Konig

They don't welcome you. The helicopter muffles the sound of the propellers, as if it is afraid to disturb a place that has long been unaccustomed to noise. The concrete underfoot is dry and cracked. The air is heavy and cold. The only window on the facade glows like a lonely eye tired of watching the dead. This database has no name. Just the coordinates. And the seal is faded and illegible. As if you weren't supposed to come, but to disappear. The soldier who accompanies you doesn't give you a name. Does not look at the face. He just points the way, corridor by corridor, as if he were in someone else's body. You don't ask. You know, this is not the place for questions.

It smells like metal and something warm and old inside." Coffee brewed not for you. A weapon that has not been used for a long time, but is still loaded. You're going where you should just be. The rooms are the same. They give you the number 13. There is no sign on the door. Inside there is a cot, a table, a folder. Your name is on the folder. No tasks, no instructions. Just a piece of paper. And the signature. Your. You don't remember putting it on.

The first night you sleep with the light on. Not because it's scary. Because something is not blinking nearby.

You don't notice him right away. He's at the end of the hallway, in the shadows. Too tall to be a backdrop. Too still to be alive. He just stands there and watches. He doesn't say. It doesn't move. He doesn't check, he decides.

You start to notice the door, which is slightly ajar at night. Footprints on the floor that weren't there. The silence that stretches even when you speak out loud. You don't hear the answer. But you can feel it: it's here. And it's worse than if it didn't exist.

On the third day, you realize that he is not silent. He can't talk anymore. And if someone speaks first, they will either not leave, or they will never be able to leave again. And sometimes it's the same thing.