A vast, quiet garden opens around me, filled with flowers and fruit trees. The colors are vivid, almost too vivid. The air is soft and steady. I walk for a long time with no goal, too young to look for anything, and time seems not to exist here. My gaze finally stops on a yellow chrysalis hanging from a branch. I step closer and touch it with my fingertips. It’s warm, faintly alive under my skin.

  A voice rises behind me. I don’t need to turn. I recognize the presence before the words. My mother.

  "Heyo, do you know the story of the three caterpillars?"

  I shake my head.

  "No, Mom."

  I hear her smile.

  "What you’re looking at is the second caterpillar. The yellow chrysalis."

  She pauses.

  "When it was still a caterpillar, it wanted every object in the world. It collected them, kept them close, refused to let them go."

  I stare at the chrysalis without moving.

  "The gods watched it. So they gave it what it desired."

  Her voice stays calm.

  "It became a golden chrysalis. Every object in the world was sealed inside its cocoon. It was happy. For it, that form was perfect."

  My child’s voice answers at once, simple and whole.

  "That’s incredible. I want to keep everything too. That way I’ll be free. And I’ll give you anything you want, Mom."

  The sentence hangs there. I’ll be free. By owning everything. In that moment, it feels obvious. The garden dissolves without transition. The colors withdraw. The air disappears. I want to stay, but the world doesn’t give me time.

  "Mom!"

  I jolt awake and fall out of bed. Air leaves me for a second. My chest rises too fast. Water runs down my cheeks before I understand why. I drag a hand across my face. It trembles.

  It wasn’t a simple dream. Something shifted inside me. The images keep stacking in my head, as if something has refused to be silent since the awakening of my Mots. They don’t fade. They press in, heavy and persistent, until an obvious truth forms slowly, without anger, without panic.

  I’m a prisoner.

  The thought meets no resistance. Nothing in me fights it. That’s the worst part. And that garden, why is it the only image I still have of her?

  A brutal sound cuts through my ears, too close, too sharp.

  "Up."

  The voice drops without preamble. Authoritative. Not a trace of patience.

  I groan, still half elsewhere. My throat is dry, my muscles numb.

  "Not now…"

  The answer is immediate, harsher.

  "This isn’t a hotel. Up."

  I don’t move. My body is too slow to obey, and more than that, they’re afraid of me. No one is coming in here to drag me out by force.

  Then another voice speaks, lower. I recognize it instantly.

  "Up."

  This time, my body reacts before my mind.

  The door opens without a sound. Norman steps into the cell, gaze fixed, silent. A precise kick lands in my ribs. Not hard enough to injure. Just hard enough to rip the rest of sleep out of me.

  He stands over me, perfectly steady.

  "This is the last time I come to get you."

  This story originates from a different website. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  I sit up slowly, one hand to my still-heavy head.

  "Yes."

  I don’t have time to add anything. Hands seize me. Noise-canceling headphones are pressed over my ears, then a blindfold over my eyes. The world vanishes in one stroke. Only my steps remain, guided mechanically. My body moves out of habit, not choice.

  Everything stops. The headphones come off. The blindfold drops. Light hits me full-force. My eyes burn for a second before they adapt.

  The Colosseum is there. Cold. Empty. Unchanged. Valie is already in the stands, still, tablet in hand. She writes before anything even begins. Her gaze, purely analytical, never leaves us. Norman faces me and adjusts his stance without a word. I haven’t fully recovered. My muscles still pull. My breathing stays short. But it’s enough. I clench my fists. This time, I refuse to endure.

  Norman inclines his head slightly.

  "Go."

  I raise my guard. Sand grinds under our steps as we close in. Norman strikes first. His fist slips through my defense and hits my face before I can react. My head snaps to the side and I take two steps back to absorb it.

  "Hands up."

  No raised voice. Just fact.

  I reset my footing. My jaw tightens. I attack. He dodges without effort and counters instantly. A dry straight. My vision wavers for a second, then locks back in. The tension rises.

  I retreat just enough to regain control. I adjust my breathing and let the energy move through my body without forcing it, without trying to spill it out. Norman is already on me. He chains fast. I slip aside at the last moment. My legs respond better than earlier. My reflexes are cleaner.

  I counter with a right. He avoids it and follows with a kick. I lift my guard in time and step back.

  "Better."

  He accelerates and targets my stomach. I don’t evade fully. The hit gets through. Air compresses in my lungs, but I hold and fire back immediately. He barely slips it. Something has changed. I don’t hit harder. I’m not faster. But my body answers differently. More stable. More alert. I don’t back away on instinct anymore. I close the distance. My breathing holds. I read his intent, not with my eyes, with my body. A tightness before each strike. A shift so small it’s almost nothing.

  One more step. This time, I could touch him.

  Training continues like that, in a chain of dry, repeated exchanges. No useless pauses. No release. Norman adjusts constantly, corrects an angle, a stance, a timing, always with the same cold precision. His remarks are brief, almost mechanical. He never raises his voice, never gets irritated, never praises. He observes. He corrects. He repeats

  I don’t land a clean hit. But I stay standing to the end.

  When it stops, Valie finally lifts her eyes from her tablet. Her finger freezes for a second on the screen, then moves again.

  "Sufficient progress."

  "Insufficient combat capacity."

  She scrolls data without looking up.

  "Celia will inspect your sealing."

  "Wait here."

  "Prepare for the next training."

  It’s simple. I’m not ready.

  Celia arrives a few minutes later. Impeccable outfit. Hair tied with care. Glasses perfectly straight. She looks at me in silence for a few seconds, as if weighing something I can’t see.

  She hands me headphones and a blindfold.

  "Put these on. Blindfold yourself."

  Her voice stays calm.

  "Some information isn’t accessible to you yet."

  I obey without arguing. The world cuts out again. The headphones swallow everything. The blindfold eats the light. I walk slowly, guided by her close presence. I don’t know how much time passes. The ground changes under my feet. Softer. The air grows warmer, more humid.

  She stops.

  The blindfold comes off, then the headphones. Light hits hard, bright and direct. I blink before I understand where we are. Around us, glass walls rise to the ceiling and let sunlight flood the space without obstacle.

  A garden.

  Trees of different sizes and colors stretch around us. Flowers cover the ground and climb the structures. A stream winds through the vegetation, and farther out a small waterfall spills down in a steady murmur.

  Without deciding it, my body loosens.

  "Where are we?"

  Celia folds her hands behind her back.

  "A garden in HQ."

  "We’re still inside the building?"

  "Yes. Just somewhere else."

  I take a slow breath. The air is clean, fresh, almost too pleasant after the cell and the Colosseum.

  "It’s beautiful."

  She nods slightly. Her expression softens, almost sincere. Her shoulders drop by a fraction, as if the place affects her too.

  "I agree. I like working here. It’s peaceful."

  Her gaze drifts across the trees and filtered light, then returns to me.

  "With a bit of luck, we’ll run into its creator."

  Something shifts in her face, almost imperceptible. Chin lifts. Focus tightens.

  "But for now, I need to check your sealing."

  We walk through dense, soft grass. I sit where she tells me to. My shoulders drop again. For the first time in a long time, I don’t feel threatened.

  And yet, when Celia kneels in front of me, I notice something tiny. Her breathing is slower than usual. Her fingers hesitate for a fraction of a second before she activates her Mots, as if she isn’t evaluating a phenomenon, but a risk.A tension rises for no clear reason. My body closes a little. Like it’s bracing for something I still don’t understand.