The air was different when they brought me back.
It wasn't just the smell or the light. It was the way the silence stretched around me like skin pulled too tight. The door clicked shut behind me with an oddly respectful hush, as if the guards were afraid of breaking something delicate. No barked orders. No shove between the shoulder blades. Just that quiet, sinking stillness. Something had changed.
Rellan looked up from the grooves he was tracing into the floor. The stitched boy didn't smile, didn't blink. His dark eyes followed me like a shadow searching for a body. Even Marik, always quick to mock or bait, didn't say anything at first. His smirk faltered. His posture tensed.
I walked to my usual spot and sat against the wall. Same corner. Same stone. But the air felt heavier now, like the room was weighing me.
Marik finally spoke. "So... did they open your head and count the thoughts?"
I didn't respond. That was the game.
He chuckled, but it was nervous. "Must've been something, though. You look taller somehow."
Still, I said nothing.
That silence settled deep. Not awkward, warning. I wasn't their prey anymore. I was something else now.
The hours passed without much movement. A guard swap. A food tray. Time slithered forward in tiny, scraping inches.
Then the cell door opened.
A man was thrown in, literally thrown. He hit the floor shoulder first, rolling into a heap. His clothes were soaked with blood and sweat, and his hair had gone white at the roots. Not from age. From fear.
He cursed and spat onto the floor, dragging himself upright with trembling arms. His hands were calloused. Military. Or miner. Something brutal.
He looked around at us, his gaze settling on me last. "Well ain't you all a friendly bunch."
No one answered. He stumbled to the wall and sat with a grunt.
"You're new," Marik said after a while.
The man scoffed. "Sharp tongue on you."
"Got a name?"
"Klay," he said flatly.
Marik nodded. "Welcome to Scrap-Rung."
Klay snorted. "They said this place eats the weak. But you all look like you're already halfway digested."
He pointed a shaky finger at me. "You. What's your deal?"
I didn't blink. "Surviving."
"That right?" He chuckled. "We'll see how long that lasts."
He slumped into the corner, coughing dryly. His eyes kept shifting—door, walls, inmates. A man measuring for escape routes, or ghosts.
Klay's voice returned after a while, quieter. "Used to run border patrols. Desert sector. Me and fifteen others. Then one day we got sent to clear out a rebel camp. Simple job."
Marik listened, arms folded, leaned against the stone. "Was it?"
Klay shook his head. "They weren't rebels. Just a village. Poor, starving. One of the officers made a call... burned the place to ash."
He didn't have to say more. We'd seen the type. Soldiers who followed, then broke. Men who used to be something.
"That's when they marked me," he continued. "Didn't fit in after that. Got reassigned. Then sent here."
"To rot?" Marik asked.
Klay's mouth twisted. "No. To wait. For something worse."
That line lingered.
Later, after lights dimmed, I watched the guards again.
Routine. Always routine. The fat one tapped his left boot. The younger one rubbed at the back of his neck every time he passed the torchlight. I started to mark the interval between footsteps, rotations, tray deliveries.
One guard dropped a key. Bent too fast to pick it up. Fumbled the lock on the way out. Didn't double-click it shut.
It was subtle. But enough.
Marik noticed. So did I.
Across the room, Rellan etched spirals into the stone. His fingers trembled. The shapes weren't random anymore—they were layered. Precise. Like glyphs.
I didn't sleep.
At feeding, Klay finally cracked. He stood, yelled at the walls.
"You bastards think this is justice?" he screamed. "You think this makes you safe?"
Rellan didn't flinch. The stitched boy giggled.
Klay turned toward Rellan. "You're one of them, aren't you?"
No answer.
He lunged.
I moved first.
One hand to his chest, no force, just presence. I leaned close, voice quiet.
"Touch him and I'll bury what's left of your name."
Klay froze.
Then backed down.
Marik smiled from the dark. "Well played."
I sat back against the wall. My eyes stayed open.
Soon.
Very soon.
The next day, something changed.
A paper was slipped beneath the cell door. Not a summons. No name. Just a seal: black wax, no crest.
Rellan looked at it and blinked for the first time in hours. Klay shifted. Marik walked over and picked it up, handed it to me without a word.
Inside was a message, handwritten in sharp, clean strokes:
"One door is enough. When you find it, knock twice."
I folded it, tucked it into my sleeve.
Then I stood, crossed to the back wall, and stared at the ventilation hatch near the ceiling. Too small for most. Not for me.
Klay muttered, "You're not serious."
"I'm always serious," I said.
That night, I traced the guard rotation again.
Twelve minutes between rounds. Five between internal checks.
The lock had not been fixed.
I waited until they passed. Then I rose.
Marik whispered, "You'll need more than luck."
"I've had worse," I said.
He nodded once.
Using the bed frame's splintered edge, I jimmied the lock. Quiet. Slow. Patient.
When the latch popped, no one moved.
I opened the door an inch.
Silence.
No alarms.
No voices.
Just air.
And freedom.
Behind me, Marik whispered, "What now, Vaun?"
I smiled without turning.
"Now I make them regret building doors."
Then I slipped out into the dark.
And the prison stopped feeling like a cage.
It started feeling like a hunting ground.
The hallway beyond was narrower than I expected. Built for control, not comfort. Every wall was the same uneven stone, pressed together like it had been clenched by a giant fist. Torches flickered in iron holders, throwing shadows across every inch.
I crouched low, letting silence settle around my shoulders like a cloak.
The first hallway ended at a junction. One path turned left, with stairs that curved upward. The other sloped down, toward heat and metal. I chose down.
Voices echoed faintly ahead—muffled, irregular. Two guards talking.
"…heard they're cycling another batch next week."
"Another? Where are they even coming from?"
"Doesn't matter. They don't stay long. You see that stitched freak in Cell Three? Gave me nightmares."
Their boots scraped closer.
I ducked behind a pile of rusted crates, supplies maybe. Rations or body bags. Hard to tell in the dark.
The guards walked past, too close. One stopped to light a smoke. His match flared. For a moment, the orange glow lit up my face from between the cracks.
He didn't see me.
They passed.
I moved again.
This part of the prison was older. Crumbling edges. Water dripping from ceiling cracks. Smelled of mold and old sweat.
A large metal door blocked the path ahead. No lock—just a runic seal carved across the frame. Magic. My first real sight of it.
The runes pulsed faintly when I approached. They hummed in my skull. Not pain. Not fear. But memory.
Like they recognized me.
I placed a hand against the door.
The runes flared.
Then dimmed.
And the door creaked open.
Inside was a stairwell, spiraling, endless. Black stone and rusted rails. I climbed.
Step by step.
Each one felt heavier than the last. Not from exhaustion. From meaning.
I wasn't escaping anymore.
I was ascending.
At the top of the stairwell, the air shifted again.
Cooler. Thinner. Touched by wind.
A single iron hatch blocked the exit. No runes, no lock. Just a heavy lever crusted with age. I pushed it. Metal shrieked against metal as the hatch gave way, lifting like a coffin lid forced open.
Beyond was the roof.
And sky.
I hadn't seen the sky in how long? Days? Weeks? It looked bruised purple with clouds swirling like smoke. No stars. No moon. Just cold wind and the faint hum of electricity from the watchtowers beyond the wall.
I stepped out onto gravel.
The roof was wide, ringed with broken fencing. Barbed wire dangled like dead vines. Antennas stood crooked like the bones of a fallen god. There was no clear path. No easy descent.
But there was space. There was wind. And there was a way.
I crouched behind a rusted ventilation duct and scanned the yard below.
Floodlights swept the grounds at intervals. I tracked them. Four lights, ten-second gaps, blind spots near the south perimeter.
Then I saw it.
An old drainage pipe ran down the back wall. Narrow. Slick. But solid.
I heard footsteps behind me.
Spun around.
Rellan stood at the hatch, silent as death.
He didn't say a word. Just stared.
I raised a brow. "You followed me?"
He didn't blink.
Then, slowly, he pulled something from his robe. A small blade. Bone-hilted. Clean.
He held it out to me.
I took it.
Rellan stepped back into the stairwell without another sound.
And vanished.
I turned the knife over in my hand. There were no markings. But it felt right. As if it had waited for me.
Below, the lights shifted.
My time was now.
I moved to the edge. Climbed over. Fingers wrapped around the cold iron pipe.
One breath.
Then descent.
Hand over hand. Muscle straining. Breath held.
Halfway down, alarms sounded.
Screams cut through the night.
Someone else had tried to run.
But not me.
I landed hard in a patch of mud. Rolled. Came up fast.
And I ran.
Through the shadows. Along the fence. Toward the forest beyond.
Toward the first step of a world that no longer had chains.
Behind me, towers blinked.
But I didn't look back.