Zayaan hadn't slept. Again.
The cot in the observation bay might as well have been stone. The fluorescent light above his head blinked like it was trying to send a message in Morse code, and his dreams—when they came—were cracked and rust-colored.
By 06:00 hours, he was pacing.
At 07:12, he left without clearance.
He needed to see her.
---
Arwa was at breakfast when he found her.
Sitting at the edge of the mess hall, alone, hunched over a bowl of something that barely passed as food.
zayaan approached her, but she didn't look up!.
Zayaan looked at her but wasn't sure what to say.
Then—
"You're staring."
Her voice was casual. Flat.
Zayaan blinked. "Sorry."
"You're always quiet before you lie."
That made him pause.
"You okay?" he asked.
"Fine," she replied too quickly. Then she smiled — but it didn't land. Her lips curved, but her eyes didn't lift. Like someone had drawn the expression from memory and gotten a few proportions wrong.
He sat down across from her.
"You didn't come back last night."
She stirred her food. "I went for a walk."
"Through the restricted wing?"
She paused mid-stir.
"I couldn't sleep."
Zayaan leaned forward. Quietly:
"Arwa… did you go to Room 308?"
This time, she looked up. Held his gaze for a heartbeat too long.
Then: "Why would I do that?"
He froze.
He knew she had. She'd told him she got the envelope. He'd seen her heading that way.
But now she was rewriting it.
Erasing it.
"I think something happened to you in there," he said.
She tilted her head, slowly.
"You think a lot of things."
Then her smile returned.
And Zayaan felt it for the first time — a sliver of real, cold fear. Not at what had happened to her.
But at the possibility…
…that maybe this wasn't her at all.
---
Later, as he walked back toward the Delta Wing, he passed the reflection panel in the east corridor.
He didn't mean to stop.
But something made him look.
There, in the glass, two figures moved:
Himself. And Arwa.
Except — in the reflection — Arwa wasn't walking.
She stood still.
Staring at him.
Smiling.
And behind her, faint but real, was the glow of a white chair.
Still waiting.