Helen couldn't sleep well that night, not after all she had learnt from Kai and the hollows.
The Overseers weren't just powerful--they were everywhere in the city. They control the city in silence. Watching them.
No one… except those in The Hollow.
Helen played her part silently. She stopped asking for Lena. She noticed more people missing, but she observed them closely now.
They were watching them, Kai had called them the echoes. They were mostly invincible, they recorded everything. She pays more attention now.
The Overseers used to detect anomalies - people who remembered.
And Helen was glowing red on their radar. She was aware.
She and Kai developed a plan. They had one chance: infiltrate The Vault, the place where erased minds were stored and reprogrammed. It was deep beneath the city, heavily guarded, and accessible only through a data key carried by the city's Lead Architect.
And he would be attending the Unity Gala in three days.
They would steal his access pass. And they would break into the Vault.
That night, Helen wrote Lena's name on her wrist in black ink.
***
The Unity Gala screamed perfection. It was elegantly decorated. Helen had never been here before and had never seen such luxury. She felt them watching.
The silver dress she wore was given to her by one of the hollows. Kai wore a guard's uniform. Each enters separately to avoid suspicions.
Her heart hammered as she slipped through the glass doors.
They had one hour.
The Lead Architect, Darel Wynn, was tall and quiet, dressed in midnight-blue robes. The pass they needed hung from a black chain around his neck - disguised as a pendant.
Kai moved first, engaging one of the perimeter guards in a "systems glitch" distraction. As the guard checked his tablet, a light shone across the gala's walls.
Helen took her chance.
She approached the Architect slowly, feigning a stumble near his table.
"I'm sorry," she gasped. "So clumsy."
Darel turned just slightly - just enough.
Her fingers brushed his chest. The magnetic slip Kai had given her latched onto the chain with a near-silent click, duplicating the pass in just three seconds .
He didn't notice.
She stepped back, heart racing, and whispered into her comm, "I have it."
They exited separately, melting into the night like shadows.
Behind them, the Gala sparkled on.
But war had just begun.
***
It was already three hours into the gala, it was a long journey,, but the city maps said there was only concrete. But with the Architect's pass encoded, a door opened silently in the stone.
A cold breeze hit them as they descended metal stairs into the dark.
The Vault was real.
Surveillance bots glided past them without pause. The Architect's pass worked like a charm.
As they went deeper, the halls changed. The walls became smooth glass, reflecting faces - some faces familiar
Rows and rows of stasis pods lined the inner chamber. Helen gasped, hand over her mouth.
Each pod contained a person. They weren't moving, their eyes closed. Wires embedded at their temples, with soft light pulsing across data streams.
She spotted Lena. She was in one of the pods, she seemed peaceful but all of it felt wrong.
Kai found his brother too. The few Hollow members that came with them found their missing loved ones.
"They're reconditioning them," Kai whispered. "Downloading new memories. Replacing who they are."
"But why?" Helen asked.
A robotic voice echoed from the wall behind them.
"To preserve harmony."
They turned. A woman in silver stepped from the shadows. Her skin was not like a human's. Her eyes looked empty and ancient.
She was an Overseer.
"You threaten order," she said. "So you must forget too."
Sirens begin to sound.
The door began to close.
Helen grabbed Kai's hand. "Run."
****
Helen and Kai sprinted down the corridors, alarms flashing red above them. Behind, footsteps echoed after them - the Overseer wasn't alone. Drones launched from the walls, chasing them
They ducked into a maintenance hall. Kai slammed a small disc against the wall - one of The Hollow's jammers. The drones froze in midair.
"We don't have much time," he panted.
Eliora stared at Lena's pod through the glass.
"She's in there," she whispered. "I can't leave her."
Kai pulled a small device from his bag. "We're not leaving anyone."
They reached the control chamber. They found dozens of names and neural maps rotated in holographic loops. It was the Overseers' nerve center.
Kai began to reset it.
Helen stepped to the central console. Her hands hovered over the commands.
Deactivate stasis. Erase reconditioning. Memory restore.
"I can do this," she said.
The door slammed open, and the Overseer stepped inside. Her voice was calm, but her eyes glowed.
"Do you have any idea what chaos you'll bring?"
Helen didn't flinch.
"I'd rather live in truth than peace built on lies."
The Overseer moved towards them. Kai tackled her, buying Helen time.
She slammed the final key, and the vault shook.
All the pods went down.
Lena's eyes fluttered open inside the glass.
Dozens of people stumbled out completely dazed
The Overseer screamed - a sound not human - and collapsed, her control severed.
---
Three Days Later.
They had brought seventy-two people from the pod. The Overseer was gone - disappeared into the system's collapse. People were slowly remembering.
Now, Helen wasn't alone.
She and Kai walked through the old station. Lena followed behind them, brushing ink from her arm, the name Helen had written on her own wrist so many days ago.
"You remembered me," Lena whispered, close to tears.
"Always," Helen said.
Novelle was beginning to wake up.
And the ones who remembered?
They would make sure the world never forgot again.
---
She would not forget.
---