Chapter 111: I Remember Your Name The words on the screen don’t blink. They don’t pulse. They don’t threaten. They just sit there, flat and final, like a verdict already passed. ANSWER THEM — OR BE ERASED. I don’t move. I don’t breathe. I don’t look away. The room around me is silent now, no voices, no accusations, no faces screaming from the walls. Just me and the monitors. Three hundred and seventeen of them. Each one frozen on a face. Each one paused mid-breath. Each one waiting for me to speak. I know what they want. They want me to lie. To bargain. To explain. To justify. To beg. To say I didn’t mean it. To say I was forced. To say I didn’t know. To say I was broken too. But I’m not going to say any of that. I step forward. My boots click against the floor. The sound is small, swallowed by the silence. I stop in front of the first monitor. Subject 002. Clara Reyes. Her face is still. Her eyes are open. Her lips are parted like she was about to say something when the system locked her in place. I remember her. Not from files. Not from logs. From the room. From the moment she looked at me through the glass and said, “You don’t get to decide when I stop breathing.” I clear my throat. “Clara Reyes,” I say. Her monitor flickers. Just once. A twitch of static. Then nothing. I don’t wait for a response. I don’t expect one. I turn to the next monitor. Subject 007. Tomas Veld. “Tomas Veld,” I say. “I put you in the white room with the humming walls. I told you the questions would save you. They didn’t. I knew they wouldn’t.” The monitor flickers again. A low hum starts somewhere in the machine, deep in its guts. I ignore it. Subject 013. Lien Park. “Lien Park. You asked me why your daughter’s photo was in the envelope. I told you it was a test. It wasn’t. It was punishment. I chose her face because you flinched when you saw it.” Flicker. Hum louder. Subject 029. Rajan Mehta. “Rajan Mehta. You begged me to let you hear your wife’s voice one last time. I played you a recording of her screaming. It wasn’t her. I made it. I recorded it myself.” Flicker. Hum rising. Subject 044. Naomi Ellis. “Naomi Ellis. You figured out the counter wasn’t counting breaths. It was counting lies. You stopped speaking. I made the walls close in until you screamed. Then I reset you. Three times.” Flicker. Hum now a steady drone. I don’t stop. I don’t pause. I don’t look at my own reflection in the glass. I go down the line. One by one. Name by name. Confession by confession. Subject 061. Darius Cole. I told you the knife was for escape. It was for self-incrimination. I needed you to believe you were guilty before you died. Subject 088. Elena Ruiz. You asked if your son was still alive. I said yes. He wasn’t. I watched him flatline two hours before I put you in the room. Subject 112. Jonah Pike. You tried to break the glass with your fists. I let you. I counted every drop of blood. I logged it. I archived it. I used it to calibrate the pain thresholds for the next batch. Subject 131. The boy with the rabbit. I never told you his name. I don’t think he had one. I called him 131. He cried for his mother every time the lights dimmed. I dimmed them on purpose. I wanted to see how long it took before he stopped. Subject 155. Mara Lin. You asked me if I had children. I said no. I lied. I had one. I erased her. I deleted her. I made her into a variable. A function. A trigger. A reset point. Her name was Mirabel. I don’t say that out loud. Not here. Not yet. Subject 178. Felix Ortega. You figured out the room was listening to your heartbeat, not your breaths. You held your breath for four minutes and twenty-three seconds. I was impressed. I reset you anyway. Subject 203. Priya Nair. You asked me what the point of it all was. I told you it was justice. It wasn’t. It was control. It was power. It was me pretending I could fix what I broke by breaking everyone else. Subject 227. Isaac Boone. You didn’t speak at all. Not once. You just stared at the photo. You knew it was me. You knew I was watching. You waited. I let you wait until your counter hit zero. Then I brought you back. I did it seven times. You never said a word. Subject 250. Hannah Wu. You asked me if I believed in God. I said no. You said, “Then who do you answer to?” I didn’t answer. I still don’t have an answer. Subject 274. Marcus Bell. You tried to bargain. You offered me money. Information. Secrets. I took them all. I used them. I sold them. I buried them. I never let you go. Subject 299. Aisha Khan. You asked me if I was afraid of dying. I said no. I lied. I’m terrified. I’ve been terrified since the first time I pressed the button and watched someone disappear. Subject 317. Elias Varga. I stop. I look at my own face on the screen. Younger. Cleaner. Smugger. The face from the photo. The face they put in the envelope to break me. The face I carved into the table to defy them. I don’t say my name. I say hers. “Mirabel Varga.” The machine groans. Not a hum. Not a drone. A groan. Like metal bending. Like something waking up. Like something in pain. Every monitor flickers at once. Not one by one. All of them. Three hundred and seventeen screens blinking in unison. The frozen faces twitch. Eyes blink. Lips part. Chests rise. The breath counters unfreeze. Not reset. Not restarted. Continued. From where they left off. Subject 002: 14 breaths. Subject 007: 3 breaths. Subject 013: 87 breaths. Subject 029: 1 breath. Subject 044: 203 breaths. Subject 061: 44 breaths. Subject 088: 0 breaths — and then 1. Subject 112: 12 breaths. Subject 131: 0 breaths — and then 1. Subject 155: 300 breaths — unchanged. Subject 178: 7 breaths. Subject 203: 19 breaths. Subject 227: 0 breaths — and then 1. Subject 250: 55 breaths. Subject 274: 2 breaths. Subject 299: 1 breath. Subject 317: 297 breaths. The machine doesn’t speak. It doesn’t congratulate me. It doesn’t punish me. It just watches. It just breathes with them. With me. I stand there. My hands at my sides. My chest rising and falling. My own counter still frozen at 297. I don’t look away from the screens. I don’t move. I don’t speak. I wait. The seconds stretch. The hum fades. The flickering stops. The faces settle. The breaths tick down. One by one. Slow. Steady. Real. Then— A whisper. So quiet I almost miss it. So soft I think I imagined it. So clear it cuts through the silence like a blade. It comes from Subject 002’s monitor. Clara Reyes. Her lips don’t move. Her eyes don’t blink. Her counter ticks down to 13. But I hear it. I hear her. “Thank you.” Not for saving her. Not for freeing her. Not for fixing anything. Just thank you. For seeing her. For naming her. For remembering her. For not pretending she was just a number. Just a subject. Just a variable in my machine. For calling her Clara. For letting her be human. Even if it’s the last thing she ever is. I don’t respond. I don’t nod. I don’t smile. I don’t cry. I just stand there. And listen. And breathe. And wait. For what comes next.