The corridor doesn’t empty, exactly. Guards remain. Runts remain. The Rot hums on. But thepacechanges. Footsteps become less frequent. Voices lower. Orders are no longer barked; they’re murmured, exchanged between people who already know what comes next.
Aftermath.
I sit where they left me, hands bound behind my back, legs folded awkwardly in an attempt to take stress off my injured knee. The concrete planter is pressing coldthrough my pants. It’s getting uncomfortable, but not unbearable, and that, too, feels intentional. Pain sharpens attention. Comfort dulls it.
I don’t shift again. I learned that lesson already. Instead, I watch.
Across the corridor, one of the women from earlier is being repositioned. Not dragged. Guided. A hand at her elbow, another at her back. She keeps her head down, shoulders rounded forward like she’s trying to disappear into herself. Her restraints are adjusted twice while she stands there, compliant and shaking. When she’s moved on, she goes willingly.
I file that away.
Another woman, taller, older, refuses to move when she’s told. She stiffens, feet planted. It doesn’t earn her defiance or violence. It earns her waiting. Two guards step back, unfazed, and simply stand there while the rest of the corridor continues around them. After a long minute, she moves on her own.
No one speaks. No one needs to.
The Rot doesn’t correct behavior immediately. It lets it dangle on the vine, like a ripening piece of fruit to be plucked later.
I strain to look at my hands, bound behind me, but it’s no use. Nonetheless, the cord doesn’t bite. It doesn’t loosen either. Whoever tied it expected me to stay present, as if I could really go anywhere.
I’m sorting out what that means, when Armen reappears.
He doesn’t approach right away. He stops several feet away, just inside my peripheral vision, close enough that Iregister him without having to turn. The effect is immediate anyway. My spine tightens. My breath shallows. My body reacts before my mind catches up.
He speaks to someone else first, low, controlled instructions about placement and spacing. I don’t catch the words, but I catch the shape of them. Nothing wasted. No unnecessary emphasis.
Then his attention turns fully to me.
I lift my head slowly, refusing to rush it, refusing to look startled. He’s standing closer than before. Close enough that I can see the faint crease between his brows. He smells faintly of metal and sweat and something clean beneath it, soap, maybe. Or just discipline.
He’s so… solid.
Not imposing, exactly. Just steady. Almost safe, if I can say that about someone who is my captor. Like the kind of man who doesn’t need to raise his voice because everyone around him knows to listen.
He doesn’t touch me, at least not at first. “You’re favoring the knee,” he says calmly.
I blink. “It’s injured.”
“Yes.” His gaze flicks down, then back up. “You’re also holding your shoulders too tight.”
“That’s not an injury,” I say.
“No,” he agrees. “It’s a habit.”
I shake my head. “No. It’s a reaction.”
“To what?”
I look around to make my point. “This isn’t exactly the most normal place. You know, with restraints around my wrists and ankles. Whimpering women everywhere andbig, burly guys barking orders. If my posture is a little off, it’s no wonder.”
He steps closer and crouches in front of me, slow and deliberate. Not looming. Not crowding. Just close enough that the air between us changes somehow.
I know my breathing does.
His hands move automatically at first, reaching behind me for the binding at my wrists. I feel the brush of his fingers through the fabric of my shirt where it’s ridden up, the heat of his palm as he checks the knot. He doesn’t tighten it. He doesn’t loosen it either. His hands pause. The hesitation is subtle, but I feel it immediately. A fraction of a second where his grip adjusts, where the motion stops being purely procedural.
I look up at him. Really look.
He’s watching my posture. The way I’m holding myself upright despite the strain. The way my chin is lifted just a little too high, my shoulders drawn forward like armor. Of course, I’m uncomfortable. Everyone in this shithole of a shopping mall is uncomfortable.
