Ward C
1138 Words
Chapter five
The gun was pointed at me
For a second nobody moved
Nobody breathed
Even the alarms felt far away, like the whole world had narrowed to the black mouth of that gun
The man smiled
That same cold empty smile that had been haunting me since the street
And I realized something that made my stomach turn
He wasn’t aiming like he planned to kill me
He was aiming like he already knew what I would do next
“Don’t,” the officer said sharply, stepping in front of me
The man tilted his head
“You still trying to protect her?”
Protect me?
My pulse jumped
Before I could think, a shot rang out
I screamed and ducked
Glass shattered somewhere
The officer grabbed me hard and dragged me sideways
“Run!”
Run where?
But he was already pulling me through a side door into a stairwell
My legs barely kept up
Another gunshot echoed behind us
Then footsteps
Fast
Following
We ran down concrete stairs two at a time
My lungs burned
“What is happening?” I gasped
The officer didn’t slow
“If he catches you, we all die”
That did not help
We burst through another door into a lower corridor
Darker
Older
This part of the building looked abandoned
Peeling paint
Rust stains
Locked metal doors lining the walls
Something about it made my skin crawl
Then I saw a faded sign bolted above one corridor
WARD C
My breath caught
No
This place was real
The officer stopped suddenly and turned to me
“Listen carefully”
His voice was urgent now
“You asked what was in Ward C”
I nodded, shaking
He swallowed once
“You were”
The world seemed to drop under me
“What?”
“You were never a patient in the way you think”
His eyes searched mine
“You were a witness they couldn’t control”
I stared at him
Nothing made sense
Then why call me Subject 47
Why erase my memory
Why frame me for murder
As if hearing my thoughts, he said, “Because you saw something no one was supposed to survive seeing”
My chest tightened
“What did I see?”
Before he could answer, a sound came from the corridor behind us
Metal scraping
Slow
Deliberate
We both turned
One of the locked doors was moving
No
Not moving
Opening
From the inside
I took a step back
The door creaked wider
And a voice drifted out
Soft
Familiar
“Amelia”
My blood froze
Mara
Impossible
She stepped into the weak light looking exactly as before, calm as if she hadn’t died six years ago or appeared in a locked cell like a ghost
The officer swore under his breath
“You can see her too?” I whispered
He didn’t answer
That was answer enough
Mara looked at him and smiled faintly
“You told her too much”
“Stay away from her,” he snapped
She ignored him and looked only at me
“You still don’t remember the children”
Children
That word hit like a blow
Flash
Rows of beds
Small hands gripping rails
A little girl crying Don’t leave me
I staggered and grabbed the wall
Mara stepped closer
“You opened Ward C because they were using children”
My heart pounded so hard it hurt
“No…”
But I felt something breaking open in my mind
Not full memory
Fragments
Enough to terrify me
The officer moved between us
“She’s manipulating you”
Mara laughed softly
“Or protecting her from you”
Silence
Then my head snapped toward him
Protecting me… from him?
The warning from the wall came back
Don’t trust the officer
Cold moved through me
I took a small step away from him without meaning to
He noticed
Pain crossed his face
“Amelia don’t do that”
“How do I know you’re not lying?” I whispered
Because suddenly I didn’t know anything
The man with the gun wanted me
Mara knew me
Dr. Soren knew me
And this officer kept acting like he was helping while hiding half the truth
His jaw tightened
“You want truth?” he said
Then he reached into his jacket slowly and handed me a photograph
I looked down
My breath stopped
It was him
Younger
Standing beside… me
Not recent me
A teenage me
We were both covered in soot
Smoke behind us
Fire
And written on the back in shaky handwriting—
If they erase us, find me. – Elias
I looked up sharply
“Elias?”
“That’s my name” he said
Everything tilted again
Younger me knew him
Trusted him enough to leave a message
Then why didn’t I remember him
Because they erased you
The thought wasn’t mine
It came from Mara
I turned
She was staring past me now
At the end of the corridor
My skin prickled
Someone else was there
The man
Standing in the shadows
No gun visible now
Which somehow felt worse
He stepped forward slowly
“You’ve wasted enough time”
Elias moved in front of me again
“Don’t come closer”
The man smiled
“You still think you can stop this”
Then he looked at me
And for the first time, there was something almost human in his expression
Regret
“Amelia, you were supposed to die in the fire”
My breath vanished
What
Elias lunged toward him
Everything happened at once
Another shot
A scream
I don’t know if it was mine
Elias stumbled
Blood spreading across his shirt
“No!” I grabbed him as he dropped to one knee
The man started walking toward us
Unhurried
Certain
Mara suddenly shouted, “Open door seven!”
I looked up confused
“What?”
“Door seven!” she screamed
I dragged Elias toward the seventh metal door and shoved it open
The moment it swung wide
Cold air rushed out
And darkness
Deep darkness
Rows of old files lined the room
Monitors
Tape reels
And on one central screen glowing through static
A video had started playing by itself
My heart stopped
Because on the screen
A younger me stood in a white room
Looking straight into the camera
And she said
“If you’re watching this, they’ve already erased me… and Elias is probably dead”
I froze
On the floor beside me Elias whispered weakly, “Don’t let her finish the tape…”
Too late
The girl on the screen, who was me, leaned closer and said words that turned my blood to ice
The real Subject 47 isn’t me
Static cracked
Then the screen cleared
And revealed the face of the mysterious man
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