Log 08
False Narrative
When I woke again, the world was white.
No edges. No sound. Only light stretching without end.
For a moment, I thought I was dead.
But the pain in my chest reminded me: I was still alive.
I just wasn’t sure where that life existed.
I stood. Shallow water lay beneath my feet, reflecting the endless white sky.
In the distance, a figure sat quietly.
I walked closer and saw his face—
Commissioner Lau Kwok Fan.
He wore a spotless uniform, holding a cup of tea as if we were in a conference lounge.
“You’re awake,” he said calmly.
I stared at him coldly. “Where am I?”
“Where do you think?”
“A dream.”
“Not entirely. This is the second layer—the boundary state your brain enters after E-IX stimulation. Reality is outside. Dream is inside. You are in between.”
I let out a short laugh. “And you? A hallucination?”
He sipped his tea. “I’m the dominant force of this layer. Without me, you don’t leave.”
The white light around us began to ripple, shifting into fragments of images—
the harbor, the explosion, Minmin’s shadow, the pink glow.
“Where is she?” I asked.
“Your subconscious chose to keep her. In reality, her body has entered a critical state.”
“What did you do to her?”
“I made her quiet.”
I grabbed his collar and roared, “What do you want?!”
He didn’t resist. He simply looked at me the way a doctor observes a patient.
“I want a human society that no longer makes mistakes. Dreams are the only tool capable of achieving that. Project MORPHEUS is not about control—it’s about reconstruction.”
“Reconstruction?” I scoffed. “You’re destroying everything.”
“Destroying what?” he leaned forward slightly. “Conflict? Crime? Ego? Loke Tin Kay, you’ve spent your life investigating cases. How many innocents have you seen die? How many killers walk free? Aren’t you tired? In dreams, no one suffers.”
“But it isn’t real.”
“What is real?” he countered. “Lies? Betrayal? Death? Or the guilt you can’t escape?”
That sentence cut into me like a blade.
I stepped back. “What are you talking about?”
He smiled faintly. “Have you forgotten? The earliest test designation of Project MORPHEUS was ‘TK-1.’”
I froze.
TK—Tin Kay.
“You were the first subject,” he said softly. “E-IX has been flowing through your body for five years. Your dreams became the foundation of this entire project.”
My mind roared.
Images flashed—white lab walls, the cold press of neural sensors against my scalp, medical commands, Lau Kwok Fan’s silhouette behind observation glass.
It hadn’t started with Lam Chi Ying.
It had started with me.
“You lied to me.”
“I gave you a second chance at life,” he replied evenly. “After that shootout, you should have died. E-IX saved you.”
I closed my eyes.
That year. The anti-gang operation. A bullet through my lung. I woke in a hospital bed. He returned my badge, told me I’d cheated death.
Now I knew what had really saved me.
“So the entire MCS…”
“Reconstructed from your subconscious,” he finished. “Wai Hing, Chee Yan, Mun Tseng, Man Man—they are based on real people in your memory. But here, they are projections of your personality.”
“You’re lying,” I whispered.
“Truth doesn’t require belief,” he replied coolly. “You should have awakened long ago. You just refused to let them go.”
The pain in my chest intensified.
“You want me to let them go? Then prove this isn’t a dream.”
I raised my gun and aimed at his heart.
“Shoot,” he said calmly. “If this is a dream, I won’t die. If it’s real, you’ll never leave.”
I pulled the trigger.
The gunshot echoed.
Blood burst into the white air—
but it wasn’t red.
It was pink.
He smiled faintly as he fell.
The white world began to collapse.
—
I jolted awake.
Darkness. Heavy breathing. Salt in the air—
the sea.
I was on the shore. Waves lapped at my boots.
In the distance, flames burned.
I struggled up and saw Minmin lying nearby, still gripping my sleeve.
“Man Man!” I rushed to her.
Her eyes fluttered open. “We’re… alive?”
“I don’t know.”
The dock’s ruins still smoked behind us.
The sky was pink—like sunset. Or like a dream not fully faded.
My earpiece crackled.
“Sir Luo, it’s me.” Huixing’s voice.
I stiffened. “Where are you?”
“Don’t speak loudly. The Commissioner is dead.”
“What?”
“He was found in the medical college basement. Severe brain damage. Looks like E-IX backlash.”
Silence swallowed me.
That shot in the dream—
it had echoed into reality.
“What about Morpheus?” I asked.
“I found the source,” Huixing lowered his voice. “The project goes beyond dreams. They tried to build synchronized consciousness on a mass scale—connecting the city’s dreams together. You were the first node. They used your brainwaves as the template to generate the city’s ‘stability frequency.’”
Cold crept up my spine.
“So if I die, the whole system collapses?”
“Yes. But if you live, the system keeps rebooting—until you willingly ‘fall asleep.’”
“What do I do?”
“I’m at North Pier. There’s a cargo ship. Leave New City and you’ll exit the signal range. But you need to hurry.”
“And you?”
“I stay,” he said with a bitter laugh. “Someone has to press the shutdown button.”
“Wai Hing—”
“Don’t,” he cut me off. “These old bones of mine were meant to sleep anyway. You still have them. Go.”
The line went dead.
—
I looked up at the pink sky.
The wind carried a trace of jasmine—not sweet anymore.
That wasn’t fragrance.
It was memory burning.
We reached North Pier.
A cargo ship’s lights blinked three times—Huixing’s signal.
But before we could approach, the ship trembled.
A burst of white light erupted from the hull.
“Wai Hing!” I shouted, pulling Man Man down.
The explosion tore the night apart.
Flames roared skyward.
I knew—
he was gone.
He had shut down half the dream.
Man Man leaned against me, trembling. “Is he… really dead?”
I stared at the burning wreckage. “He chose to wake up.”
The wind carried smoke and sandalwood—like his cigarette scent.
For a moment, I almost laughed.
Before closing every case, he used to say, “Wake up. Show’s over.”
This time, he said it to the entire city.
—
We boarded a small lifeboat and drifted toward open sea.
Night fog descended. The pink sky faded into gray.
I thought we had escaped.
But beyond the waves, the city lights flickered—
synchronized.
“Do you see it?” Man Man whispered.
“I do.”
The city was breathing.
Every building. Every light. Pulsing in the same rhythm.
Not power fluctuation.
Brainwave synchronization.
I finally understood.
Project MORPHEUS had never ended.
It had simply evolved.
Lau Kwok Fan was dead, but the system ran itself.
They never wanted to control one person.
They wanted everyone dreaming the same dream.
I tightened my grip on her hand.
“We have to go back.”
“Back? To that city of dreams?”
“No.” I looked toward the horizon.
“To tear the dream apart.”
The sea wind filled my lungs with salt and the faint scent of blood.
It reminded me—
I was still awake.
Maybe I am the only one who hasn’t fallen asleep.
And dreams—
must be ended by those who remain awake.