Died and Dossier

The man known only as Died walked into the archives at exactly 3:00 AM, the only time the building felt honest. The rain on the roof whispered like old ghosts as he descended the concrete stairwell to Sublevel Three, the place where the government buried its sins.

He was a shadow wrapped in a dark trench coat, face obscured beneath the brim of a hat no one could quite remember the color of. But to those who whispered about him in the dim-lit corners of failed revolutions and vanished files, he was a legend.

And tonight, he came for Dossier 800.

Died’s real name had been erased years ago, burned from databases, blurred from memories. All that remained was his work: finding what should stay lost, and destroying what must never be found.

He passed the retinal scan, which flickered blue then green, accepting his borrowed eye. The steel door hissed open.

Rows upon rows of high-security cabinets stretched before him, each one humming with electric secrets. Most held ordinary monstrosities—assassination orders, foreign manipulations, experiments that traded ethics for results. But Dossier 800 was different.

It didn’t exist.

At least, not officially.

Died reached Row J, Section 12, Cabinet 34. His fingers trembled slightly as he keyed in the seven-digit code. It accepted the sequence and slid open.

There it was. A dull black file marked with only three digits:

800.

He hesitated. Then he pulled it free.

The moment he did, a light above flickered, and somewhere in the building, a silent alarm he’d never known about triggered. He had fifteen minutes, maybe less.

Died opened the dossier.

Inside were photographs, aged and yellowing. A village, burning. People screaming. An unnatural figure, featureless and pale, standing amidst the chaos like a conductor leading a symphony of death. Redacted reports. Autopsy notes that ended mid-sentence. One photo showed a child staring into the camera, eyes entirely black.

The last page was a list. Names. All crossed out—except one:

Died.

He stared.

A sudden noise.

He snapped the file shut and turned, gun drawn.

The figure in the doorway wasn’t security.

She was tall, clad in a black coat mirroring his. Blonde hair, slick and wet from the rain. Her eyes were unreadable.

“Agent Wren,” Died said, lowering the weapon.

“You shouldn’t be here,” she said.

“And yet, you are.”

She stepped closer, her gaze dropping to the file in his hand.

“You read it.”

“I did.”

“Then you know,” she said quietly.

“I know enough. What the Bureau did… what I did—”

“You were chosen,” she interrupted. “Like me. You weren’t born Died. You were made.”

He nodded slowly. “This is a kill order.”

“Yes. The moment the file’s opened, the program activates again.”

“The program’s dead,” Died said. “They shut it down after Kazakhstan.”

She smiled bitterly. “You think the program was ever meant to end? Dossier 800 wasn’t a project. It’s a failsafe. Every agent connected to it is terminated once the cycle completes.”

He looked at the list again.

"Why am I the last?"

“Because you buried the others.”

He flinched. Somewhere, long ago, he’d forgotten that part of himself. The missions, the disappearances, the whispers of traitors and internal purges. They weren’t traitors. They were witnesses.

“Then what now?” he asked.

Wren raised a small device, blinking with a red light.

“This building is rigged. If neither of us completes the objective—”

“We both die.”

She nodded.

Died stared at her. “You’re not here to kill me, are you?”

“No,” she whispered. “I’m here to give you a choice.”

“What choice?”

She reached into her coat and pulled out a second file—Dossier 900. This one wasn’t aged. It was sealed in black polymer, labeled with a single word: REWRITE.

“What is it?”

“A rewrite protocol. Memory, identity, full personality conversion. A new life.”

He stared at the file. “A way out?”

“No. A way forward.”

He opened Dossier 900.

Inside was a single form. Blank name, blank history. A new cover. New fingerprints. A plane ticket. Passport. Birth certificate.

“Why are you giving me this?” he asked.

“Because someone has to survive.”

“But I don’t deserve it.”

Wren gave a sad smile. “None of us do.”

Sirens blared in the distance. Reinforcements.

Died looked at the two files in his hands—800 in his left, 900 in his right.

Death or rebirth.

He stepped forward and dropped Dossier 800 into the incinerator chute, watching as it was devoured in blue flame. Then, clutching Dossier 900, he turned to Wren.

“I’ll disappear.”

“You already have,” she said, and handed him a key.

Ten minutes later, a small, unregistered car slipped out into the rain and vanished into the city’s veins.

Back in Sublevel Three, Wren stood alone as the agents burst in, weapons raised.

She didn’t resist.

Because Died had died.

And something else had just begun.