The air hung thick with the scent of ozone and desperation, a miasma clinging to the shadowed corners of the Memory Market. My contact, Silas, a wiry man with eyes like chips of obsidian, had led me to a secluded stall tucked away behind a mountain of discarded data-crystals. He’d promised information, a piece of my past he claimed to possess, but the price, he’d warned, would be steep. The price was never just credits; it was always a piece of you, a gamble with your very self.

Silas produced a small, tarnished locket, its surface etched with symbols I didn’t recognize but instinctively felt resonated with a forgotten part of me. Inside, nestled on faded velvet, was a data-chip, no bigger than my thumbnail. “This,” Silas rasped, his voice like gravel grinding against stone, “contains a memory fragment. It’s raw, unfiltered. Be warned, it might shatter what little you think you know.”