The dream starts like it always does.
A train station, empty except for a handful of blurred figures. The air smells of metal and rain, thick and damp against her skin. The overhead lights flicker, casting shadows that stretch and retract like they're alive. Something about this place feels way too familiar to her, but she can't place why and how.
She's standing near the platform edge, holding her coat tightly with one hand, her breath visible in the cold air. Her heart pounds with an unshakable sense of urgency, though she doesn't know why. Then, a man passes her his face is obscured, his presence ghostly. He walks by in slow motion, and as he does, something falls from his fingers or he knowing drops it. A key.
It clinks against the ground, sharp against the muffled noise of distant announcements. She bends down, reaching for it, but before she can grasp it, he speaks.
A whisper, just loud enough for her to hear.
"Don't forget again."
Her fingers froze just above the keys. Cold ice runs through her veins. Her head snaps up in lighting force
A train is coming. Too fast. Too soon, before anyone could react.
Someone screams, those sounds echoes all through the station.
There's a flash of blinding light.
And then....
Nothing.
She wakes up with a jolt.
The sheets are tangled around her legs, her body drenched in sweat despite the cool air of her bedroom. Her heart pounds, the dream still fresh, still vivid, still wrong.
It's not a new thing for her, She's had strange dreams before too flashes of things she doesn't understand, fragments of places she swears she's never been. But this? This felt different,To much real to be exact and knowing she feels cold all around her body.
Her breathing slows as she blinks into the darkness, trying to bring herself in the reality. The faint glow of the streetlamp's outside spills through her transperant curtains, casting silver streaks across the floor. But the Same thing was, The rain which continues to patter against the window, just like in the dream she saw or was just a moment ago.
She rubs her face. Just a dream. She estate's.
But then she feels it.
Something cold against her palm, something metalic which she had fell before too.
Her breath stuck's as she slowly uncurls her fingers.
A key.
The same one from the dream.
She frozed right in her place, she just stares and stares at the cold metal presses against her skin, the jagged edges digging in slightly. This isn't possible. It can't be. But it's there, real and solid and sitting in her hand like it belongs there.
A sudden shiver runs down her spine.
She sits up, clutching the key so tightly that her knuckles go white. Maybe she picked it up earlier and forgot. Maybe it was always here, and she's imagining things. But deep down, she knows that's not true. She had never seen this key before, neither in her room or somewhere except in the dream.
Or has she?
The thought unsettles her. She again looked down towards the keys on her hand. Lately, there have been gaps in her memory likely small at first, little things like forgetting why she walked into a room or misplacing objects she swears she left somewhere else. But then there were bigger things. Entire conversations she couldn't recall. Faces that seemed familiar but just out of reach, just like a blurry vision of someone she knows but at a same time she doesn't.
And now this, The same Key from the same unknown person, but the thing was that thing was in her hand right under her eyes.
She forces herself to breathe to calm herself down. Think. There has to be a logical explanation. Maybe the dream was just her subconscious remembering something real. Maybe she thought she hoped.
And her eyes suddenly drift's to the clock on her nightstand. 3:47 AM.
She looks back at the key, then then at the window. Outside, the rain falls steadily, the city streets deadly silent, the only sound was the raindrops falling nothing else.
She doesn't remember going anywhere. She doesn't remember leaving her bed. She tried to make herself believe that.
But..
She looks near the Door and again the same cold runs through her back.
Her shoes, Were there sitting by the door, Wet like they had been used just half an hour's ago.
She swallows hard,still her eyes at the door and the shoes settled over there.
Something is wrong. very, very wrong.
The next morning came up sooner then she thought. But the more strange thing was the key which still sits on her nightstand like it belongs there. She had barely slept, turning it over in her hands again and again, trying to make sense of it. But no matter how many times she traces its edges, it doesn't change the fact that she doesn't know where it came from, neither she had seen them before then how? Was the only thing she could asked herself.
By the time the sun rises, she had made up her mind.
She has to go to that train station, to know the truth.
If the dream wasn't just a dream, if it was a memory resurfacing then maybe, just maybe, she'll find answers there. She can't shake the feeling that something happened to her in past, something she's supposed to remember but couldn't or is there something else she don't want to know herself.
And if she doesn't start looking for the truth now, she might never get the chance. Maybe something is there she's missing, which is missing from her life and she is willing to know the truth.
Don't forget again.
The words echo in her mind repeatedly, as chilling as the key in her palm.
She won't forget.
Not this time, She thought In her mind, As she thinks about the thing she's going to do.
Hopefully. Or will She?
——————————————————
The rain hasn’t stopped. It's still pouring like yesterday and still till she leave her house towards her destination. It looks like it's following her like an unspoken omen as she steps onto the train station platform. The air is thick like her dream with the scent of damp concrete and rusting metal, the rhythmic drip of water echoing through the cavernous space.
But It’s quite different from her dream busier, louder but something about it still feels unsettlingly familiar. Every detail seems to press against the edge of her mind, teasing her with a memory just out of her own reach.
She tightens her grip around the key she found out yesterday night, its metal still cold against her palm. The same spot. The same feeling. If her dream wasn’t just a dream, if it was a fragment of something real, then maybe, just maybe, this station holds the answers she’s looking for. But the more she stands there, the more she feels like the walls themselves are watching her, silently her every steps her actions, Everything.
Her eyes land on a torn, faded poster stuck to the old announcement board near the platform entrance. But something about it makes her breath hitch. Though the ink has worn away, the edges curling from years of neglect, but it’s unmistakably a missing person’s notice. The image is too faded to make out, but a familiar sensation crawls through her chest like she had seen this before, but not with her waking eyes, maybe, maybe in her dream's.
A flash brief, suddenly slams through her head like she's being hit hardly. The station. The scream. The key hitting the ground. But now there’s something new.
A girl.. Is beside her in the vision, someone whose face is blurred like an unfinished painting again. The moment is gone just as quickly as it came, leaving her with a pounding headache and an unease curling around her ribs, those feelings she felt when she was with that unknown man yesterday or in dreams she still don't know.
She takes a step back, her breath shaky. That’s when she sees him, A Man, not the same but still gives the same vibe of the old man she met before.
The Man who was standing a few feet away, half-hidden in the shadows near the vending machine. He’s watching her. Not like the way strangers idly glance at passersby, but with purpose. Like he knows something. Like he knows her, About her.
Before she can say anything to him, he speaks. “You shouldn’t be here.” His voice is low, rough, edged with something close to fear she can't pin-point.
Her fingers tighten around the key settled in her palms. “Do I… know you?”
His jaw clenches, and for a second, he looks like he’s debating whether to answer the questions she asked him or not. Then, suddenly without another word, he turns sharply and walks away.
“Wait-!” She moves forward to follow, but something small slips from his fingers or he purposely did as he vanishes into the small but huge crowd to find. A single train ticket flutters to the wet floor.
As She bend down and picks it up, while her pulse hammering against her ribs. The date printed on it sends a chill down her spine.
Again the same feeling, and she knows that it wasn't a good thing.
It’s from a journey she doesn’t remember taking.
Her vision wavers. The edges of the station distort like heat ripples on asphalt. The sound of the rain dulls, replaced by an erotic silence. Her head throbs, and suddenly, she isn’t standing on the platform anymore.
She’s somewhere else.
The lights are flickering. The walls seem older, cracked, covered in something dark. A train rushes past, its windows distorted, the passengers inside, who's faces are shifting, melting into one another like wax figures under a flame.
And then-
A whisper,Same one. Right by her ear.
“Don’t forget again.”
She gasps, stumbling backward. The world snaps back into focus. She’s sitting on a bench, the ticket clenched tightly in her fist. Her hands are trembling with fear or with cold running in her spine,she don't know. She doesn’t remember sitting down. She doesn’t remember how she got there.
All she knows that, She knows Nothing.
The train station looks normal again. The people around her move like nothing happened. But she knows better now.
Something happened here. Something is buried in her past. And whatever it is, it’s starting to bleed through, like the past is itself remembering her what had happened.
The key. The dream. The missing time. The man who seemed to recognize her. It’s all connected.
And now She has to know the truth, The real truth beneath this incident.
Before she loses herself completely.
Again.
Just like the last time. Maybe now it isn't a coincidence she thought before she goes blank out completely with the key in her hand and now a ticket.
——————————————————
As the world fades into darkness. Her body feels weightless, as if it's floating between time and space without any worries. The rhythmic echo of train wheels screeching against metal rails reverberates through her mind, distant yet deafening. A sharp, cold wind rushes past, sending a shiver down her spine. She knows that she isn't on the station bench anymore.
She is somewhere else again.
A train stands before her, its doors yawning open like the mouth of an abyss. The air inside is thick, heavy with something unexplainable like memories but that aren’t hers but feel deeply familiar. The dim overhead lights flicker erratically, casting elongated shadows on the worn-out seats inside. The passengers sit eerily still, their heads bowed like they don't want to show their faces, it hidden beneath the brims of hats and the shadows of flickering lights.
The ticket in her grip feels warmer now, as if it's urging her to step inside.
She doesn’t want to, but her feet move on their own like something's pulling her inside the train.
The doors slide shut behind her with a soft hiss. She takes slow steps down the aisle, her heartbeat syncing with the slow, deliberate rhythm of the train’s movement. She tries to catch a glimpse of the passengers' faces, but the moment she focuses on one, it distorts features blurring, twisting into something grotesque, something unnatural like she isn't allowed to look at any of them.
Her breath quickens. The train isn't just moving forward. It feels like it’s moving backward in time, Fastly but slowly at the same time.
A familiar whisper slithers through the stale air again.
"You're late."
She spins around, searching for the voice. At the far end of the compartment, near the connecting door, a woman stands. Dressed in an old-fashioned black dress beautifully, her hair falls in loose waves over her shoulders, obscuring part of her face. There’s something unsettlingly familiar about her.
"Who are you?" she manages to whisper.
The woman tilts her head, lips parting as if to speak. But before a word escapes, the train lurches violently. The lights flicker, plunging the compartment into momentary darkness. A sharp and loud scream pierces the air.
And then, Silence.
It was Silence for a moment till the light return's
When the lights return, the woman was already gone.
Then the train slows. The atmosphere shifts into something different she felt like danger. The passengers, once lifeless, suddenly rise in unison, their movements synchronized, robotic. They turn toward her, their hollow eyes locking onto her as if she’s an intruder in a place she doesn’t belong to.
Panic surges through her veins. She has to get out, immediately.
The train screeches to a halt making her slightly jolt. The doors slide open, revealing a platform shrouded in thick fog. She stumbles forward, barely but fastly making it off the train before the doors slam shut behind her. She breathed heavily.
She turns to look at the train but it’s gone. No screeching departure, no fading lights. Just… gone completely like it never existed.
The station in front of her eyes were different from before. The walls are cracked, the signs faded and peeling. The air is thick with the scent of damp earth and something metallic.. Blood?
And then, she sees it Again.
The missing poster,From before.
But, it's no longer faded. The ink is fresh, the image looks crystal clear like it's newly being placed.
Her own face stares back at her like a mirror.
"Missing: Last Seen at the Station. Boarding the 11:45 Train."
Her blood runs cold this time,more like she felt her blood soaked from her body completely while looking at the poster.
She was never supposed to leave.
Or maybe… she never did.
Or maybe she Did really?.
She didn't know, what was happening, those dreams, that man, the key, the station, strange behaviour of people's inside the train, the lady's sudden appearance and disappearing infront of her own eyes, and now the missing poster of her's right in front of her eyes,fresh and newly inked.
She knows nothing, She just felt a huge burden up at her head seeing at this things like someone's playing with her mind, heart, herself and suddenly she felt shap pain in her head and drop down on ground unconscious right in front of the poster where her own image was being posted on the wall.
