Chapter 6 Memories

The day started as usual.

Aurex sat at the breakfast table, smiling through bites of scrambled eggs and toast. His mother was sipping her juice, his father quietly flipping the pages of his newspaper. His sister hummed softly as she scrolled through her papers, and his little brother kicked his legs under the table with a cheerful rhythm.

But Aurex's smile was cracked at the edges. The memory of last night clung to him. The footsteps he wasn't supposed to hear. The silence that followed.

They told him never to leave his room after 6 p.m. And he listened.

But no one else seemed to.

Still, it was his family. They were strange, but they weren't dangerous… right?

He glanced at his father, who seemed completely absorbed in the newspaper,just like every other morning. Aurex took a deep breath, trying to sound casual.

"Dad, what are you reading today?"

"The news," his father replied with a faint smile.

"I know," Aurex said, trying to keep his voice steady. "But what kind of news?"

His father finally glanced at him, the same warm expression on his face. "Let's see," he said, flipping a page. "A man was caught breaking the rules. Killed someone,was killed on the spot. Then there was a robbery near the southern sector. They took jewelry, mostly. Oh, and the prices for some groceries went up. Apples especially."

The fork slipped from Aurex's fingers.

It was the same answer.

Word for word. The exact same sentence he'd said days ago when Aurex first asked him that question. As if he were reading from a script.

Aurex forced his hands still. He looked over at his sister, who kept humming. His mother laughed at something that clearly wasn't funny. His little brother chewed with a perfect, unbroken smile.

His heartbeat thudded in his ears. He didn't ask anything else.

He left for school with his brother like always, but every step down the road felt heavier. The houses, the streets, the people… everything seemed familiar to the point of being unnatural. Like the world had been copied and pasted over itself one too many times.

At school, nothing had changed. The same dull lessons. The same morning praise of the ten rules. The same fake cheer.

But this time, something did change.

During lunch, someone sat beside him.

It was the boy.

The one with red eyes. The one who always smiled like the rest, but whose eyes told a different story.

They sat in the farthest corner of the cafeteria. No one paid them any attention. At first, they ate in silence.

Then the boy spoke.

"Hey."

His voice was low but clear. "You've been eating eggs and toast every morning for six days. Orange juice on the side. Lunch? Bread. Soup. Bread. Soup. Same portions. Same tray. Every day."

Aurex stared at him, stunned. "How do you know that?"

The boy didn't blink. "Think about what happened seven days ago."

And just like that, he went quiet again.

No matter what Aurex asked, the boy didn't respond. He just smiled and looked ahead, like he hadn't spoken at all.

That evening, at 6 p.m., Aurex sat in his room, mind racing. The words replayed in his head over and over.

Seven days ago… what happened seven days ago?

He tried to think. Really think.

But the more he reached into his memory, the more it slipped through his fingers. Nothing came to him before six days ago. Not a moment. Not a single thing.

"That's not possible," he muttered, getting up. "I write in my diaries every day."

He rushed to his drawer, pulled it open, and started searching.

Only this month's journal was there.

Everything else was gone.

He searched again. Behind books. Under his bed. Nothing. Only the entries from the past week remained.

He opened them up. Line after line of the same routine. Wake up at 6 a.m. Shower. Eat. School. Eat. Praise the rules. Write. Sleep.

At first, it had felt normal. Safe. But now it was suffocating. The same words. The same tone. The same order. The same family lines repeated over and over. A mechanical loop.

And now, he noticed something even worse.

The entries before day one of this month were torn out.

Aurex's hands shook. He didn't remember doing that. He would never rip out pages of his own journal. So who did?

He sat there, frozen, until his eyes caught something,just a flicker. A flash of something else.

A memory.

He was standing in a room, but it wasn't his. It was cold, lit by a white flickering light. He could hear people speaking, but not see them.A machine buzzing. His eyes wide, heart pounding, mouth forced into a smile.

Then… nothing.

He blinked, and the image vanished.

Was it a dream? A memory? Or just his mind playing tricks?

His heart told him it was real.

His hand moved to grab his pen. He needed to write this down, even if it made no sense. He sat at his desk, flipped to an empty page,and then stopped.

He got up instead.

Slowly, carefully, Aurex moved to the wall beside his door. His parents told him never to open the door after 6 p.m., but tonight he didn't want to open it.

He wanted to see.

He moved to the far wall, where a loose plank always creaked when walked on. He knelt by the edge and pressed his ear to it. Silence. Then, faintly, footsteps again,this time slower, moving back and forth.

He grabbed a ruler and wedged it into the edge of the panel, creating a thin opening between the wall and the window frame. Just enough to peek.

At first, all he saw was darkness.

Then a figure moved past.

It was his father. Still holding the same newspaper. Still smiling. But he wasn't walking like himself. He was pacing in slow, stiff steps, like someone playing a role in a show, waiting for his next line.

Aurex covered the hole again.

He backed away and sat on his bed.

Was this all real?

Was any of it?

He smiled, as always, but his stomach twisted. He'd never felt so alone.