My Eros (Modern Cupid and Psyche Dirty)

Did you just snap your fingers like Thanos?

The professor's groan makes me feel defensive, but I'm saved from having to answer since the gesture, in spite of being a spur-of-the-moment choice, actually works.

The memory world around me instantly comes back to life, and everything around me that can move...does start moving again - man with red eyes included, and now it's my worst memory playing out right in front of me.

Memory Me's knee hits the edge of one of the stairsteps, and I can only flinch as her face contorts with pain. She tries her best to get away, but she can't, and I find myself fighting back tears alongside her when the man comes to pick her up.

Fuck you, fuck you, FUCK you.

I'm so tempted to snap my fingers and freeze time again so I can save Memory Me.

But I can't.

The professor was explicitly clear before agreeing to help me explore my memories for clues. This world is fragile, and he's estimating it can only tolerate two attempts of time-freezing before it disintegrates...and possibly take my soul along with it.

Remember your promise, Halyna. Don't interfere.

"I know. I get it."

Interfering can lead to unnecessary freezing of time, but it won't change the past. So it's pointless. I get that. I know that. But just because I know doesn't make it any easier, and I find myself clenching my fists as I follow my then-captor carry Memory Me inside the memory room.

I'm not sure if it's trauma or magic, but I've never been able to remember anything that happened inside this room. My parents even had me work with different therapists, but because none of their treatments ever worked, the things I'm seeing now are all new to me.

It's almost like I'm watching a horror movie unfold...except it isn't.

Because this was real.

Everything I'm seeing now did happen, and right now Memory Me is sobbing...as she should.

I had hoped that by the time Memory Me comes into this room, it would've all been over.

But it isn't.

It isn't, dammit, and the professor swears as he hears me choke back a sob.

What's wrong?

"They're all alive," I cry out. "They're all still alive! I saw...I saw them when they were still alive, and I wasn't able to s-save them."

My chest starts to heave, and when Memory Me starts to scream, I want to scream with her.

Why, Memory Me is asking and choking.

But the man doesn't speak. He simply lays Memory Me on the floor, and even though she does her best to struggle and escape him, it's no use. There's a length of rope next to them, prepared in advance just as one would expect from someone so efficiently psychotic. `

Why? Why? WHY?

Memory Me screams it over and over as he ties her up.

The fear in her eyes is gone. All I see is despair, and it's exactly how I'm feeling now.

Why would anyone hurt another person like this?

He has one man chained with his guts slit open while another one has his intestines braided with a fucking ribbon. A woman has her tongue cut out and eye sockets empty while the younger girl next to her has all of her nails ripped off.

Every one of them is gruesomely unique, and when I look back at Memory Me, I find her trembling and pale, her despair turning into anger as she watches our captor acting calm as you please. He's chewing on something while tightening the ropes around her wrists. He's acting like everything's normal. Like there aren't people he tortured around them, and when I glance back at Memory Me, I can see she feels the way I do.

It's just too damn much.

Just too, too much—-

That even though I'm only seeing this for the first time, I understand exactly why Memory Me snaps and kicks her captor in the face—-

But it's a short-lived victory, with the man spitting at her face and chopping his hand down on her injured knee in vicious retaliation.

Memory Me crumples with a cry, and this time I can't help but cry out alongside her.

Halyna!

It's only when I hear the professor say my name in my mind that I remember we're still connected, but before I can find the words to explain what I just saw—-

It's at that moment I realize this nightmare is far from over.

Because Memory Me is sobbing now.

Please stop! Please! Please! Stop it! Stop!

Because the man with red eyes is hopping from one body to another now, and with every person he "visits", he would wrap his fingers around their neck and break it.

Hop. Snap. Hop. Snap. Hop. Snap.

He does it the way he does everything.

Chewing and hopping and neck-snapping as calm as you please, and he doesn't even seem to hear Memory Me sobbing and crying out for him to stop—-

Hop. Snap. Hop. Snap. Hop. Snap.