Every part of me froze. Each time I thought of my mother and how she died, I always blamed myself. But I'd put the blame on the food I'd sent to her house, on the supplies I'd ensured were delivered when she needed them. Because it was those deliveries that killed us, too; what was meant to sustain us, murdered us. Poisoned by the processed foods the Government provided so we may have "lived."

It wasn't the coordinates...

She didn't die in Georgia...

Did she?

Shooting my arm out, I grabbed the collar of the man's jacket. He grunted and grabbed me back. "Where's my mother?" I shouted. "Where is she!"

"She's dead, mate! I just said that!" The man shook me and pushed me against the side door. The driver reached down towards his leg, retrieving a gun with one tug.

The barrel pointed at me but I wasn't afraid. Not now. Not then. I lunged at the man again. "I lived up to my end of the bargain!" He pushed at me and when my back hit the side door again, it swung open. My hands struggled to grab the seat of the car as I stumbled out into the rain, landing flat on my ass with my legs sprawled in front of me. My eyes never left the man still seated or the driver who aimed to kill me. "I did my job! You have to do yours!"

"We tried!" The man stepped out of the car and stood over me. Rain pelted down on him as the storm intensified. "Your mother refused... she wouldn't come with us," he hissed down at me. "She called us criminals. Said her son would save her. Ha!" he laughed. "If only she knew..."

Quickly dropping to his knees, the man grabbed my collar again. "You killed your mother, Damian."

"No... No..." I squeezed my eyes shut. The blasts from their attacks had killed her, not the food. And the attack was my fault because I'd given them the position. I gave up our base, my friends. I couldn't sit back and let them lie to us anymore. We weren't winning and I couldn't keep fighting a losing battle.

I wanted out. And I wanted to take my mother with me.

I don't want to be here anymore...

Looking away from the man, I turned my gaze up at the sky. A part of me was waiting for Xerses to pull me out of the memory. I was fine walking through these memories to find the core of my crimes, but remembering the truth about my mother? The actual reason she'd died? I wasn't ready for that. I wasn't then, and I wasn't now.

The man pushed me down into the dirt. My hands pressed into the wet mud, fingers digging into the earth. Even with the rain, I felt the tears on my face. I remembered thinking, what have I done? Even now, reliving this moment through digital files, I thought the same, felt the same.

If only I could go back and fix all of this...

"It hurts, doesn't it?" the man above me asked. He kicked at my leg but I didn't look at him. He laughed. "Just look at what all of your lyings has done."

"I want out." I turned onto my stomach, staring off at the side of the road. Puddles formed in the mud, creating dark spots on the road. Deep spots. My hand reached out to pull me forward and my fingers dipped inside. It wasn't cold.

It's not real?

I couldn't feel the puddle. It wasn't there, it couldn't be. I couldn't help but think it was a hole in my memory; a gap in my data file. Curling my fingers into the space, I pulled my hand back against me. It took a second until I felt land again.

The man above me kicked me again. "You're running away? Huh! You can't run from your crimes! You can't hide from what you've done!"

I didn't look at him. I focused on the oddity, praying it could be my escape. To it, I whispered, "I want out." Turning my gaze up to the sky, I called out to Xerses, praying he could hear me. "X, I want out!"

The clouds moved. The rain shifted with the changing direction of the wind. As I blinked away drops of water, I watched the sky change. When the stars appeared, they vanished. So did the weather.

This wasn't my memory anymore. I faded out into the void. That had to be it. It just wasn't as instant as I wanted it to be, but that was okay. If Xerses could pull me out, I would be all right.

Moving myself to balance on my hands and nose, I looked back at the ground, at the dirt on my hands. The slowing rain pushed away the specks of black and brown. "It's okay." I spit out a drop of rain that slipped into my mouth. "I'll be out of here before I know it and—"

The sound stopped. The weather with it. There wasn't any wind, any noise. My eyes widened as I tried to hear, feel. Anything.

"Going through your memories is rough, isn't it?" a voice echoed behind me.

It wasn't the man from my memory. The pitch was deeper, rougher, older. The fact that it sounded close yet so far through me off. And yet, I didn't want to turn around to look at him.

There were errors all through my memory files. I found most of them, piece by piece. And each time they were released into my mind as if they'd never been buried, I changed. I noticed.

I could do without the memory of my mother. I could do without the truth of this lie.

Staying with my naivety was a better place, right?

"It is hard reliving everything you've done wrong. Wishing you could go back and fix it. It's knowing that you can't which hurts the most," the voice continued. The sound of footsteps followed.

I squeezed my eyes shut. "X, come on, I need you to hear me," I whispered. "Pull me out of here."

The footsteps stopped behind me. The tip of a shoe hit the bottom of mine. A laugh followed. "Wouldn't remembering everything be freeing, Roger?"

My eyes snapped open. No one in this memory should know that name; error or not, I wasn't Roger before this. My name is Damian.

"Xerses," I hissed through my teeth. "Pull me out of here, man."

"I think that's what bothered me about you." The feet moved. The steps came louder. Thump, thump beside my head.

I remained how I was—head down, leftover raindrops sliding down my nose. There was something about that voice that scared me, like a resurging sound from a nightmare. I knew it, but couldn't face it. Just like I shouldn't have faced the truths about my mother.

The Province had sealed away my data and that of the others because they feared what we may become. Little did they know... they were probably helping us.

I can't let Malfunctioners feel this kind of pain...

The person, whoever it was, kneeled beside me. I felt a face close to mine. His breath smelled of old cigars.

No one smokes anymore...

"I've seen you come through here a lot more than the others, you know," the voice said. "You just need to remember everything like it'll fix something in you."

I pressed my tongue into my cheek. "This isn't real," I whispered.

"It isn't?" the voice asked. "What if I made it real?"

I glanced to the side without turning my head. I saw his silhouette; the outline of casual pants and shoes. Flickers of light glinted off a watch on his wrist. Needing to see who or what it is, I turned my head.

My eyes widened as I focused on a broadening grin.

"Funny. Out of all the things you've remembered, you'd think I'd be one of them."

Polk.

Hank Polk.

The man who created the machines used to build Codes. But it wasn't for us. It was for her, his wife. The single piece of data released each and every one of us into the minds of Provincial civilians.

Zara freed us because she thought she was helping.

I flopped to my side and crawled away from him, backward, so I could still see him.

Why is he here? He's dead. Zara killed him.

Hank hadn't changed. Granted, when I first met him, I didn't know he wasn't there; there were no clues pointing to him having been dead and Zara was in complete control of his corpse. But I'd gone in there, into that office. I made sure each of those computers was fried, leaving no trace of the original data.

This meant Zara's data was gone. And Hank... he'd never been stored into the Void. He hadn't been copied and saved.

No. Right? No!

Hank shook his wrist so that the watch he wore jiggled and glimmered. He glanced at it once before grinning at me. "Out of everything you forgot, was I one of them?" He stood, walking over to me. "Come on, you couldn't have forgotten old Hank."

"Xerses!" I screamed, still crawling back. What was left of my memory faded away. Pixels broke apart, drifting into the air like dust. Then the white returned, the color of my emptiness.

"X!" I looked up at the sky, but it wasn't there. The Void was vast. No ceilings, no walls, and yet, I hoped. I crawled. My fingers dug into the flat surface. "Xerses!"

"You did forget me," Hank laughed. He kicked at my shoe as I continued to move away. "Mr. Roger, the savior of the world, the protector of Codes. How could you be afraid of little old me? Hm?"

He disappeared in a flash. And I stopped moving, panting, glancing around the empty space. Sweat formed on my forehead. Maybe he wasn't real? Maybe this was all a part of my fears?

But when I blinked and he reappeared, I knew this wasn't me. It was him. He was physical. He reached out and grabbed my cheeks, so hard it hurt. "There is too much clutter in here, Roger. Too many hidden lies. So, I'm freeing up this data and letting each of you remember." He came closer, his nose to mine, his eyes digging into my soul as he glared at me. Fear swelled up in my chest as he said, "And I'm doing this because it was what she wanted."

That fear broke out of me.

I screamed. "Get me out of here!"