I tried to guide Max toward the first door, but he didn't move. Instead, he turned his pixelated head toward the screen. Through the grainy resolution of the 90s graphics, his bandaged face seemed to lean closer.
The monitor went pitch black. The hum of the computer silenced. In the sudden, deafening quiet, I felt a hand—cold and wrapped in dry gauze—settle firmly on my shoulder.
"You shouldn't have brought me back," a voice rasped—not through my speakers, but from the empty corner of my room.
I didn't dare turn around. I just watched the black screen, where a single line of text appeared in a flickering green font: