I have… several questions.

Ami was back at her small apartment again, but she was still not completely in control of her own body. They were taking turns - first Ami, then the Sleepwalker, then back to Ami. It was disorienting, the pull and tug of semi-consciousness, until suddenly, she watched as her hands filled the sink with water.

What are you doing?

“I’m trying something,” said the Sleepwalker.

Suddenly, she was looking down - looking at herself. Her own reflection. She desperately wanted to look away - the pain of an eternity, of staring at her own eyes, clawed at her gut, ripping. But her eyes would not budge.

Stop it. Please.

“Look at yourself, Ami. Really look.”

It was then that Ami felt the metronome slow - the back and forth stream of Ami, Sleepwalker, Ami… The pendulum was speeding up. Faster. Faster.

Sleepwalker.

Ami.

Sleepwalker.

Then it stopped.

Ami opened her eyes, and unclenched her white knuckled hands, gently unwrapping them from the edges of the sink. She slowly lifted her head. She was in control again, but something felt different.

The tight knot in her chest was undone, and her heart was beating slower than it should. She took a deep breath, and found herself noticing things she hadn’t before.

A tiny dot of rust forming at the base of the sink drain. Muffled voices of her neighbors in the halls. A steady, crackling hum of the bathroom light above.

She turned around, stepping into her small bedroom, taking everything in. Even her own muscles seemed more focused - her posture straightened and tall.

“Are you… Are you still there?” Ami asked the empty room.

Yes, I am here.

“What… What happened?”

Ami, we are one now. You are in control, but you will have everything you need from me to survive. This is your body.

Ami hesitated, unsure how to respond.

If you ever need me to take control again, I will be here, waiting.

“Even… even at night? Can I… Can I sleep? Without you waking up?” Ami asked, looking at her unmade bed.

You can sleep, but you might not like the dreams.

Ami wasn’t sure what that meant but was still too excited at the prospect to protest.

“Can you tell me… can you tell me everything you know. Everything about the bubble - your ‘training’... What do you know about Optica? I just… I still have so many questions.”

There was a moment of silence, and Ami sat on the edge of her bed, before falling backwards on her pillow. She waited for any answer, tracing the subtle cracks in the wall.

Still she waited, even as the crack of light from the broken window shining behind the bookcase began to dim. Ami jumped up with the sound of her door barricading for the night, before slumping back down. Still nothing.

It wasn’t always Optica.

“Huh?”

The sudden voice startled her upwards once again.

I suppose I need to go back further than that… When the accident happened, they did not know what to do with you. You were a child. So they put you into temporary holding until they could come up with a solution. They needed to investigate.

But then, the next night, the same thing happened.

I got out of your room. We were angry… we were hurt… so we made people hurt like we did.

They said it was a “mental break,” triggered by the night, caused by your trauma.

But then similar things started to happen around the world. Other kids with their own Sleepwalkers began to appear. A worldwide affliction. A sickness in the brain, a misfire of neurons, causing them to act out as soon as they began their REM cycle.

So what were they to do? Lock up all the children like criminals? Lock them up only at night?

They needed time - they needed to keep the children awake, and safe, until they could find a cure.

There was a scientist, a young woman who was able to solve at least one of the problems. Inspired by her own daughter being a victim of the waking sickness. She created the bubbles - a temporary solution until they could find a cure to this mystery affliction. A cryogenic liquid would be pumped into the pods - slowing down everything - but not completely stopping it. A completely self-sustaining system. A marvel at the time.

You were the first to be put in a pod, but you were not the last. There were rows of us, all along the line. And as you stayed awake, watching the new children join, I also watched in the background - waiting.

We were deep underground - in an effort to quarantine the affliction. And the only faces other than our own we would see were that of the many lab coats making their rounds. Every once in a while, they would choose a child at random, and run some tests, only to quickly return them at the end of the day. Still no cure.

This went on, for ages, with the only real sign of time passing was the lines on the technician’s face as she would walk through the pods, sometimes singing melancholy songs.

Eventually, she would only come by herself - lack of funding, maybe? I wasn’t sure. But new children stopped coming a long time ago. Maybe the illness had finally stopped, so they had no need for a cure - I can only speculate.

She stopped visiting altogether - then came the long wait.

I watched as our hair grew long, turning white with the chemicals. Our nails grew too, digging into our sensitive skin. We watched as we slowly grew older - maturing but only very slightly. We were no longer in a child’s body, but in the hundreds of years we were down there, our bodies seemed to age ten, maybe fifteen years at most. But no, you remember this part. It’s etched in your memories.

When Optica came, we were all but mush. But judging by their firearms, they knew what we were capable of. When I finally was able to take control again, within the thickly isolated cell, I felt reborn. I was chaotic, berserk even in my anger and frustration.

Eventually, when I calmed, they tried to talk to me, reason with me. Of course, I played their games, and gained their trust until they opened my cell.

I then… I will spare you the details, but they did not let me free after that.

These Optica people, they saw us as an opportunity. A perfect killing machine - potentially unlimited predator drive - if only they could control us.

So they honed our stills, let us select our weapons and methods of choice, carefully teaching us methods and techniques, and we played along - letting us become the ultimate weapon, all the while breaking down your waking form. They would control you with fear - intimidation, as it seemed to make the Sleepwalkers even stronger than before. A weak, pliable host to use at their will.

But, as you can tell, this backfired - and the more they tried to control us, the more they became the enemy.

So, naturally, they resolved to let us all loose in the city. You and the other hosts were told as little as possible - hoping that the Optica connection would be lost in the chaos of this damned city. They wanted the hosts to feel isolated, to resort to escape and sleep all their troubles away.

They even put a suitcase full of that Sage stuff in your room, but I got rid of it on your first night. They wanted you to forget everything - Optica included, and let me all the Sleepwalkers roam free through the Downtown - acting to their malicious heart’s content. All the while Optica stays safe outside our walls.

“But why?” Ami finally interrupted, “Why would they want the Sleepwalkers to be loose Downtown, taking out their anger on innocent people? It doesn’t make sense…”

Ami waited for an answer, but was met with silence in the now almost pitch black room.

“Hello -” she started, before the voice interrupted her.

Shh… Listen.

There was a slight creaking coming from her window. She watched as the heavy bookshelf moved, very slightly, forward. Someone was pushing it - trying to get in. Ami’s eyes darted around the room, looking for any sort of weapon. But the gun was still where she left it on the bathroom floor, too far away. There was another creak, and Ami backed into the corner of the room - out of sight, considering her options.

Out from the shadows stepped a tall man, one that Ami recognized from before. The man who had pushed Charlie to the street so long ago. The man who was there, helping clean up after the chip factory explosion.

The man who knew her name.

“Hello, Ami.”