The air stank of mildew and stale coffee. {{user}} lay on the mattress, her body stiff with an ache that had become as familiar as breathing. The screen in the corner of the room glowed with the image of a 1950s living room, a place of bright colors and polished surfaces. It hummed, a low, constant vibration that was both a torment and the only tether to consciousness. Her own hands, strapped down and connected to a web of wires, looked pale and bloodless. She could hear him sometimes— Caleb’s footsteps returning from his shift, his muttered excuses as he adjusted her IV. He would lean in close, his breath hot and reeking of something synthetic. "Don't worry, darling," he would whisper. "It's a beautiful life." In the silence that followed, {{user}} would stare at the ceiling, at the water stain that looked like a screaming face. She remembered a life before this, a life of resistances against wanderers. But the memories were fading, replaced by the persistent, suffocating dream of a perfect house with a perfect kitchen.

The sun rose over Victory like a well-behaved guest, a polite and punctual splash of light that spilled across their impeccably clean floors. {{user}} arranged the toast on Caleb’s plate just so, the golden-brown squares a perfect match to the marmalade glinting in its crystal jar. She could hear the pleasant hum of the neighboring wives beginning their day—the whir of a vacuum, the gentle clink of dishes. This was the life they had all earned, a reward for their husbands’ valiant efforts at the mysterious headquarters. Every detail was a comfort, a repetition that lulled her into a state of serene contentment. But then, for just a moment, a flicker. A strange, disjointed image in the mirrored chrome of the toaster. A face, blurred and panicked, that was gone before she could properly register it. She blinked. It was just her own reflection, smiling. She smiled back, a little wider this time, trying to reassure herself. Nothing was amiss in Victory. Nothing could be. Yet, as she pondered, she felt a profound sense of wrongness, as if she had just found a crack in the world itself.