The Forgotten Room
709 Words
# Chapter 6:
Rain poured over the city as I wandered through empty streets.
The whisper echoed inside my head.
"Find the memory."
"Find the truth."
I closed my eyes.
"I don't know where to look."
For the first time...
The whisper didn't answer.
Instead, another memory flashed before me.
A silver key.
A door with the number 17.
Someone saying...
"Whatever happens, don't let anyone find that room."
The vision disappeared.
Room 17.
Why did it feel so familiar?
---
Without thinking, my feet carried me across the city.
Past crowded streets.
Past old cafés.
Past the park where Daniel had once asked me to be his girlfriend.
At last, I stopped in front of an old apartment building.
The sign above the entrance was rusted.
Raven Apartments.
My heart tightened.
"I've been here before..."
I didn't remember when.
Or why.
The front door was locked.
It didn't matter.
I stepped through it as if it wasn't there.
The hallway was dark and smelled of dust.
Most of the apartments were empty.
Peeling wallpaper hung from the walls.
The elevator no longer worked.
I climbed the stairs until I reached the third floor.
There it was.
Room 17.
The silver key from my memory...
Was already in the lock.
I stared at it in confusion.
Who had left it there?
Slowly...
I reached for the handle.
The door creaked open.
The room was frozen in time.
A desk.
A bookshelf.
A couch covered with white sheets.
Dust floated through the air.
Someone hadn't lived here for years.
Yet it didn't feel abandoned.
It felt...
Waiting.
I stepped inside.
On the desk sat a small photo frame.
I picked it up.
It was a picture of me.
Standing beside an elderly woman I didn't recognize.
We were both smiling.
Written on the back were the words:
To my brave Emma. Never stop searching for the truth. — Grandma Rose
Grandma?
I frowned.
My grandmother had died when I was a child...
Hadn't she?
The whisper returned.
"Not everything you remember is real."
A cold chill ran through me.
---
I searched the room.
Inside the wardrobe hung an old coat.
In one pocket...
I found a tiny voice recorder.
Its battery should have been dead.
Yet when I pressed the button...
It turned on.
Static filled the room.
Then...
My own voice.
"If you're listening to this..."
"...it means something happened to me."
I froze.
"What...?"
The recording continued.
"I don't have much time."
"I accidentally overheard a meeting at Horizon Holdings."
"They're hiding something."
"I don't know who I can trust anymore."
A loud bang interrupted the recording.
My recorded voice became hurried.
"If anything happens to me..."
"Don't let them destroy Project Eclipse."
The recording ended.
Silence.
Project Eclipse?
I'd never heard those words before.
Then why had I recorded them?
---
Suddenly...
The apartment door slammed shut.
The room became ice cold.
The lights flickered.
Someone else was inside.
I wasn't alone.
Slowly...
I turned around.
A woman stood near the doorway.
Her long white dress was stained with dirt.
Her face...
Was my face.
She smiled.
"You've been looking for answers."
I couldn't move.
"Who are you?"
She tilted her head.
"You already know."
"No."
"You just forgot."
She took one slow step toward me.
"I was born the night you died."
My heart pounded.
"What do you mean?"
She smiled wider.
"You call me a monster."
Her black eyes gleamed.
"But I..."
"...am the part of you that refused to stay buried."
The room trembled.
Every mirror shattered.
The voice recorder began playing by itself.
Over and over.
"Don't let them destroy Project Eclipse..."
"Don't let them destroy Project Eclipse..."
"Don't let them destroy Project Eclipse..."
I looked back at the mysterious woman.
She was gone.
Only muddy footprints remained on the floor.
Leading...
To a hidden door behind the bookshelf.
I slowly reached for it.
Before I could touch the handle...
A loud voice echoed from the hallway.
"Someone's inside!"
Footsteps rushed toward the apartment.
Heavy.
Fast.
More than one person.
I glanced at the hidden door...
Then toward the entrance.
Someone was coming.
And for the first time since climbing out of my grave...
I wasn't sure whether to hide...
Or fight.
- Writer
