The Last Look

It started with a flicker.
Just a small glitch on one of the security feeds, nothing unusual for a night shift. But something about that motion caught my eye. Camera 12. The east hallway.

That corridor led to the cryogenics lab, the one that had been sealed off since the explosion six months ago. The one where Dr. Vassiliev supposedly died.

I leaned closer to the monitor, rubbing my eyes. The image was grainy, but the shape moving across the screen was definitely human.

For a second, I thought someone had broken in. Then the figure stepped into the light.

It was him.
Dr. Vassiliev.

I froze. My pulse started racing. Every report said the same thing—no remains, no chance of survival, nothing but twisted metal and ice. And yet, there he was, walking slowly down the hallway, wearing the same long coat he used to wear every night, the ID badge still clipped to the pocket.

I should have called it in. I knew that.
But curiosity did what fear couldn’t stop.

I logged into the restricted feed—something only supervisors were supposed to access. My clearance had been left active by accident. I told myself I’d just take a look and report it. Just a look.

The camera switched, showing the inside of the sealed chamber. The feed flickered for a second, then cleared.

That was my keyhole.

Dr. Vassiliev walked into view. He was thinner, paler. His hands trembled slightly as he approached the glass pod at the center of the room.
Blue light pulsed inside it, soft and steady, like a heartbeat under water.
Something moved inside the pod. Something alive.

I turned up the volume. The static hissed, and then his voice came through quiet, almost like a prayer.

“It worked,” he whispered. “You came back.”

The thing inside shifted. The shape was human, but the skin wasn’t right—it shimmered like liquid metal, changing shape every second. Then it spoke, and my stomach dropped.

“You shouldn’t have come back either.”

The voice was wrong. It sounded like two people speaking at once—Vassiliev’s voice buried under something colder.

I sat there, staring, unable to look away as he pressed his hand to the glass. The creature mirrored him perfectly, every movement in sync, as though it was mimicking him—or remembering him.

“We are not separate anymore,” it said.

Then, as if hearing me breathe, Vassiliev turned.
And looked straight at the camera.

My chair hit the floor as I stumbled back. That was impossible. The feed wasn’t two-way. There were no lenses capable of transmitting anything back.

But he kept staring.
And then, one by one, all the other monitors came alive, every single one showing the same feed—Vassiliev, standing there, looking directly into the lens.

His voice came through the speakers, distorted and broken up by static.

“You looked through the keyhole, didn’t you, Alex?”

My name.
He said my name.

I grabbed the mouse to shut everything down, but the cursor froze. The feeds began to shake, the screens rippling like reflections on disturbed water.

Behind Vassiliev, more figures began to form stepping out of the pod, one by one.
At first, I thought the image was looping, but then I realized every one of them was him. The same face. The same smile. Dozens of them.

I panicked. I yanked the main switch on the wall, and the room dropped into silence. Every monitor went black. I stood there, chest pounding, trying to make sense of what I’d just seen.

Then I heard it.
A soft, rhythmic tapping behind me.

Knock.
Knock.
Knock.

It came from the glass wall that looked out into the corridor. My stomach twisted.

Someone or something was standing there in the dark.

The emergency light flickered on, just enough to show his face.

Vassiliev.

He didn’t move. He just smiled through the glass, and then lifted one finger, pointing slowly toward the power switch behind me.

“Turn it back on,” he mouthed.

I took a step back. Then another.
But before I could even reach the door, the lights came on by themselves. The hum of the servers returned. The monitors blinked to life again—every single one showing the same thing.

Me.

On all twelve screens, I was sitting in that chair, frozen mid-motion, staring at the monitors. Some of the versions of me looked older. One had blood running down his temple. Another was screaming silently. All of them were trapped in the same loop.

And behind each one stood Vassiliev, his hand resting on my shoulder, calm and patient.

Then, through the static, his voice came again. Soft. Almost kind.

“Every watcher becomes the watched.”

I turned toward the nearest monitor. My reflection the one on-screen smiled.

And then the feed cut out.

They said they found the security room empty.
The monitors were still running, looping the same frozen image. The chair was overturned. No sign of a break-in. No sign of me.

The official report said “equipment malfunction.”
They replaced the whole surveillance system a week later.

But there’s one thing they can’t explain.
Every once in a while, the new staff notice a thirteenth camera feed appear on their monitor. No number, no location. Just Camera 13.

When they click it, the screen shows a room that looks exactly like theirs.
Same desk. Same monitors. Same chair.

And someone sitting there,
leaning closer to the screen,
watching them back.