Part I – Carlos Mendoza
Whistle. Whistle.
Step by step, Carlos moved forward through the narrow passageway of the isolation wing. The overhead lights burned white and sterile, bright enough to banish shadows, yet the silence made the place feel darker than any unlit corridor. Machinery hummed endlessly in the walls — a mechanical breathing that never stopped.
It’s been a week already…
A faint chill crawled up the back of his neck. His suit display insisted the temperature was normal.
“Creepy place,” he muttered to himself. “Always feels like someone’s watching. Or maybe I’m just losing it.”
He exhaled a short laugh.
“Here I am, strolling down Victory Road like I’m about to become a Pokémon Champion. Yeah right. More like Misery Road.”
Carlos was on patrol. Standard procedure. Make sure doors were sealed, monitors functional, nothing out of place. It would’ve been tolerable if not for the constant unease — the kind that settled in your bones rather than your mind.
The humming changed.
Not louder.
Sharper.
Rougher, like metal grinding against something it shouldn’t. Carlos slowed, turning his head slightly as he passed the wall. The sound wasn’t coming from the usual channels.
That’s not right.
Curiosity won. It always did.
He stepped closer, inspecting the wall panel, pressing his gloved hand against the cold surface. Then he heard it — something layered beneath the machinery.
Whispers.
Carlos frowned. “No way.”
These walls were absurdly thick. Half a meter at least. He leaned in anyway, pressing his ear against the metal. For several seconds, there was nothing.
He sighed. “Yeah, okay. Imagination. Detective brain doing detective things.”
He straightened—
“
You’re next.
”
Carlos stumbled back as if shoved. His heart slammed against his ribs. He spun around, hand already moving toward his sidearm.
Nothing.
Empty corridor. Silent lights. Endless white.
“…Nope,” he breathed. “Didn’t hear that. Definitely didn’t.”
He laughed weakly. “Must’ve been that burrito this morning.”
He closed his eyes, inhaled slowly, forced his pulse to steady.
“You’re just imagining things.”
“Oi! What are you doing spacing out like that?”
Carlos nearly jumped out of his skin.
He whirled around to see Gonzalez standing behind him, cane planted firmly on the floor, expression unreadable.
“Oh—hell,” Carlos said, exhaling hard. “Old man Gonzalez. Thought you were a ghost for a second. Was wondering how I’d fight one of those without holy water.”
Gonzalez raised an eyebrow. “You hit your head?”
“Probably. Don’t worry about it.”
“You’re behind schedule,” Gonzalez said flatly. “This isn’t a place for daydreaming.”
“Yeah, yeah. My bad.” Carlos smirked. “Didn’t mean to waste your time, pops.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“…Noted.”
Carlos turned to leave.
Behind him, Gonzalez spoke again — softer this time.
“Whatever you see. Whatever you hear.”
Carlos paused.
“You pretend it never happened.”
He turned back.
But Gonzalez was already walking away.
Carlos swallowed and continued down the corridor, whistling again — this time louder, faster, desperate to drown out the hum.
Whatever this place was… it wasn’t just a prison.
And he wasn’t sure he wanted to know what it really held.
Part II – Viola Patrick
The infirmary smelled like antiseptic and old regret.
Viola stood silently before the display, staring at Inmate 301’s cognitive readout — a perfect, merciless flatline. The medical drones hovered nearby, flawless in their precision, utterly indifferent.
She used to be a nurse. Back when pain had explanations.
“I’ve seen worse,” she whispered to herself. “Broken bones. Missing limbs. Knife wounds.”
This should’ve been easy.
The body showed no trauma. No burns. No scars. No signs of restraint.
But the mind—
Partial paralysis. Severe dissociation. Cognitive collapse.
She leaned closer, peering into the patient’s eyes.
They weren’t looking
at
her.
They were just… open. Seeing without perceiving. Like windows into an empty house.
“What happened to you?” she murmured.
The drones finished their scans, injecting stabilizers with perfect timing. Viola envied them. No doubts. No guilt.
This was supposed to be a controlled facility. So why were they bringing in eight patients a day like this?
Not fights. Not accidents.
Something else.
Torture?
The thought made her stomach twist.
No. They wouldn’t. Not here. Not officially.
She told herself to stop thinking. She needed the money. Thinking got people reassigned. Or worse.
She prepared the stabilizing injection.
As the needle touched skin—
The patient gasped.
His eyes snapped into focus, locking onto hers with terrifying clarity.
“
They’re not studying us,
” he said calmly. “They’re
harvesting
.”
Viola froze.
“Don’t let them finish,” he continued, voice steady, rational. “It isn’t pain they want. It’s what happens
after
.”
The monitors screamed.
The clarity vanished.
He went limp.
The drones moved in immediately, correcting, erasing, restoring the silence.
Viola’s hands shook.
She stepped back, staring at the patient she had just helped
destroy
.
I’m complicit.
Her break alarm chimed.
She turned away, forcing herself not to look back.
Part III – Frederick
I first met Titus in the army.
Same platoon. Same dirt. Same sleepless nights.
I had already been in for a few months when he joined, which made me his superior by technicality more than experience. I was put in charge of the new arrivals — a loud, unruly bunch who hadn’t yet learned that discipline wasn’t about orders, but survival.
Titus stood out immediately.
Not because he talked more — he didn’t — but because when things got loud, he got quiet. During our first major training exercise, we were tasked with capturing a mock enemy base. Standard scenario. Smoke, confusion, simulated casualties.
Most recruits hesitated.
Titus didn’t.
He moved decisively, clear-headed under pressure, adjusting on the fly when plans collapsed — and they always did. By the time the exercise ended, the objective was secured ahead of schedule.
That was the moment I realized he wasn’t reckless.
He was
steady
.
After that, we started talking. Not just about the mission, but about life. We disagreed on almost everything — politics, ambition, what a “good life” even meant — but those conversations never turned hostile. They were grounding. Like looking at the same horizon from different angles.
We stayed together in the army for three and a half years.
Long enough to see promotions. Long enough to see losses. Long enough to understand each other without needing to explain much.
Then came the mission that ended it.
The details still blur together — a rapid deployment, an extraction that went sideways. Titus took the hit while covering a retreat. Severe leg trauma. Surgery saved his ability to walk, but that was it.
No more field work.
No more front-line duty.
The army doesn’t wait for recovery.
They let him go.
I remember visiting him after. The painkillers dulled the physical damage, but not the reality settling in. He went home to a life that had already been struggling before the uniform gave it structure. The injury didn’t just take his career — it took his momentum.
We stayed in touch at first. Messages. Calls when time zones aligned.
Then deployments stretched longer. I transferred branches. Priorities shifted the way they always do. Not because you want them to — but because survival demands focus.
When I finally had a break, one of my contacts mentioned a private facility looking for personnel. High pay. Discretion required. Long-term security contracts.
That’s when I thought of Titus.
I didn’t hesitate.
I told myself I was repaying a debt. That this was loyalty. Brotherhood. All the words soldiers use to justify decisions they don’t fully examine.
We met again for the first time in years — older, quieter, carrying different kinds of damage. The offer meant stability for him. Medical coverage. A future.
For both of us.
That’s how we ended up here.
This place.
At first, it seemed simple enough. Strange, sure — but manageable. Every classified job has its quirks.
Now I’m not so sure.
The deeper I look, the more I feel like this facility isn’t just
containing
something.
It’s feeding it.
And I can’t shake the thought that I didn’t just bring Titus here to help him.
I may have brought him somewhere that will swallow us all whole.
For now, I’ll keep watching.
That’s what soldiers do when they don’t yet know how to retreat.