The Recall Trials Chapter 91: Cognitive Reframing Technique

The Eighth Trial

Vincent’s POV

I kept running.

I could still hear Zaara screaming my na from sowhere behind the walls.

But I didn’t stop.

Because if I stopped....I’d drown in my own head.

My vision was still spinning as I stumbled forward, out of the fog, into a corridor of blinding white lights.

"Contest 001. Congratulations for passing the Eighth Trial,"

the voice bood overhead.

My chest heaved, sweat dripping down my spine. I was still in fear. Fear from the scene. From the blood. From screaming Zaara’s na into shadows that weren’t real....and sohow felt too real.

"One contestant has been eliminated." The voice said.

Suddenly, red warning lights flared across the hall like sirens.

I thought of Zaara.

Please, not her.

A masked guard stepped out of nowhere, grabbed my arm, and guided through a security door. I didn’t resist. My legs barely rembered how to walk.

He escorted into the main room....I blinked into the light.

Already inside were six other contestants....so slumped against walls, so pacing, one sitting on the floor hugging her knees.

My eyes darted around wildly.

No Zaara.

No Jojo..

No Carter.

Not even Nomi.

Panic gripped my chest.

Bleep.

"Another contestant has been eliminated."

A girl with freckles let out a sharp sob. She was trembling so hard she couldn’t stay upright.

"This is the sixth ti they’ve announced soone eliminated already,"

a guy with ssy hair muttered. "Six people... just... gone."

The freckled girl wiped her nose. "I’m so nervous. I thought I’d never find my way out. The walls kept changing. It....it knew things about . Things I haven’t told anyone."

Another guy in a neon bandana shoved his hands through his hair. "The ga almost swallowed whole. I swear... I saw my dead mom. She kept telling to stay with her. I almost did."

A tall girl standing near the tal tables spoke up. "Mine kept looping this... this scene from my life. When I nearly drowned. Over and over. I could feel the water in my lungs. I thought I’d die in there."

Soone else exhaled shakily. "They’re using our trauma against us. I don’t even know what’s real anymore."

I stepped closer.

"That’s the point of the ga. To make us think we deserve whatever happens. They want us hopeless."

The neon-bandana guy glared at . "Easy for you to say. You’re Sector A. The wildcard. You grew up with money. You don’t know shit about being hunted like this."

A pulse of guilt shot through . But I stood my ground.

"You’re wrong. We’re all hunted in here. They don’t care where we’re from. They just want blood."

People shifted uncomfortably, so looking away, so eting my eyes.

Bleep.

"Another contestant has been eliminated."

My fists clenched so hard.

The freckled girl whispered, "I hope my friend makes it back. I can’t... I can’t lose her too."

Neon-bandana guy swallowed. "If this keeps going, there’ll be no one left."

I stared at the door, praying for Zaara. For Jojo. Nomi. For any of them.

Then....

The lock hissed.

The door slid open.

A masked guard stepped in, gripping soone by the arm.

Another contestant.

Alive.

We all froze.

Please let it be one of them.

Nomi.

She jerked her arm away from the masked guard so hard he nearly stumbled back.

"Get your filthy hands off ," she spat, glaring at him like she could bounce on him. She walked into the room with her hair ssy, shaking with adrenaline.

"What sort of ga was that in there? These people are psychos," she hissed her teeth in disgust, brushing dirt from her arms as she stord toward the locker area.

She didn’t even look at . Just kept moving like she’d punch the next person who got in her way.

Bleep.

"One contestant has been eliminated."

Then again.

Bleep.

"Another contestant has been eliminated."

And again.

Bleep.

"Another contestant has been eliminated."

Soone whispered under their breath, "Ten contestants eliminated already..."

The freckled girl, murmured, "So trauma kills faster than any physical trial."

A guy I’d barely noticed until now stepped forward. Short, stocky, dark eyes with thick square glasses.

He cleared his throat and lifted one hand slightly.

"My na’s George."

His voice was soft.

"I was literally the first to end today’s trial"

Gasps rippled through the group.

Neon-bandana guy’s head snapped around. "Hold up. You beat that trial first? How the hell did you do that?"

George shoved his hands into the pockets of his jumpsuit and exhaled, as though deciding whether to share a secret.

"Because I’m a psychologist. And there’s a trick to it."

Everyone leaned in closer, suddenly desperate.

George looked around the room, making eye contact with each of us.

"Because I’m a psychologist. The maze wasn’t real, but our reactions to it were. The trick was realizing the walls weren’t the threat. Our own minds were. They hijacked our guilt and fear loops, forcing us to relive traumatic mories over and over again. The more we fed into those emotions, the deeper we got trapped."

I blinked at him.

"So what did you do?" I asked.

George held up one finger.

"I used what we call ’cognitive reframing.’ It’s a technique where you consciously reinterpret the aning of what you’re seeing. Instead of accepting the hallucinations as truth, I reminded myself:

These images were data points, not reality.

My mind was trying to protect ...even if it was doing it the wrong way.

And most importantly: emotions are just signals. They’re not commands."

Freckles girl whispered,

"But it felt real... the slls, the sounds..."

George nodded gently.

"Of course it did. The brain stores trauma in the sa neural pathways as sensory mory. So when they hit those pathways, it feels real. But feelings aren’t facts."

"So what....you just decided not to feel scared?"

Bandana guy asked.

"I was terrified at first. My hallucination was my mother’s funeral. I could hear the priest’s voice. Sll the flowers. But every ti I felt panic, I repeated to myself:

’This is a mory, not a prophecy.’

I forced myself to notice tiny details that didn’t belong. The wrong color of the priest’s robes. A digital glitch in the candle flas. The illusion started falling apart because I stopped believing it. It’s like hypnosis." He said.

Bandana guy’s eyes widened.

"So it’s about... questioning the illusion?"

George spread his hands.