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I WALK BEHIND CASTLE, every step echoing off the cold, metallic walls.
The hallway stretches out, its stark whiteness making everything feel clinical, impersonal—just like the world I'm stepping into.
I don't want to trust anyone here. Especially not him. But there's something unsettlingly disarming about Castle, something that keeps pulling at me, making it harder to keep my guard up.
It's not just his calm demeanour, though that's unnerving enough. It's the way he watches me, like he's studying me in a way I can't quite grasp.
We stop in front of a door, and Castle opens it, gesturing for me to enter.
The room inside is minimalist, modern—almost too perfect. The kind of sterile, calculated space that feels as if it belongs to someone who controls everything around them.
I don't want to sit across from him, but I do, trying to keep my hands still in my lap, as if the trembling inside me doesn't exist.
Castle moves to sit behind the desk. He's still watching me, like he's waiting for me to crack, or maybe hoping I'll give him some sign. I don't. I keep my face neutral, but the fluttering in my chest won't stop.
"How are you settling in?" His voice is calm, polite, almost gentle.
It doesn't make me feel at ease. If anything, it makes me more wary. I want to answer with a sharp remark, but I settle for the truth, as vague as it is.
"I'm fine," I say, my voice sounding hollow even to my own ears.
He tilts his head, as if studying the way, I said it.
There's a brief silence before he nods and reaches for the console behind him, pressing a button. The lights dim slightly as a large screen on the wall flickers to life.
I don't know what I expected, but the footage that appears is not it.
It's the parking garage from earlier, but distorted. Blurry. The grainy video quality makes it hard to see clearly at first. I see myself and Juliette, we're talking.
I freeze.
The footage shows the four people storming into the room, I step into the deepest shadows in the corner, and then I vanish. I fade completely into nothing. Like the shadows swallowed me as a whole.
"Wait—what?" My voice cracks as I try to process what I'm seeing.
I watch, stunned, as my body flickers in and out of view like some kind of optical illusion. The shadows bend around me, swallowing me whole.
Castle watches my reaction carefully but says nothing, letting the footage play out in silence.
I want to look away, but I can't. My breath quickens as I watch myself disappear again. The shadows stretch and warp as I slip deeper into them. It's not just that I'm hiding—I am the shadows. And I don't know how or why.
