Taking a deep breath, I release it on a rage-filled scream.
“Kayla!”
I open my eyes and the room is black. Not dark. Black. Matte walls that swallow light rather than reflect it. The floor is the same. The ceiling too. No edges. No corners. The geometry is deliberately difficult to parse.
And yet I can see.
Pinpoints of light bloom as my pupils adjust – tiny, cold, white. They are everywhere. Hundreds of them, embedded in the walls, the ceiling, the floor. Too many to count. Too many to track.
Cameras. Of course.
I sit up slowly, testing nothing but myself. No restraints. No cuffs. No pressure points. My body is uninjured. My clothes are intact.
They don’t need to touch me.
The lights brighten a fraction, just enough to reveal the room’s true shape. Circular. Perfectly symmetrical. No doors visible. No shadows.
That is the first real cut.
Shadows are where you hide the things you don’t want catalogued. Shadows are where intent blurs. They have taken them away with surgical care.
A voice speaks. Not from one direction. From all of them. “Subject Nightshade is awake.”
I don’t respond.
“Please stand.”
I smile.
Slowly, deliberately, I lie back down.
There is a pause. Not hesitation but recalculation.
“Compliance is not mandatory,” the voice says. “Observation will continue.”
Good. I sit up anyway, feet flat on the floor, spine straight. If I am to be watched, I will choose the posture.
“Where’s Kayla?”
Silence.
The cameras adjust. I hear it this time – the faint mechanical whisper as lenses refocus, as angles optimise. They are not just recording movement. They are reading intent.
I stand.
The room reacts immediately. Lights shift microscopically. The cameras track as one organism, their attention sliding over me like a blade. I turn slowly in place, letting them have the data. Gait. Balance. Weight distribution. Let them build the model.
Because I know what comes next.
A screen ignites in the air in front of me, translucent and sharp. Then another. Then another. Soon the room is full of them, floating at different heights and distances. On the screens: Me.
Not live feed. Archive. Footage from angles I never noticed. Reflections I didn’t know existed. Movements I don’t remember making.
Me, watching. Me, waiting. Me, standing in doorways, half in shadow – except now there is no shadow, only the implication of one.
The voice returns, smooth and precise. “You exhibit consistent pre-engagement behaviours.”
I tilt my head slightly. “Do I?”
