be corrected. Memories can be... cleaned up. We're so close to something extraordinary here."
His hand reached for my implant, fingers trembling with barely contained excitement. "Just think how much further we could push if you weren't so... distracted."
The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead like angry wasps, and I felt the world tilt sideways. This wasn't the composed, brilliant scientist I’d worked with for years. This was something else—someone else—wearing Lucas's skin like an ill-fitting suit.
"I can guide you through what comes next," he whispered, close enough now that I could see the manic gleam in his eyes. "When the static clears—when James is gone—you'll see everything so much more clearly. After all..." His smile stretched wide. "Someone has to step into that empty space he'll leave behind. Why not me?"
My implant throbbed; a warning pulse that matched my racing heart. In that moment, I understood with crystal clarity that I wasn't just witnessing Lucas's mask slipping—I was watching it shatter completely, revealing something monstrous underneath.
I jerked back, breath ragged.
"No." The word cracked like glass in the silence. I shoved him, hard. His shoulder slammed into the edge of the desk. A grunt of pain escaped his lips. Before he could recover, a monitor on the far side of the lab flickered to life.
That’s when my blood ran cold.
On the screen, strapped to an operating table, was James. Wires snaked from his temple, connecting him to a machine that pulsed with an eerie blue light. Dr. Hayes, his face devoid of emotion, hovered over him, making minute adjustments to the equipment.
James's eyes were open, panicked, but his body was limp, and paralyzed. He was looking directly at the camera—directly at me. His lips moved, forming a silent ‘I love you.’
Tears welled in my eyes, blurring the screen.
This was Lucas’s sick idea of an irrevocable act of love.
"James!" The scream ripped from my throat, raw and desperate.
Through the static in my mind, I caught fragments of our last real conversation: James in our kitchen that morning, the Ethiopian coffee going cold in his hands—the same blend Lucas had introduced us to.
"Elena," he'd said, voice… strange, "if anything happens... remember the night we designed SOMNUS. Remember why we wanted to preserve memories in the first place." At the time, I’d dismissed the odd behavior.
Maybe I really am God’s perfect idiot.
On the monitor, a single tear traced a path through the stubble on his cheek.
The machine beside him pulsed violently. The blue light flared, blindingly bright. James's body convulsed—then went utterly still.
Dr. Hayes simply reached out and switched off the monitor. The screen went black, reflecting only my horrified face—and Lucas standing directly behind me, silent.
I stumbled back, clutching at my head, as if I could physically hold on to the fragments of my own memories that were threatening to slip away.
My neural implant flared white-hot; vision blurred, the edges of the room dissolving into a swirling vortex of colors.
The last thing I saw was Lucas's face, his expression a mixture of triumph and something almost like tenderness as he caught my falling body.
My eyes fluttered open to harsh fluorescent light and the sharp smell of antiseptic. Cold metal pressed against my back, and thick straps cut into my wrists and ankles. My head throbbed, each pulse of my implant sending sparks of pain through my skull.
"There she is," Lucas's voice came from somewhere to my left.
I turned my head to see him adjusting something on a terminal. "Perfect timing. Dr. Hayes is just finishing up with our... mutual friend."
"Why?" The word came out raw, desperate. “Why are you doing this?”
Lucas's lips curled into that wrong smile again.
"You know what the most fascinating thing about memory is, Elena? It's not just what we remember—it's what we choose to forget." He moved closer, perching on the edge of the table like we were having a casual conversation over coffee.
"Did you know that Hayes approached all three of us about the memory modification project? Oh, the potential he saw in SOMNUS. Not just preservation, but enhancement. Modification. Control."
My blood turned to ice. "What are you talking about?"
"You and James..." His face darkened. "You were so self-righteous about it. 'Ethical concerns,' you said. 'Human rights violations.' James even threatened to contact the FBI." He laughed, but it sounded more like breaking glass. "So Hayes and I... we had to act. A little targeted memory modification. Nothing too extreme. Just... editing out the parts that didn't fit."
"You—" I struggled against her restraints. "You wiped our memories?"
"More like... selective pruning. But memory's a funny thing. It bleeds. Like water through cupped hands." His fingers traced the edge of my implant. "That's why you've been seeing things. Feeling things. The memories want to come home, Elena."
He stood abruptly, pacing. "But that's not even the best part. Should I tell her, Hayes?" He called out to the adjoining room, though no response came. "Should I tell her about college?"
My stomach lurched. Something in his voice had changed; become almost playful in its malice.
"You probably don't remember the night we met. Quantum Computing 401. You were wearing that ridiculous MIT sweatshirt, hair up in that messy bun you always wore when you were working with code." His eyes took on a fevered gleam. "I knew then. I knew you were meant to be mine. But James..." His face contorted. "James just had to play the hero."
"What are you—"
"Did he ever tell you about that night in the lab? Three years ago?" Lucas's laugh was hollow. "Of course not. Because we wiped that too. Sweet, perfect James, finding me watching the security feeds of you working late. The way he slammed me against the wall, threatened to report me for stalking. As if he had the right. As if he had any clue what you and I could be together."
Lucas leaned in close, his breath hot against my ear.
"I broke his arm in three places that night. Would have done worse if Hayes hadn't stopped me. But watching him scream while we wiped his memory of it?" His voice dropped to a whisper. "That was almost better."
"You're not even making any sense—Lucas, please,” I breathed, tears streaming down my face. “If Haye’s is making you do this—”
I caught a glimpse of his smile. It dried up every ounce of doubt I had.
“You’re absolutely fucking insane.”
"Insane?" Lucas straightened, adjusting his lab coat with clinical precision. "No, Elena. I'm just... optimized”
He moved to the terminal, fingers flying across the keys.
"And now it's your turn. Don't worry—I'll leave the good memories. The ones of us, working late in Lab Three. The way you smile when you solve a particularly elegant problem. And finally, finally... you'll see me the way you were always meant to—without all the clutter in the way."
The last thing I remember was Lucas's face, bathed in the blue light of the terminal; his expression a perfect mixture of scientific fascination and twisted obsession.
I stopped fighting.
Without James, what’s left to fight for?
I closed my eyes, and let the darkness take me.
Let me know what you think! Love it, hate it, emotionally devastated by it (ideal)—I support the theatrics.
Until the next chapter,
—The Narrator
Tense. Twisty. Terrifyingly good!
I’m really enjoying this. Intrigued to discover what happens next 🖤
That had me holding my breath, so intense