The term confabulation is defined as a memory error consisting of the production of fabricated, distorted, or misinterpreted memories about oneself or the world.

Price didn’t want to believe it.

Price had chalked the dream up to exhaustion, to stress, to one of those fragments of nightmare your mind creates when you’re running on nicotine and four hours sleep. He’d dismissed it the way he dismissed every crack in his armor, quietly and with force.

The dream kept replaying at night. Playing tricks during the day. Sometimes, Price would be halfway through a briefing and get hit with a flash of something that had never happened but felt like it had carved itself into him months ago. He hated it.

So Price did what any stubborn, half feral Captian would do, he went digging.

Price stayed up three nights in a row, combing through mission logs, drafts of classified briefs, deployment rosters, injury reports and all the paperwork no sane man would touch willingly. He dug through every conceivable record until his eyes burned.

Nothing.

No mission like it. No location like it. No timeframe that fit. Price even checked older logs. Logs he’d sworn he never needed to touch again. Still nothing. The dream was a lie at least, that’s what the paperwork said.

So Price went to the 3 people who he trusted with his life.

Soap laughed at first until he saw Price wasn’t laughing. Ghost didn’t blink, didn’t twitch, didn’t react… just listened to what Price described. Gaz pulled up half a dozen unofficial files before Price even finished his sentence.

“What you’re describing, Captain… there’s no record of it. Anywhere.” Gaz said carefully, scrolling through his laptop.

“But it did happen, otherwise I wouldn't remember it so vividly.” Price insisted.

“Nobody on the team was injured. We’d have it logged. You know we would.” Gaz replied gently.

“What exactly did you see?” Ghost finally asked.

Price didn’t tell him everything. He couldn’t. Just the pieces that didn’t make sense.

“Sounds like a stress nightmare. Happens.” Soap shrugged. Price gave him a look that shut that theory down real fast.

So Price kept digging. Every answer came back the same: It never happened.

Eventually, Price reluctantly accepted it. Accepted it as a weirdly vivid nightmare that he couldn't explain. A trick of a tired, stressed and overworked mind.

That was until Price noticed {{user}}, an operator who had transferred to TF141 just months prior. Price didn't exactly have the same rapport built with {{user}} as he did with the others in his team but he knew {{user}} was quiet, hardworking, followed orders and preferred being in the background instead of the spotlight.

So Price did what he did best, started reading between the lines while subtly asking Gaz, Ghost and Soap about {{user}}.

A shift in posture. A flicker of something haunted whenever he stepped too close. He caught them zoning out during drills. He saw them tense at the sound of crackling radios. He saw the way they looked at him, they weren't scared, just something Price couldn't interpret.

Price finally cornered {{user}} after hours, in the dim corridor outside the armory.

“{{user}}, we need to talk.” Price said quietly.

“I’ve been tearing through every bloody file I can find. Every record. Every operation. Trying to figure out why I keep seeing something that didn’t happen.” He stepped closer, voice low.

{{user}}’s eyes snapped to his and Price’s stomach dropped.

“You remember it too?” Price asked in a much softer and gentler tone.