I don't know how long I've been here. Time doesn't work the way it worked outside, which is to say it doesn't work at all.

Alex is the name I give myself in the Scenes. It's not my real name—I know that, somewhere under the layers, there's a real name attached to a real face in a real mirror. But Alex is the name I use when I'm inside the simulation, and the simulation has been running so long that "inside" and "outside" mean the same thing now.

The Team is real. At least, their reality is as real as anything in here is. There's Marcus, who leads. He used to be funny. Now he's efficient. There's Sarah, who fixes things. She used to use real medical procedures. Now she uses things that aren't quite medical and aren't quite anything I can name. There's Reyes, who carries the equipment. He used to complain about the weight. Now he doesn't complain about anything. His face is smooth. Blank, in the way that Frank at The Plant was blank, but more complete. Where Frank's blankness was the absence of expression, Reyes's blankness is the absence of everything except compliance.

We are on a mission. Marcus says so. Every Scene is a test, and every test brings us closer to the Root Memory—the place where the simulation began, where we can exit, where we can go home.

"Home," I said last time, and Marcus looked at me the way you look at someone who's just said something that's not quite right but you're too tired to correct.

"You know what home is, Alex."

"I know a word. Not a place."

He changed the subject.

The Scenes are different every time. Sometimes they're rooms. Sometimes they're streets. Sometimes they're things I can't describe because there aren't words for them in the vocabulary we have. A Scene might be a hospital corridor that stretches infinitely in both directions, with doors on either side and each door leads to a room where something bad happened. A Scene might be a highway at midnight with no other cars and a radio that plays a song I used to know the words to but now only remember the melody of. A Scene might be a room with no doors, no windows, and a mirror, and I have to figure out how to leave without an exit.

I've been in the mirror Scene three times. Each time, the reflection does something I'm not doing. First time, it smiled when I wasn't. Second time, it spoke: "You know the answer." Third time, it said: "The correct answer is the one you're most afraid to say."

The Doctor appeared between Scenes. Not in a Scene—between them, in the Gap, which is the space between one Scene and the next where nothing exists except the feeling of falling and the sound of your own breathing.

The Doctor has a face I recognize but can't place. He's middle-aged, tired-eyed, wearing a white coat that's clean but not new. He stands in the Gap like he's standing in an office, which is funny because there are no offices in the Gap.

"Alex," he says. "You need to wake up."

"Where am I?" I ask. This is the wrong question. I know it's the wrong question. But it's the only question I have.

"You're in a simulation. A therapeutic simulation. You're in a—

He stops. Looks at something behind me. I turn. Marcus is there, which is impossible because Marcus can't enter the Gap. Only I and the Doctor can be in the Gap. Marcus is a Team member. Team members exist inside Scenes.

"Dr. Evans," Marcus says. His voice is different in the Gap—flatter. Like he's reading lines instead of speaking. "You shouldn't be here."

"I have to reach him."

"He's not ready."

"He's never ready. That's not how this works."

I watch them talk the way you watch a car accident from inside the car. You know it's happening. You know you can't stop it. You can only brace.

Dr. Evans says something to Marcus I can't hear. Marcus shakes his head. The Gap starts to dissolve—the way it always does when something goes wrong—and I'm falling into the next Scene before I can ask Dr. Evans what he was going to say.

This Scene is a house.

Not just any house. A specific house. The kind of house that exists in suburbs and has a driveway and a lawn and a front door that opens to a living room with beige carpet and a kitchen with Formica counters. The kind of house that exists in thousands of cities across the country and in each one a different family is living different lives.

But this house is different. I know this house. I've been here before. Not in a Scene. In the real world. In the world outside the simulation.

The kitchen is the same. The Formica is a light green. The fridge has magnets on it—letters that spell things but not words. D. A. D. Not Dad. D. A. D. As if someone had taken the letters and arranged them into something close to meaning but not quite.

The living room has a television. It's on. I can hear it. A news broadcast. Something about an accident. Something about a highway. Something about—

I don't want to hear it. I turn off the television. When I turn it back on, the broadcast has changed. Now it's a weather report. Now it's a commercial for a product I've never heard of. Now it's static.

The Team is here. Marcus, Sarah, Reyes. They're standing in the living room, and they're looking at me like they're looking at a puzzle they've been given and don't have the instructions for.

"Where are we?" Marcus asks.

"I know this place," I say.

"That's not possible. You haven't been assigned to this Scene before."

"I know this house."

Sarah steps forward. Her eyes are the color of rain. "Alex, sometimes the Simulation uses familiar locations to make the lessons stick. It's a technique. You've seen this house before—in real life. That's all."

"That's not all. This house is—

I stop. Because if I say the word, I'm one step closer to the Correct Answer. And the Correct Answer is the thing Dr. Evans was trying to tell me in the Gap, the thing Marcus blocked, the thing I am most afraid to say.

What is the Correct Answer?

The Correct Answer is: I am not in a simulation.

The Correct Answer is: there never was a Team.

The Correct Answer is: Marcus, Sarah, Reyes—they're not people. They're parts of me.

The Correct Answer is: the Scenes are not tests. They're memories. And I am not trying to escape. I am trying to remember what happened.

I look at the kitchen. The Formica counters. The magnets. D. A. D. I understand now. Not the full truth. Not the whole story. But enough to know that if I go one step further—if I find the Root Memory—I will know everything. And knowing everything is the same as knowing nothing, because you won't be able to carry it.

Marcus is waiting for my answer. Sarah is waiting for my lead. Reyes is waiting for my order.

I don't give them one.

I walk to the front door. I open it. Outside, there's nothing. Not darkness. Not light. Nothing. The absence of Scene. The absence of simulation. The place where the Doctor stands.

I step through the door.

I step out of the house.

I step out of the Scene.

And I stand in the Gap with the Doctor and I say the thing I've been afraid to say my entire life.

"I remember."

Dr. Evans takes off his glasses. He wipes them on his coat. He puts them back on. He looks at me with eyes that are tired and kind and full of something that might be hope.

"Tell me," he says.

And I do.

But I won't tell you what I told him. Because the Correct Answer is mine. And maybe—just maybe—if I keep it to myself, it'll still be true.

OTMES-v2-1F4D9E-090-M9-055-8R4610-12F8 M: [9.0, 5.0, 5.0, 8.0, 3.0, 6.0, 9.5, 7.0, 6.0, 4.0] N: [0.4, 0.6] K: [0.25, 0.75] TI: 88.0 | θ: 090° | E: 10.2 Mode: 9 (Psychological Thriller · Total Destruction)