He was three blocks from home when the scream came. A woman’s voice, sharp, breaking, followed by the shriek of tires and the dull, final sound of metal striking flesh.Stephen froze. The car spun past him, taillights blurring red through the rain. It didn’t stop. He was running before he thought about it, boots splashing through the gutter.A body lay half under the glow of a flickering streetlight, a young woman, maybe twenty, blood threading down her temple.“Hey, hey” he dropped to his knees, breath short. “Can you hear me?”Her pulse fluttered under his fingers, faint but there. He tore open his satchel, a medic’s kit cobbled together from clinic scraps and memory.“Come on… stay with me,” he muttered, brushing wet hair from her face. “You’ve got a pulse. You’re okay.”The girl’s eyes flickered open, pale gray, confused, then rolled back. “Don’t you dare” He pressed against her ribcage, checking breathing. Shallow.He tilted her head, cleared her airway, started chest compression

Rain hadn’t stopped since the night of the accident. It hammered the courthouse roof, rolled down the barred window of Stephen’s holding cell, and beat against Mara Quinn’s umbrella as she crossed the hospital’s private entrance.Inside, everything smelled of antiseptic and money. White marble floors. Silent elevators. Guards who didn’t blink.She flashed her press badge at the receptionist. “Mara Quinn. New York Daily. I’m here to follow up on the Kingsley case.”The receptionist’s smile didn’t reach her eyes. “The family’s requested privacy.”“Of course they have,” Mara said sweetly, leaning in. “And I’m requesting a statement before your boss’s name trends for obstruction.”The woman hesitated, then buzzed her through.Upstairs, the private ward was quiet except for the hum of monitors. Elara Kingsley lay surrounded by machines that breathed for her, tubes tracing her arms like pale vines.Dr. Harlan, head neurologist, stood by the window. “Media isn’t allowed in here.”“I’m not he

The storm had cleared, but the city felt heavier, like it knew something no one was saying out loud. In the hospital, Elara’s heartbeat steadied into a quiet rhythm. The machines hummed like they were listening.Stephen sat in the interrogation room again, wrists free this time, but the tension was worse. Mara stood by the door, dripping from rain, a flash drive clutched in her fist. “You were right,” she said.He lifted his eyes slowly. “About what?”“About her. About all of it.”She set the drive on the table. “I got footage. Elara whispered your name. Right before they sedated her again.”He froze. “They what?”“They’re keeping her under intentionally. Some program, Project E-13. They say it’s treatment, but it’s control.”Stephen’s voice hardened. “You’ve seen her?”“Not since the night of the accident,” Mara admitted. “But I saw the data. They’re forcing her brain to stay asleep. And you” she exhaled. “You’re the variable they can’t explain.”He rubbed his hands together slowly.

The world went dark at 2:17 a.m. Every monitor in Kingsley Medical died in unison. The hum of machines cut to silence. The city outside went black, a skyline swallowed by shadow.And for the first time since the accident, Elara Kingsley heard herself breathe without the sound of machines.“Backup generators should’ve kicked in by now,” Dr. Harlan said, scanning the hallway with a flashlight. The beam jittered over sterile tiles and lifeless screens.The nurse beside him clutched a clipboard. “It’s the whole block, sir. Not just us.”He frowned. “That’s impossible. The hospital runs on a separate grid.”A metallic echo drifted down the corridor. Then a scream, distant, sharp, and human. Harlan turned toward Elara’s room. “Stay here.”Inside, the dark wasn’t empty. It was alive. Elara sat up slowly, the heart monitor beside her still dead.But she could feel another pulse, faint, steady, outside the room yet somehow inside her chest. “Stephen,” she whispered.His voice came faint, fragm

The tunnel opened into a forgotten maintenance chamber, a cavern of rusted steel and dripping pipes. The light from Elara’s skin had faded, leaving only the soft amber glow of a dying emergency lamp overhead.Stephen leaned against the wall, catching his breath. His clothes were torn, his knuckles raw. But his eyes were fixed on her like he was afraid to blink and lose her again.“You’re real,” he said quietly.Elara smiled faintly. “You keep saying that.”“Because it keeps surprising me.”She took a slow step closer. “You saved me once. Now it’s my turn.”He frowned. “You think we can save anyone now?”She looked at her hands, the faint traces of light still threading her veins. “Maybe not everyone. But something happened to us back there, Stephen. When we touched.”“Yeah,” he said, rubbing his chest. “Felt like someone plugged me into a lightning storm.”“It wasn’t just a shock.” Her voice trembled. “It was information. I saw things. Memories that weren’t mine.”He met her eyes. “Wh