Dead man surviving .. survival chance 0.002

Chapter 6 — You Remember

The girl knelt beside Rayn, the weight of her breath shaky and uneven. Her silver-white eyes glinted with something far older than fear—recognition.

"You weren't supposed to see it," she whispered again. Her voice had none of its usual calm. It cracked, raw, as if something had broken inside her.

Rayn blinked slowly, struggling to keep his focus. His ears still rang from the gunfire, his skin burning with dried blood and smoke. Milo was unconscious behind him, Cole barely breathing.

"I wasn't supposed to see what?" Rayn rasped.

The girl didn't answer. She only stared at him with that strange sorrow, like he'd just asked the wrong question at the wrong time. Then she stood up—too smoothly—and turned her back to him.

"We need to leave. Now."

"No," Rayn said, dragging himself to his feet with a grunt. "You said I remembered something. What was it?"

The girl's back stiffened.

"You remember its voice," she said without turning around. "That… thing. The one that woke early."

Rayn felt his stomach twist. "It spoke to me."

"No. It called to you. That's worse."

---

They moved quickly, but the forest felt different now—alive, pulsing with something watching from behind every tree. The mimic girl led them north, away from the gas station, through a stretch of broken highway now overgrown with fungus and vines. Cars were fused to the earth, their metal bones split open like corpses.

Rayn noticed that she avoided shadows. She walked carefully, never stepping too deep into the dark, never passing beneath the thickest trees. He copied her instinctively.

"Where are we going?" he asked.

"There's a place called the Sink. It's where things go when they… wake up too early."

"Things like that?" Rayn glanced behind them.

She nodded. "And things like you."

---

They reached the edge of an old rail tunnel by dusk. The air buzzed with insects, but none dared cross the boundary into the tunnel. It was carved into a mountainside, but the entrance was blocked with heavy metal fencing and a strange symbol painted in dried blood.

Three overlapping circles, surrounded by jagged lines. Rayn didn't recognize it—but something inside him did.

The mimic girl stepped back. "We're not going in. Just resting here until the sun's gone."

Cole stirred weakly, his voice gravel. "That's a terrible plan."

"No," Rayn said, crouching beside him. "It's worse. She's scared."

The girl didn't deny it.

---

As night fell, the world changed. The trees moaned in the distance. Small lights flickered in the sky—too low to be stars, too silent to be aircraft. The forest beyond the tunnel entrance went silent. Even the wind seemed afraid.

That's when the mimic girl spoke again.

"This world wasn't always broken."

Rayn didn't answer.

"It changed," she continued, "because something remembered it wrong. Someone woke up in the wrong version."

Rayn's heart stopped.

"Are you saying—?"

"You. Me. All of us. We're echoes. Some of us… louder than others."

She turned to him then, face pale and distant.

"You're not the first Rayn. Just the one who made it this far."

He wanted to argue. Wanted to say she was lying. But something inside him—something that had stirred when the mimic creature emerged—knew she wasn't.

"I've died before," he whispered. "I remember now. Not fully. But pieces."

"Yes," she said softly. "And every time, it remembers you a little more."

---

A low howl echoed across the tunnel mouth.

Not an animal. Not anything Rayn had ever heard.

It was answering back.

The mimic girl stood, pulling a long, thin knife from beneath her coat. Its blade shimmered oddly in the darkness—curved and shifting like it was made of liquid thought.

"What is that?" Rayn asked.

She didn't answer.

Cole, groaning, tried to sit up. "Whatever that thing is, it's coming. We're not ready."

Milo stirred, gasping awake, but his eyes were wild and unfocused.

Rayn looked around. "We need shelter. That tunnel—"

"No!" the mimic girl snapped. "That place remembers too much. If you go in there, it will know you."

Rayn stepped closer to her. "You said this Sink… it's where things go when they wake early. What happens to them?"

"They don't die. They become."

---

Something moved in the woods.

Not running. Not walking. Gliding.

A shape. Slender. Pale. Human—but wrong. Its limbs didn't bend right. It had no eyes, but it turned its head toward them like it was watching.

Rayn took a step back.

The mimic girl gripped her blade.

Cole was panicking. "We can't fight that."

"You can't," she said. "But he might be able to."

She pointed at Rayn.

And then, as if on cue, a second Rayn stepped from behind the trees.

Eyes wide. Face blank. Clothes identical.

But this one… smiled.

---

The mimic girl backed away, her voice low. "It remembered too well."

"What is that?" Rayn asked, trembling.

"Another you. One who lost."

The second Rayn raised its hand.

In it was the same crowbar Rayn had carried. Bloody.

The mimic girl stepped between them. "Don't listen to it. No matter what it says."

Rayn's double tilted its head. "She's lying to you."

"I am you."

Rayn's mind screamed.

The mimic girl looked at him, urgency in her eyes. "You have to choose. Now."

"Choose what?!" Rayn yelled.

"Which version of you survives."

Rayn stared at himself.

Not a mirror. Not a mimic.

Another him.

The copy stood barely upright, one eye gone, body shaking with exhaustion. He was bloodied, burned, and terrified.

"You have to kill me… before it wakes up," the copy whispered.

Rayn tightened his grip on the crowbar, but his hands trembled. The walls of the ruined bunker felt smaller now, more claustrophobic.

Milo stepped forward cautiously. "Rayn... what is that?"

"Me," Rayn said numbly.

The injured double collapsed to his knees. "It's inside me… I tried to trap it. You can't let it finish the merge."

Before anyone could speak, the mimic girl—Jun—moved to his side. Her eyes locked on the duplicate.

"He's not lying. Something's wrong."

The copy looked at her. "You... remember me?"

Jun's expression tightened. "Not this version."

---

Cole cursed under his breath. "This is a trap. It has to be. We kill him and it wakes up. We don't kill him, and it wakes up."

Jun shook her head. "It's not that simple. He's splitting."

Rayn blinked. "What?"

Jun stepped closer. "Two instances of the same mind—torn from sync. You're diverging. And something else is feeding on the gap."

"Something?" Milo asked.

Jun didn't answer.

The duplicate Rayn suddenly convulsed. His body arched backward, and a low, gurgling scream rose from his throat.

The mimic girl stepped in front of him, shielding him. "He's not the danger. Not yet."

But then the wall behind them—cracked and crumbling—began to bleed.

A long slit opened in the concrete, oozing dark mist.

Out of it came a voice.

"Split… complete."

The copy of Rayn went still.

Then something peeled out of him.

A shape. Humanoid at first. But too tall. Too thin. Its face blank, skin stretched, and where its eyes should've been—two black pits leaking a mist that burned the ground it touched.

Rayn stumbled back.

Jun shouted, "It's the Echo Shade!"

Cole raised his rifle. Milo screamed.

The shade screeched, and in that moment, Rayn's thoughts collapsed into instinct.

---

They scattered. Gunfire and mimic shrieks. The Shade didn't move like anything Rayn had fought before—it flowed like liquid shadow, tearing toward Milo.

Rayn tackled Milo out of the way. The Shade's claws sliced through air where they'd been.

"RUN!" Jun shouted. "It's not physical!"

Cole threw a grenade. It passed through the Shade.

Useless.

Rayn's copy still knelt, unmoving. His eyes vacant.

Rayn grabbed him. "You said I had to kill you. That it would stop it. Is that true?!"

No answer.

The Shade turned. It looked at Rayn.

And it spoke.

"Only one version survives."

Jun hurled a mimic knife. It hissed, flashing with mimic bile. The blade cut the Shade—and it reeled.

A weakness.

Rayn reached into his coat. The mimic blade Jun had given him—still there.

He turned to his copy. "Do I have your consent?"

A whisper. "End it."

Rayn stabbed.

The moment the blade pierced the duplicate's chest, light burst from the wound—blinding. The Shade screamed. Folded. Collapsed into a shrinking sphere of black.

Jun raised her hands. "Get back!"

The sphere pulsed.

Then shattered.

Silence.

---

The bunker lights flickered back to life. Jun stood over Rayn's limp copy, now a lifeless husk.

Cole paced. Milo vomited in the corner.

Rayn just stared at the knife in his hand.

Jun whispered, "You stopped the merge."

But she didn't sound relieved.

Rayn finally looked at her.

"What the hell is going on?"

Jun's eyes were filled with something new—fear.

"We need to find the Doctor," she said. "Before the next version wakes up."

Rayn blinked. "Next version?"

Jun didn't reply.

She just walked into the tunnel.

Rayn followed.

The dark closed in again.

To be continued..