The neon flickered above his head, spitting out a sickly white light that made the shadows tremble at the corners. The room was bare. Too bare. The silence wasn't the absence of sound — it was a suspended breath, as if the air itself were afraid to move.
He blinked. His head throbbed. His wrists felt heavy.
Handcuffs. Black. But not metallic. Ink. Alive. Thick. The letters shifted, sliding across his skin, forming words he didn't understand. With every heartbeat, they pulsed. As if they were reading his blood.
A one-way mirror. He felt the weight of a gaze — distant, judgmental. The kind that listens without understanding.
The door opened.
A man entered.
Gray suit. Clean. Too clean. He wore gloves. Round, steel-framed glasses that reflected the room but never revealed his eyes. In his hands, a black file. No name. Just one word, burned into the cover in deep red:
WRITER
The man sat down. Slowly. He didn't open the file right away. Instead, he ran his fingers across it, almost tenderly. Then he spoke — in a voice without echo, as if it didn't quite belong to this world.
— "Name."
— "I don't have one."
— "All madmen say that."
He opened the file. Pages blackened. Not by ink — by scratches. As if written with fingernails. He turned a page, stopped, tapped the paper twice.
— "You were found at the entrance of the Manor of Silence. Zone 7. You spoke with a Writer. Are you aware that this zone is forbidden?"
A heartbeat. A memory. Ink on the walls. The screech of a quill against flesh. An ageless gaze.
— "Yes."
— "Describe him."
He inhaled. Flashes. Pages suspended in the air. A hand writing in silence — and behind it, the world shifting.
— "He was writing. Not to tell a story… but to command one."
The man nodded slowly. He slid a photograph across the table. The image was blurry. A silhouette drowned in fog. Long hair. A frayed coat. It looked like a sketch left unfinished.
— "Is this him?"
The prisoner's fingers trembled. Just slightly.
— "I think so."
— "What did he say to you?"
The silence that followed was heavy. Dense. Then came a sentence — fragile, torn from somewhere deep.
— "He talked to me about the Codex."
A shiver crawled up the walls. The neon light sputtered. A shadow moved behind the mirror.
The man leaned forward.
— "Repeat that."
— "He talked to me about the Codex. He said… every word written in it reshaped reality. That to write was to wound the world. He told me I could change everything… but only if I was willing to pay the price."
— "What price?"
— "Me."
The man closed the file. He stood, walked around the table, and stopped behind the prisoner. Then, he whispered:
— "The Codex doesn't choose. It responds. It answers those who have nothing left… except a story to tell."
He placed a hand on the prisoner's shoulder. It was ice cold.
— "You are dangerous. Not because you know. But because you seek."
Two guards entered. White uniforms. Faceless. The ink-cuffs stirred, restless, as if they sensed what was coming. They dragged him to his feet. He staggered. With each step, the walls felt closer. The ceiling lower.
His cell was small. Crushed. The lights flickered.
Carved into the wall — with nails or teeth — was a forgotten warning:
You are not locked up for what you are.
You are locked up for what you could write.