[Ethan’s Condo]
"Why can’t I recall that man’s face?"
Kathrine pressed her fingers against her temples, her voice low but strained. "I clearly rember saying he was the one who took into that room. I said it. I know I did."
The harder she tried to focus, the worse it beca.
Her head throbbed painfully, a sharp pressure building behind her eyes as if her mind itself were pushing back. Every ti she reached for the mory, it slipped through her grasp like smoke. Not blank—never blank—but blurred, distorted, unfinished.
She squeezed her eyes shut.
A corridor. A door. A hand gripping her wrist. But the face?
Nothing.
"No... no, this doesn’t make sense," she whispered hoarsely. "I heard him. I know I heard him."
Kathrine’s breath hitched as Jason’s words echoed in her mind, calm but firm, spoken during the session that had ended far too abruptly.
’Forcing mory retrieval can sotis turn deadly, Kathrine. Your vitals aren’t stable. We need to stop.’
She rembered the way his expression had changed—professional concern replacing curiosity—the mont her pulse spiked and she clutched her head in pain. He had stopped imdiately, grounding her, talking her through slow breaths before finally handing her the notes.
Read these later, he’d said. But don’t push yourself alone.
She looked down at those sa notes now, resting in her trembling hands.
They were neat. Clinical. Too clean for sothing that felt so violently ssy inside her.
1. Subject recalls event involving abduction.
2. Perpetrator present, physical contact confird.
3. Facial recognition—blocked.
4. Possible mory suppression or trauma-induced dissociation.
Kathrine’s fingers curled around the pages.
’mory suppression.’ The words sat heavily in her chest.
The more she read, the clearer it beca—this wasn’t simple forgetfulness. This wasn’t stress or imagination. A part of her life had been erased, deliberately or otherwise, and she had been living without knowing it.
That realization made her stomach churn.
"How can you lose part of your life and not even know it’s gone?" she murmured to the empty room. "How do you just... keep going?"
Her gaze drifted unfocused toward the window, city lights blurring together. She felt unmoored, like soone had shifted the ground beneath her feet without warning.
She tried again. The room. Dim lighting. Her own voice, raised in protest.
"Arh!" She gasped, dropping the notes as pain lanced through her skull.
"Kathrine!"
Ethan was beside her instantly.
She hadn’t even heard him get up from the chair. One mont she was alone with her thoughts, the next his hands were gripping her shoulders, steadying her as she swayed.
"Hey—stop," he said sharply but gently, lowering her onto the couch. "Don’t do that. Don’t push."
"I can’t rember," she whispered, tears pricking her eyes in frustration. "It’s right there, Ethan. I know it is. Why can’t I see him?"
Ethan crouched in front of her, his expression tight with concern. He reached out hesitantly, then brushed her hair back from her face.
"You’re hurting yourself," he said quietly. "Jason warned you about this."
"That’s what scares ," she replied, voice trembling. "If rembering is dangerous... then what happened to must’ve been worse."
The words hung between them.
Ethan inhaled slowly, like he was bracing himself.
"Kathrine," he said, "listen to . You don’t have to rember everything right now. Or all at once. What matters is that you’re safe now."
She shook her head weakly. "But what if I’m not? What if sothing like this happens again and I don’t even recognize the danger because I don’t rember the last ti?"
Her hands clenched in her lap.
Ethan’s jaw tightened. There was a brief pause. A hesitation so subtle she might’ve missed it—if she hadn’t been hyper-aware of everything in that mont.
Then he spoke. "There’s sothing I should tell you," he said.
Kathrine looked up at him, but he didn’t et her eyes imdiately.
"What?" Her chest tightened while waiting for him to speak.
Ethan exhaled and finally looked at her, his gaze conflicted. "I t Anna today" he began slowly, "I asked her sothing."
Kathrine stilled. "...About ?"
"Yes."
Her brows drew together. "What did you ask her?"
Ethan hesitated again—just a fraction of a second too long.
"I asked her," he said carefully, "whether you had ever been abducted."
The room seed to tilt.
"What?" Kathrine whispered.
Ethan imdiately held up his hands. "Wait—before you react—"
"Why would you ask her that?" she cut in, her voice sharp with disbelief. "Ethan, that’s not a normal question to ask soone."
"I know," he said quickly. "I know it’s not. And I didn’t ask lightly."
Her pulse quickened. "Then why?"
He rubbed the back of his neck, clearly uncomfortable now. "Because she seed to be worried about you and kept asking where you were"
Kathrine stared at him, stunned. She knew she had been keeping things from Anna for soti, but letting her know what she was upto was sothing she didn’t wanted her to know yet.
"And Anna?" she asked slowly. "What did she say?"
Ethan’s eyes flickered away.
"She declined," Ethan said quietly, his face grim as he lowered his gaze.
Kathrine stiffened.
"Yes. Of course she did," she replied imdiately—too imdiately. "Because Roseline wasn’t even married to my dad when I was seven. Anna ca a few months later. After they registered their marriage."
The words spilled out of her mouth in a rush, unfiltered and unguarded, as if her mind had decided before she could stop it that the truth no longer deserved to stay hidden.
The mont the silence hit, Kathrine froze.
Her breath caught.
She stared at Ethan, realization dawning a second too late that she had said far more than she intended to.
Ethan’s head snapped up.
"...What?" he asked slowly.
Kathrine’s lips parted, but no sound ca out.
"You an," he continued, voice carefully asured, "Anna is not your sister?"
The words seed to echo in the room.
Kathrine swallowed hard.
"She isn’t," she admitted quietly.
Ethan leaned back slightly, shock rippling through him—not loud, not dramatic, but deep and unsettling. He dragged a hand down his face as fragnts of past observations suddenly aligned into a picture he hadn’t known he was missing.
Anna was never really introduced. Never shared the family spotlight. Never spoke publicly as Hugo Bennett’s daughter.
And Hugo...
He had always introduced Kathrine with pride. While Anna remained in the shadows.
Ethan let out a slow, uneven breath.
"Then... does that an I made a mistake by asking her?" he said quietly.
He lifted his head and looked at Kathrine, the realization settling in all at once.
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