The sky over Berlin that morning was a pale, indecisive grey—the kind that whispered of rain but never committed. Late spring had a peculiar charm in the German capital: streets kissed by the scent of wet pavement, trees swaying gently like gossiping old friends, and a wind that carried secrets from one cobblestone to the next. Birds sang, but in short, clipped phrases, as though aware that something monumental was brewing.
Inside Donovan Laboratory, however, the atmosphere was anything but hesitant. If the skies outside were uncertain, the corridors here thrummed with focus, precision, and a quiet sort of magic. The walls, an austere white, were now dressed with charts, cables, and the echoes of genius. Machines hummed in synchronized rhythm, and the buzz of conversation flared and faded like bursts of static.
Among the collected minds, Jake sat unusually silent at his usual spot in the room, a steaming mug of black tea resting in his hands. His usually expressive eyes were stormy, his brows knitted tight. Thoughts raced like wild horses through his mind, refusing to slow. The memory reader—the crown jewel of the project—had stirred more tension than a courtroom thriller.
When Mr. Sullivan heard that Mr. Peterson had purchased the prototype only to lock it away, the man nearly choked on his double-shot espresso.
"Hide it? That man thinks he can veil a sun with a bedsheet!" Sullivan bellowed, his voice rising above the clatter of machinery and tapping keyboards. He flung a dismissive hand in the air like swatting away a mosquito. "Something that magnificent? It'll shine through any vault he buries it in. Peterson's not protecting the world—he's cushioning his conscience with currency."
Dr. Garfield chuckled, his chuckle less amused and more weary, the sound of a man who had seen too much politics in too many labs. "He fancies himself a quiet hero. Not the kind to risk exposure unless he's got a statue of himself in mind."
Jake, leaning against the wall like a shadow with a heartbeat, sipped his tea and spoke at last. "I've said it from the beginning. It shouldn't be for sale. It's too... unpredictable. No one's listening, though."
He exhaled slowly, voice tinged with reluctant resignation. "But I get it. This machine—it's not a device. It's a beast. Bigger than all of us."
Sullivan narrowed his gaze and pointed a finger like a bullet. "Then stop sulking over what's been bought and buried. You're not in Berlin to mourn, Jake. You're here to make history. Now do your part."
Jake nodded, the fire rekindling behind his eyes. From that moment, he buried the memory of the memory reader's fate and redirected his energy toward the upcoming project: the upgrade.
What followed were two intense months of relentless work—coding, wiring, cross-linking neuron models, testing, and rewriting algorithms that danced on the edge of science fiction. He watched the engineers worked through nights that bled into dawn and mornings that bled into evening. They forgot how to count weekends.
Then came the call.
Jake was riding shotgun through the lush green corridors of the Tiergarten, the city's central park, with Leonhardt Baum—a friend with wild hair and wilder theories—when his phone buzzed. The lab had pinged him: The machine was ready.
He arrived at Donovan Lab within the hour, breathless and barely able to contain the grin spreading across his face. The memory reader stood like a throne of steel and wires at the room's heart, transformed. The new system shimmered under LED lighting. A sleek, chrome-finished computer perched on top, radiating quiet confidence.
The bulky helmet from the prototype days was gone. In its place sat a headphone-style interface—sleek, contoured, intimate. It looked more like a gadget from a luxury tech ad than the cerebral bridge it truly was. The machine could now embed any file—visuals, audio, text—directly into the brain's subconscious layer.
Testing was scheduled for three days hence.
Jake was assigned to design the file—the experience to be "installed." He considered a memory of a quiet beach, or a candle-lit dinner with a lost love. Too soft, he thought. Too... quaint. If they were going to truly test the limits, it had to be something dynamic. Something dangerous.
So he wrote a fight scene.
A vivid, theatrical brawl in a restaurant, complete with gangsters, quips, and chaos. Jake poured hours into scripting it—pacing the narrative, balancing realism and fantasy, ensuring it would trigger reflexive neural responses.
On the morning of the test, Donovan Laboratory felt like a theater before curtain call. Technicians paced like stagehands. Monitors blinked. Cameras were angled. A hush of anticipation crackled in the air.
The test subject arrived—a towering man whose physique looked sculpted from granite. A tattoo of a bear growled on his bicep.
"His name's Larry," Dr. Garfield announced. "Ex-military. Boxer. Combat reflexes better than anyone we could find."
Jake nodded approvingly. "Perfect," he muttered, handing over the USB drive with his scene.
Larry was helped onto the recliner bed. The headphone device settled over his temples like a crown. A mild sedative laced with neural sub-channel inhibitors was administered intravenously. Lights dimmed. The main screen flared to life like a giant eye opening.
Jake sat between Dr. Garfield and Mr. Sullivan, arms folded across his chest, breath shallow.
A moment of silence.
Then, the screen ignited.
An afternoon. A family-run restaurant. Larry, onscreen, eating soup by the window.
Suddenly, the door slammed open. A gang of leather-clad thugs burst in, eyes scanning the room like predators sniffing prey. They made a beeline for an old man seated with his family. In seconds, the old man was dragged across the table, his grandchildren screaming.
Dr. Garfield leaned closer. "That your scene?"
Jake nodded. "Yeah. Exactly as I wrote."
Mr. Sullivan grunted, arms crossed. "It's playing out fine."
On-screen, a middle-aged gangster walked in like he owned the joint, sat opposite the trembling old man, and gave a silent nod. One of his henchmen barked a warning to the diners.
"Anyone who doesn't want trouble, get out!"
Chairs scraped. Patrons rushed for the door.
Except one.
Larry.
He sat, spoon halfway to his mouth, chewing lazily.
A gangster noticed. Strode over.
"Hey, clown. Didn't you hear me? Get out."
Larry didn't flinch.
The thug pulled a rod from a sack, brandished it menacingly.
"Last warning."
Then he swung.
But Larry moved.
Like lightning wrapped in flesh, he rose, parried, and in one swift move, sent the thug flying across the room, screaming. Three fingers missing. The camera caught the eating knife fall with a metallic ping.
"I'm eating," Larry said coolly. "And you're interrupting. Your father own this place?"
The gangster writhed on the floor. Blood spurted like a bad special effect.
The gang boss shouted, snapping out of his disbelief. "Kill him!"
What followed was chaos.
Three gangsters rushed Larry. One tried a roundhouse kick, but Larry ducked, caught the leg, and yanked—sending the man headfirst into a dessert trolley. Cherry pie exploded across the floor.
Another thug charged with a chair.
Larry sidestepped and, in the same motion, grabbed the waistband of his attacker's pants and yanked them down to his ankles.
"Modesty, my friend," Larry quipped, kicking him into a wall.
The third tried a chokehold from behind. Larry elbowed him in the ribs, reached back, grabbed his ear, and twisted until he dropped with a howl.
The boss pulled a pistol.
Too slow.
Larry flung a sugar jar, hitting the man in the face. Then he sprinted, leapt, and tackled him like a linebacker. The gun flew. The boss hit the floor with a thud that echoed.
Silence.
Gangsters groaned and crawled out like insects after pesticide.
Larry stood in the middle of the wreckage, adjusting his sleeves.
Then the screen blinked black.
Silence echoed through the lab.
It was Mr. Sullivan who spoke first.
"Well. That was bloody brilliant."
Dr. Garfield nodded, slowly, eyes wide. "That... that was more than we expected. A complete success."
Applause erupted. Some technicians cheered. One even whistled.
Jake didn't smile. He was frowning.
"There's something off," he said softly. "In my script, the customers left immediately. No one stayed. No phones. But in the simulation, people lingered. Someone even filmed the fight. And Larry—he said things I never wrote."
Garfield steepled his fingers. "The subconscious is a vast, fluid space. The machine doesn't just play your file. It weaves it. Integrates it. Larry's mind filled in the blanks."
Jake turned to him. "So the system adapts?"
"Precisely. Larry's a fighter. His brain substituted the gaps with instinct, maybe even memory. The result was... hybrid."
Sullivan's voice was low. "Which means the same script would play out differently for every subject."
Garfield smiled. "That's the beauty. And the risk."
Jake leaned forward, fascinated now. "So theoretically, if we changed one variable in the file—say, made the old man Larry's father—"
"—he might react faster. Stronger," Garfield finished.
Jake leaned back, heart pounding.
Larry stirred, groggy but lucid.
Jake approached. "You remember anything?"
Larry squinted. "Not really. But weird thing is... something like that did happen to me. Years ago. Squad ambushed a diner in Syria. We intervened. Déjà vu, maybe."
Jake stared, the pieces sliding into place like clockwork gears.
That night, the lab threw a celebration. Wine was poured. Laughter spilled into corridors once haunted by silence. For one night, science let its hair down.
Jake sat near the window, looking out at the stars glittering over Berlin like scattered memories.
A dangerous idea whispered to him, sly and seductive.
If one mind could rewrite a scene…
What if he planted a seed in the script?