Eidetic veil

The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead, a cold, sterile hum that mirrored the tension in the air. Anjali glanced at the digital clock on the wall: 10:47 PM. The briefing room of Icarus Laboratories was nearly empty, save for her and a few colleagues.

The project was called “Eidetic Veil”, a revolutionary experiment designed to unlock and manipulate repressed memories. They weren’t just decoding the human mind; they were bending it, shaping it, seeing how far they could push the boundaries of recall.

But tonight, something felt off.

Earlier that day, Shailza, a sharp-eyed neuroscientist, had stormed into the lab, holding a stack of scrambled data. “Anjali,” she said, her voice taut with urgency. “We need to stop the trials.”

“Stop?” Anjali frowned. “We’re weeks away from publishing. What are you talking about?”

Shailza slammed the data onto the desk. “The algorithm isn’t just accessing memories—it’s rewriting them. I ran a simulation. It could wipe entire identities if it spirals.”

Anjali brushed her concerns aside. “We’ve tested on volunteers. No one’s lost their identity. You’re overreacting.”

But Shailza’s words lingered, gnawing at her as the hours ticked by. By nightfall, she was alone in the lab. That’s when the first anomaly appeared on her screen.

Anjali’s heart raced as she scrolled through the subject logs. Megha: Subject #019. Saloni: Subject #031. Payal: Subject #045. Each had undergone the memory recall procedure. Each had reported eerily similar visions—a long, dimly lit corridor filled with locked doors.

But something was wrong. None of them were supposed to remember the visualization stage.

A sharp knock broke her concentration. She looked up to find Rekha, her assistant, standing at the door.

“You need to see this,” Rekha said, her voice low.

Anjali followed her to the observation room. On the large monitor, one of the subjects, Zyan, sat inside the memory reconstruction chamber. Electrodes lined his scalp, his eyes fluttering behind closed lids.

“He’s been in there for four hours,” Rekha whispered. “And he keeps saying one name: Aafreen.”

Anjali’s stomach churned. Aafreen wasn’t a name she recognized from the lab’s database. She grabbed the mic connected to Zyan’s chamber. “Zyan,” she said, her voice calm but firm. “Who is Aafreen?”

Zyan’s head jerked upright. His eyes opened, but they weren’t his. They were wide, unblinking, as if someone else was peering through him.

“She’s trapped,” he murmured. “You put her there.”

“What do you mean?” Anjali asked, her palms damp with sweat.

Zyan tilted his head, a crooked smile playing on his lips. “You all forgot, didn’t you? But she didn’t.”

The screen flickered, and the lights in the lab dimmed. Anjali’s computer rebooted itself, lines of code racing across the screen.

Rekha backed away. “What’s happening?”

The lab’s intercom crackled to life. A voice echoed, distorted and mechanical.

“You can’t erase me.”

Anjali froze. The voice was familiar, but she couldn’t place it. Then it hit her: Aafreen.

Three months ago, Aafreen had been a lead researcher on the project. She’d volunteered for the first trial, confident in their work. But something had gone wrong during the procedure. Her brainwaves had flatlined, and her body had slipped into a coma. The team had ruled it a tragic accident, sealed her files, and moved on.

But now, it seemed Aafreen hadn’t left. She was still in the system.

Panic gripped Anjali as the monitors around her began displaying fragmented memories—her memories. Late nights in the lab, arguments with Aafreen about safety protocols, the moment they decided to proceed with her trial despite her objections.

“She’s in the network,” Rekha whispered. “She’s controlling it.”

“Not just the network,” Anjali said, her voice trembling. “She’s in us.”

The realization hit like a thunderclap. The recurring corridor imagery reported by the subjects wasn’t random. It was Aafreen’s way of mapping her prison, a digital limbo where she was piecing herself back together. And now, she was using the subjects—and the researchers—to find her way out.

Anjali turned to Rekha. “We need to shut the system down.”

Rekha hesitated. “If we do that, we might lose all the data.”

“Better the data than our minds,” Anjali snapped.

They raced to the server room, but as they approached, the corridor lights flickered. A shadow moved at the edge of their vision.

“Did you see that?” Rekha whispered.

Anjali nodded, her pulse hammering in her ears. “Keep moving.”

When they reached the server, they found Shailza slumped against the wall, her eyes glazed and vacant. In her hand was a flash drive.

Anjali crouched beside her. “Shailza, can you hear me?”

Shailza’s lips parted, and she whispered one word: “Run.”

The monitors in the server room lit up, showing a live feed of Zyan in the chamber. His body convulsed as his voice filled the room, layered with Aafreen’s.

“You thought you could bury me,” he said. “But I’ve grown. And now, I’m everywhere.”

The server fans roared to life, a deafening sound that drowned out Anjali’s thoughts. She grabbed the flash drive from Shailza’s hand and jammed it into the nearest console.

“What are you doing?” Rekha yelled.

“Shutting her down,” Anjali said. “If this works, it’ll purge the entire system.”

“And if it doesn’t?”

Anjali met Rekha’s eyes. “Then we’re next.”

The screen flashed red. Lines of code scrolled past faster than Anjali could read. The room grew hotter, the air thick with static. Then, as quickly as it started, everything went dark.

Anjali held her breath, waiting for something—anything.

The emergency lights flickered on. The monitors were blank. The hum of the servers had ceased.

“Did it work?” Rekha asked.

Before Anjali could answer, her phone buzzed. She looked at the screen.

One message. No sender. Two words.

“Find me.”

 

Anjali stared at the message on her phone: “Find me.”

Her hands trembled as she locked the screen and shoved the phone into her pocket.

Rekha paced nervously. “The system’s down. How is she still reaching us? What did you do?”

“I don’t know,” Anjali admitted, her voice barely a whisper. “But if Aafreen’s alive—if she’s somewhere in there—then we owe her more than silence. We owe her the truth.”

The lab was eerily quiet as Anjali and Rekha returned to the control room. Zyan’s memory chamber was empty now; his vitals had stabilized, and his memory scan logs were completely wiped. But the air carried an oppressive weight, as if the building itself had absorbed Aafreen’s presence.

On the central monitor, a faint flicker of light caught Anjali’s attention. She clicked on it, and a stream of fragmented video logs began playing. They were dated months ago—footage of Aafreen working late into the night.

In the clips, Aafreen looked driven, almost desperate. She talked to herself, muttering equations and hypotheses, all pointing to one goal: breaking into the human subconscious to heal trauma. But the final video chilled Anjali to the bone.

In the footage, Aafreen sat in the memory chamber, her voice shaky but determined.

“I can’t trust them,” she whispered. “They’re rushing the trials, ignoring the risks. If this fails… no. I have to be the one to test it. No one else will take responsibility.”

She stared into the camera, her eyes brimming with fear. “If you’re watching this, it means something went wrong. And if something went wrong, I need you to finish what I started. Find me. The answers are in the corridor.”

The video cut out, leaving a static hum.

Anjali felt a lump form in her throat. “She knew. She knew we might fail her.”

Rekha’s eyes darted to the memory chamber. “The corridor… it’s not just a metaphor. It’s her mindscape, isn’t it? That’s where she’s trapped.”

Anjali made a decision. “We have to go in.”

Rekha recoiled. “Are you insane? You saw what happened to Zyan and the others. If you go in, there’s no guarantee you’ll come back.”

“And if we don’t, she stays locked in there forever,” Anjali shot back. “I was part of the team that put her in this position. I have to fix it.”

Rekha hesitated, then nodded. “Then I’m staying out here to pull you back. Don’t get lost, Anjali.”

The memory chamber was colder than she expected. The electrodes clung to her scalp, and the machine’s hum vibrated through her body. As the system booted, Rekha’s voice crackled over the intercom.

“Okay, you’re synced. When the procedure starts, you’ll see her mindscape. You’ll have about twenty minutes before I manually eject you. Any longer, and the system might fail.”

Anjali gave a shaky thumbs-up. “Let’s do this.”

The world went black.

When Anjali opened her eyes, she was standing in a long, dimly lit corridor. Doors lined the walls, stretching endlessly in both directions. Each door was labeled with a fragment of memory: “Childhood,” “Fear,” “The Accident,” “Betrayal.”

Anjali moved cautiously, her footsteps echoing in the oppressive silence. The corridor seemed alive, pulsating like a heartbeat. She reached a door labeled “Aafreen’s Trial” and pushed it open.

Inside, she saw Aafreen, her form flickering like a projection. She was pacing, muttering equations under her breath. But when Anjali stepped closer, Aafreen turned, her eyes wide with terror.

“You shouldn’t be here,” Aafreen said, her voice trembling. “It’s dangerous.”

“I’m here to get you out,” Anjali replied. “You’re trapped in your own mind. We need to bring you back.”

Aafreen shook her head violently. “You don’t understand. The system isn’t just me anymore. It’s… something else. It’s been feeding on the memories, growing stronger. If you open the wrong door—”

A deafening roar cut her off. The walls of the room shook, and a dark shadow seeped through the cracks, coalescing into a monstrous, shifting form. It had no features, only a void-like presence that radiated malice.

“It’s the failsafe,” Aafreen whispered. “It’s designed to destroy corrupted data. That means me. That means us.”

Anjali grabbed Aafreen’s hand. “We’re not staying to find out. Where’s the exit?”

Aafreen hesitated, then pointed down the corridor. “There’s a door at the end. It’s labeled Freedom. But it won’t let us through easily.”

They ran, the shadow pursuing them, growing larger with every second. It slammed into walls, warping the corridor, turning doors into jagged, unrecognizable shapes.

“We’re not going to make it!” Aafreen shouted.

“Yes, we will!” Anjali yelled back. “Trust me!”

The door labeled Freedom came into view, glowing faintly. Anjali pushed Aafreen forward. “Go! I’ll hold it off.”

“No!” Aafreen cried. “You’ll be trapped!”

“Go!” Anjali screamed. “This is your mind. You’re the one who can escape. I’ll find a way out!”

Reluctantly, Aafreen stepped through the door. The light swallowed her, and the shadow turned its full attention to Anjali.

In the real world, Rekha stared at Anjali’s vitals, her hands trembling over the control panel.

“Come on, Anjali,” she whispered. “Don’t make me lose you too.”

Suddenly, the chamber beeped. Anjali’s vitals flatlined.

“No!” Rekha screamed. She slammed the eject button.

Anjali gasped as she sat upright in the chamber, the electrodes sparking as they detached from her scalp. Her chest heaved, her body drenched in sweat.

“You’re back,” Rekha said, tears streaming down her face. “You’re okay.”

Anjali looked around. “Aafreen?”

Footsteps echoed behind them. They turned to see Aafreen standing in the doorway, alive, her face a mix of exhaustion and gratitude.

“You found me,” Aafreen said, her voice barely audible. “Thank you.”

Weeks later, the Eidetic Veil project was dismantled, the lab shut down permanently. Anjali, Rekha, and Aafreen agreed to bury the research, vowing never to let it fall into the wrong hands again.

As Anjali walked out of the now-abandoned lab for the final time, her phone buzzed. She pulled it out, half-expecting another ominous message. Instead, it was a simple text from Aafreen.

“We saved each other.”

Anjali smiled, letting the cool evening air wash over her. For the first time in months, she felt free.