#solitary confinement mention

[trans-axolotl]

working on this essay about solitary confinement i think i would like to submit it for publishing somewhere but i don't know how to do that 👍

[lokiinmediasideblog]

Has anyone ever talked about how fucked up the constant brightness in Asgard's dungeons is? It's a form of torture. It keeps prisoners agitated and affects sleep patterns.

[turtleblogatlast]

Hi again, it's that person who sent you a paragraph of random questions, here with another paragraph of questions. Sorry about this, but my brain is now in overdrive thinking about implications and scenarios.

How exactly does the krang calling work? Can anyone just pick up the sword and talk to the krang? Does the krang ever initiate conversation? Can he? I can totally imagine both of them just randomly whispering "ᵇⁱᵗᶜʰ" just whenever. Would leo ever drunk call the Krang? What about butt dial him? Can the krang hear other stuff going on in the background, or is it just leos voice? Is this a controllable and togglable thing, or can the krang hear all the time?

Mmmm it's fun theorizing. Thank you for putting up with my rambling if you deside to respond :)

[ cw: death mention / trauma mention / abuse implied / solidarity confinement mention / ]

Sorry again for the late reply!

For Krang calling - it’s gotta be Leo specifically who does it, as the sword left behind is his soul. So the Krang cannot imitate conversation, and neither can anyone else but Leo. And Leo- he has a lot of untapped trauma in regard to the Krang, as the Krang is the cause of so much suffering for both him and his family, and has also literally killed him many, many times - but, the Krang was also the only person he had to talk to for years. Those few moments of peace meant everything to Leo, and it’s not easy to just overlook that. It’s also not easy for him to leave someone who he kinda looks at as occasionally being there for him in an eternal solitary confinement. He knows firsthand how awful it is, and it makes him sick to do it even to his greatest enemy.

So, he calls the Krang. And he never stops doing so. Their conversations vary wildly in length and tone, most of the time it’s bitter and exceedingly harsh on the Krang’s side (and sometimes Leo’s) but Leo can’t bring himself to stop calling.

Just as the Krang won’t stop answering.

(And yes, all he hears is Leo’s voice, and only when Leo imbues his sword with power.)

[little-peril-stories]

Febuwhump Day 2 - Solitary Confinement

From Man of Letters:

All the scholar could hear was his own ragged breath. The panicked rasping. The frantic gasp of each intake of air as he tried desperately to regain his senses.

Dead. He’s dead.

They’d thrown him inside, heedless of how his sight failed him and his feet stumbled and scrabbled beneath him. Now he lay motionless, tasting blood, pretending that this was all part of his plan. He didn’t move from where he’d fallen.

He’s dead, and I killed him.

He couldn’t move. He barely wanted to. The deed was done; the choice was made. There was no running, not for him. Not anymore.

The room was quiet, but it was distinctly unlike the soothing peace of the library where he had spent so many hours of his life. This—this was an ominous quiet, heavy with dread, slippery with promise. The promise—and memory—of death.

Leave him in there, they’d said, until the prince arrives.

The thud of a body striking rough stone rang in his ears. It was only once he was already prone—still reeling from the impact—that the scholar realized it had been his own weary, grief-stricken bones and his own torn skin scraping against the floor.

Let the prince decide what to do with the bastard.

[thefruitthatgodforgot]

The way they treat the sources in lockwood and co is crazy, like I know that they don't really understand the Problem or what ghosts are exactly but you're telling me that no one is worried they might be trapped/suffering human souls or whatever?

And then they just keep the sources as keepsakes instead of destroying them or trying to help the ghost at all? Their world was identical to ours before like the 50s afaik so they probably have a lot of the same old ghost stories as we do right? And it seemed like killing Fairfax got rid of Annie Ward's ghost so at least some of them have finishable business.

Also the ethical implications of taking an object that may contain the conscious soul of a human being and sealing it in a glass box forever are crazy? Is no one worried about this? The skull seems like it's fully conscious all the time. Lucy can talk to it during the day and it trues to talk even when they have it on mute and no one is even like "hey, sorry you've been trapped in that jar for decades completely cut off from the world with very little hope of ever again coming in to contact with a person you can actually communicate with. That really sucks."

I'm only on book two, so maybe this will come up eventually? -What if agents are just ghost cops and the ghosts are being like,, oppressed. That could be an interesting avenue to explore I suppose.

Perhaps I'm doing an autistic hyperempathy thing and that's why I feel so bad for the ghosts? I don't think so though??? I know there are people who like,, worship the ghosts and think they should be allowed to stick around but surely there are also people that are like, "we should help these people trapped in horrible limbo truely die so they can finally know peace"

My edible hit halfway through this post and I fear I have not expressed myself very cogently or even coherently.

Oh well

I am enjoying these books for the record

[thisbrilliantsky]

brought to you by madeline's song while she's in solitary confinement in the illegal lace factory being stuck in my head at 5am

[kybercrystals94]

Roaring Silence

Read here on Ao3!

Febuwhump 2024 | Day 2 | Prompt 2: Solitary Confinement

Rated: G

Words: 180

Summary: Omega faces a test. (Character Focus: Omega)

“I don’t like this test,” Omega says quietly, stopping short of the door, resisting the hand that presses against her back between her shoulder blades.

“Growth is rarely comfortable, Omega,” Nala Se says. “It is only forty-eight standard hours. You will be fine.”

Omega can’t seem to make herself move, staring at the windowless door to the windowless room. She has grown to dread it with a deep seeded fear she cannot quite grasp. Omega stumbles when Nala Se gives her a firm push, but the Kaminoan’s hand moves to grip Omega’s shoulder, keeping her upright.

“What does it do?” Omega asks, stalling. “What does this test prove?”

“That is classified,” Nala Se tells her.

Another push, and the door slides open with an airy swish of movement. Another push, and Omega is standing inside.

“I don’t want to do this,” Omega pleads, spinning around to face the scientist. “Don’t make me do this, please?”

Nala Se blinks. “It will be over soon,” she replies, and the door closes with silent finality.

Omega is left alone with the roaring silence.

END

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[shadowsrulemymind]

How the Prison Realm is a worse solitary confinement and what that means for Gojo Satoru:

With Gege stating that they hope to end the series this year and Gojo possibly being released from the Prison Realm very soon, I decided that it was time to write about my favorite theory for the series, especially since I haven't seen anyone else make a full documentation about it.

Content Warning! This theory will discuss in depth about horrific prison conditions, torture, suicide, self-harm, and severe mental health problems.

Spoilers for the manga up to Chapter 213.

To start off I HIGHLY recommend reading This post explaining the theory about Gojo’s left eye! Its very interesting and some of its concepts overlap with this theory. 

What exactly is solitary confinement?

Solitary confinement (SC) is a method used in prisons to punish disobedient/dangerous inmates. SC is carried out by isolating the inmate within a small room that's typically 6x9 ft. The cells may or may not have windows to see out of, have just enough room to contain a bed and a toilet with little space to walk around in, have blank walls, and little to no way to tell the time. Inmates are typically kept within the cells for 22-24 hours a day for however long the prison deems necessary. This can span from a couple of days to years.

The only contact inmates typically receive when held within a SC cell is restricted to the prison guards that give them food through a smaller door built into the steel door that keeps them trapped.

SC’s conditions have SEVERE effects on both mental health and physical health.

The psychological effects of SC are as follows:

Anxiety / Paranoia / Obsessive thoughts

Aggression / Decline in impulse control

Depression / PTSD

Insomnia / Loss of Identity

Cognitive disturbances / Psychosis

Losing touch with reality 

Increase risk of Self-harm and suicide

Hypersensitivity

The physical effects are as follows:

The shrinking of the hippocampus / Surges in the amygdala

Slowed brain activity / Worsening of intellect

Social Pain (Body translates this into physical pain)

Worsening of perceptual motor skills

Fewer/smaller/decreased connections of neurons

Fewer blood vessels in the brain

Hypertension / Increased heart rate / Shaking

Muscle atrophy / degradation of eyesight

Weakness / Loss of weight

To put it simply SC is designed to break its prisoners. Many of those who have been through SC have stated they would injure themselves to remind themselves that they are still real or even to force guards to enter the cells so that they could have a shred of human contact, even if it means being beaten by the guards and obtaining a longer sentence. Those who have gotten out have said the effects are long term and they have become afraid of being in open spaces or afraid of interacting with people. 

There is no benefit to SC, it makes violent inmates worse and non-violent inmates can become aggressive.

Many inmates commit suicide within SC or eventually do so after release due to the resulting mental health issues. The United Nations declared SC for more than 15 consecutive days to be torture.

Now that you know what the conditions/effects of SC are, lets take a look at how that relates to the Prison Realm (PR).

We only have a single image of what the inside of the PR looks like.

And just by this singular image you can immediately find similarities between the PR and SC:

Little to no room- While SC gives you at least a little room to walk around, the PR seems to have ZERO room for its inmate to move around in. Seemingly it contains its inmate within the dimensions of that persons body.

Complete isolation- The PR is a pocket dimension designed to completely separate its inmate from the rest of the world with absolutely no contact with the outside world or any other living beings.

No way to tell the time- Gojo states that time doesn't pass within the PR which means he will have no way of knowing how many hours, days or even years have passed while he’s contained within. 

Kenjaku even tells us that like SC the PR can only contain a single inmate and that the only ways out of it is either by being released intentionally or by suicide. Considering the current known similarities its no wonder Jogo states that the PR is taboo.

There's also symbolism that implies that Gojo wont be coming out of the PR the same as when he entered it.

As an artist I can tell you that blotting out the face the way that the PR does to Gojo’s before his capture is something we use often to symbolize a few things. Its been used to show that someone is inauthentic (eyes are the window of the soul) and/or that that person is corrupted. 

Trains are also a symbolism here since they can represent change and a transitional period. 

One thing that I think shows that the PR has some sort of effect on its inmate is the fact that Kenjaku wants to one day release Gojo from it. Its become obvious that Kenjaku does everything simply due to scientific curiosity and I believe that this is no exception to that. If the PR does effect Gojo, Kenjaku would ABSOLUTLY want to release him to observe its effects.

And if the PR effects Gojo the same way as SC would than it will be catastrophic.

Gojo has already shown signs of mental instability throughout the series. He’s unhinged when taking a fight seriously and seemingly had a manic episode during his rematch with Toji.

And after he kills Toji, when Geto finally arrives he seems to have started dissociating. Which he relies on Geto to help guide him and make the right choices.

Gojo has also shown multiple times that he wants to simply kill all the higher ups and be done with them all. 

Jujutsu Kaisen has had many moments that discuss mental health, whether that be during Geto’s downfall, Yuta stating he attempted suicide or Yuji’s current declining mental health and willingness to die. Gege knows what he’s talking about and its abundantly clear that the PR is based off of SC. 

This means Gojo is undoubtedly going to have serious issues when he’s finally released from the PR. 

He’ll be more aggressive than ever, his impulse control will be fucked, he might come out of there hallucinating and unable to even tell what’s real. Which if all of this is the case there is NO chance that the higher ups wont be slaughtered. He already wanted to kill them before and now that most of his friends are dead, his students are mutilated, the higher ups have exiled him and finally him losing the two children its implied that he raised? I can’t imagine he won’t finally snap. 

We’ve seen what happens to those jujutsu society deems worthless from both Maki and Toji. Maki murdered her entire clan and Toji became an unstable mess. It won’t be surprising if we will finally get to see what happens when they put ALL the expectations on someone. When they demand perfection. 

Gojo has been able to pick himself back up every time something has gone wrong, but I don’t think he will be able to do that this time. 

The higher ups at the very least will die, that I’m sure of; However, I think Gojo might take down both the Kamo and Gojo clan too. If he’s in such an unstable state he might just say ‘fuck it’ and kill everyone who had a hand in keeping their society the way it is. 

Gojo has now been in the PR for 16 days. This exceeds the UNs limit of 15 days for being held in SC. 

Another thing that I’ve begun to theorize while writing this is that it’s possible that with Gojo unable to tell how long its been inside the PR, what if the real world time he’s been imprisoned (3 years, 4 weeks) is how long he thinks he’s been imprisoned? Not sure if that will hold any weight but it’s definitely an interesting idea.

Edit: So a recent Q&A happened and...

This basically confirms everything that I said.

https://twitter.com/jacixn/status/1629947429901541377?t=dyu81gFSJzdZuGxefmQBAQ&s=19

[webfruit-sys]

School Seclusion Rooms (and solitary confinement in general) should be banned as they are merely a tool of oppression to the undesirable mentally ill children that attend the schools.

I don't have the words to talk about the horrors I've experienced and witnessed but when I find them I will use them cause I will not stand for the bullshit they put us through

[wormsin]

whumptober 2023 - Bruce & Dick

No. 3: “Like crying out in empty rooms; with no-one there except the moon.”

Journal | Solitary Confinement | “Make it stop.”

<<first | <last | master | next>

Fuck this box.

Fuck this box fuck this box fuck this fucking box.

Enough. Don’t get frustrated. Where was he?

The rugged Pyrrhus, he whose sable arms,

Black as his purpose, did the night resemble

When he lay couched in the ominous horse

Hath now this dread and black complexion smear’d

With heraldry more dismal…

Dick’s head is splitting. His throat is scratched dry from dehydration, and his every muscle feels cramped. The box isn’t even long enough for him to stretch his legs fully. No light. No sound besides his own breathing. No idea how long it’s been. Not more than four days, or he'd be dead.

But it’s been long enough for him to start hallucinating.

Which makes reciting Hamlet a decidedly less sane way to pass the time. Hamlet is now Jason, who has started to add his literary commentary on the play. Polonius is Tim for some reason, and Rosencrantz, Guildenstern, and Ophelia are played by the Joker. Who keeps veering off script. And then there are ghosts, bats and owls. Corpses in costumes.

Dick isn’t afraid of hallucinations. His fear response is just—not really there. Replaced by thrills. The wind around his body. But losing control of his mind is painful, thoughts ricocheting in his aching skull.

Enough Hamlet. He starts reciting the New Encyclopedia Britannica. That was the version in the Manor library. A-ak. Ancient East Asian music. A capella. Italian: “in the church style”…

He hates being confined. Absolutely hates it. But he can’t give in.

To the south of A-ch’eng are the remains of an ancient walled city known as Pai-ch’eng…

—

Getting out of the box is almost worse than being in it. Because Dick’s body is sore and barely responsive, and the lights and sounds are excruciating. He drags himself up over the opening of his coffin—not coffin—but it’s so much. Too much. Just get out, Chum. Hands shaking. Dick keeps his eyes firmly shut and forces himself up out of the box and onto the floor of his cell, where he lies and covers his eyes.

“Activity, in radioactive-decay process, the number of disintegrations per second, or the number of unstable atomic nuclei that decay per second in a given sample," he mumbles. Bruce must still be in his own confinement; Dick can't hear him, feel his presence.

The stranger pushes him onto his back with a booted foot. Steps on his chest. Dick can’t open his eyes yet. “The Starcore, Nightwing.”

“Activity is determined by counting, with the aid of radiation detectors and electronic circuits…”

“Sounds like you want more time in the box.”

Dick smirks. “I have a lot of encyclopedia left. We haven’t even reached the ADs. Pretty sure I can outlast you, here.”

The stranger tilts their helmeted head, considering. “Then let’s try something else.”

[trans-axolotl]

thinking a lot today about protest and resistance while in solitary confinement. or while incarcerated (and/or institutionalized) more broadly. reading a lot of writing from incarcerated writers and through the prison journalism project and rereading sick woman theory by Johanna Hedva and just thinking about the quote "Sick Woman Theory is an insistence that most modes of political protest are internalized, lived, embodied, suffering, and no doubt invisible" (Hedva, 5). and thinking about what it means to resist when all that is left to you is your body, a room, and time--how do you fight back? what options are left to you? what ways is your resistance legible, who is the audience to your resistance and does it still matter if no one ever sees? (yes, i think--i remember hours spent in restraint because i had hugged a friend and i keep thinking about the concept that protest is disruption, a refusal to allow business to keep happening as usual, and what that means about making cruelty visible by refusing to participate in that normalization. even as i was taken away, removed, made invisible--does that removal make my absence louder?)

thinking about the ways self destruction is used as protest when you have no other options--hunger strikes perhaps the most familiar iteration of this. what gets labeled as "symptom" and what is recognized as resistance varies by person by context by environment. thinking about how almost everyone i know who's been in solitary confinement started self harming eventually. what need does that meet? when all options for autonomy, privacy, and interaction is taken away, how do we meet those needs ourselves? i think a lot about survival, and remember YWEP's concept of self harm as resilience, and think a lot about what it means to keep yourself alive when all you have is your body and your mind and an empty room and time. what things become more important than physical pain? how might physical pain become important? how does our relationship between our body and harm change in that environment? how do you stay sane in solitary confinement, or maybe more importantly, how do you go insane in a way that hurts you less? what does sanity even mean when you have been placed in an unlivable environment? is resistance a basic need we need to meet when we are placed in such a hostile environment? how did i survive & how are my friends currently surviving & how many more people will i have to lose who were killed that way before this fucking ends?

[welcometoteyvat]

waterborne poetry you will always be famous

[painsandconfusion]

Like Crying Out in Empty Rooms, With No One There Except the Moon

Whumptober Third

[Journal | Solitary Confinement | “Make it stop.”] (tw: murder mention, unrealistic prison, obsession)

[Whumptober Masterpost]

“Hey...Rucker?”

Jade let his head lul against the wall, eyes pointing up to the cement between their cells. “Yea?”

“..you killed someone, right?”

He sighs, closing his book. “That’s kinda what you gotta do to get in here, yeah.” Not proud of it. Not a fan of talking about it. 

The other side was silent for a few seconds. 

Jade raised a brow. “...is that the end of the conversation, orrrr…?”

“..no,” a response finally echoed. “I’m just..just wondering.”

“Wondering what?”

“If…you could ever make it stop..?”

Jade blinked a few times, sitting up a little straighter. “Make what stop?”

He could practically feel the tension through the wall as his ‘solitary buddy’ (odd term, he knows) tried to pick their words. “..the….the impulses…obsessions....y’know-?”

Jade was frowning now. Book opening again. “Don’t have those. Just got real mad one time. Don’t ‘xpect it to happen again.” 

“.......oh.”

Jade didn’t respond, just getting back to his reading.

It was hours later that the other -Wilson, was it..?- was taken back to the normal block. The guard opened Jade’s door a few minutes after. “Guy left his book. You want it?”

Aaaaand Jade perked up again. He tossed ‘Alice in Wonderland’ aside. Desperate to read literally anything new. “Yeah definitely, thanks-”

The guard hummed a response and tossed the new book in before locking back up. 

Jade scooped the new book back up, taking a moment to stretch, groaning as blood moved into his apparently-sleeping feet. Pacing the small room as he opened the cover. 

He blinked, eyes catching on ink that was scribbled between each line.

Every line.

Every page.

Every square inch of available space inside the covers and along the margins and even inside the bend of the spine.

Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker Rucker (…)

Thanks @whumptober for hosting this event!

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As always, lmk if you want to be added or removed from any tag lists!

[turtleblogatlast]

I totally get why he still keeps in contact with the krang- While we do compare this to roommates it's more like being in solitary confinement roommates. You can't leave the house, you can run in any direction and nothing will be in front of you or behind you. In this confusing place you have two options: Being alone with yourself, or being alone with the person you hate the most. As someone who has had crippling loneliness, and chosen to go and find someone who hated me just to have someone around? I understand why he keeps coming back.

I just hope he'll slowly drop him.

[ cw: abuse mention / toxic relationship mention / solitary confinement mention / death mention / ]

Solitary confinement roommates really is probably one of the best ways to describe these two.

And yeah, you hit it right on the head as to why Leo continuously keeps contact with Krang One. There’s another reason too, that being Leo, for all that he hates the Krang, feels sick thinking of willingly putting someone else through the same thing he went through.

Solitary is horrifying, and Leo wasn’t lying when he said that he was happier to be beaten and killed by the Krang rather than exist in a void of empty nothing, all alone. So the idea that he is the Krang’s last source of contact with the outside world is a horrific one, because it means that cutting himself off from this horrible, abusive monster would make him responsible for the torturous experience of solitude the Krang would then go through.

Obviously he is not responsible for this, and he owes the Krang nothing. But, he can’t help but feel this way, and mixed with his only good times in that place being of when they talked with each other…yeah it’s conflicting, to say the least.

The good news is that, yes, paths A and C eventually stop contact with the Krang…in their own ways…

[little-peril-stories]

Whumptober 2023, Day 3 & 4: Solitary confinement, shock

Whumptober 2023 Masterlist

Read at your own risk! They're only snippets of a larger story, with no resolution that will be posted online anytime soon; they are being posted out of order; and the characters don't have names. Enjoy!

Contents: blood (barely), guilt, arrested, fear, angst (a lot—what else is new?)

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Word count: 600 || Approx reading time: 3 mins

Solitary Confinement

Teaser: There was no running, not for him. Not anymore.

"They'll kill me if I'm lucky / They'll torture me if not"

All the scholar could hear was his own rapid, fraying breath.

The panicked rasping.

The frantic gasp of each intake of air as he tried desperately to regain his senses.

Dead. He’s dead.

They’d thrown him inside, heedless of how his sight failed him and his feet stumbled and scrabbled beneath him. Now he lay motionless, tasting blood, pretending that this was all part of his plan. He didn’t move from where he’d fallen.

He’s dead, and I killed him.

He couldn’t move. He barely wanted to. The deed was done; the choice was made.

I’ll distract him, he’d promised.

He’d known what he was sacrificing when he walked into their midst.

Now. Run. Please.

There was no running, not for him. Not anymore.

The room was quiet, but it was distinctly unlike the soothing peace of the library where he had spent so many hours of his life. This—this was an ominous quiet, heavy with dread, slippery with promise. The promise—and memory—of death.

Leave him in there, they’d said, until the prince arrives.

The thud of a body striking rough stone rang in his ears. It was only once he was already prone—still reeling from the impact—that the scholar realized it had been his own weary, grief-stricken bones and his own torn skin scraping against the floor.

Let the prince decide what to do with the bastard.

The scholar’s wrists stung, unused to anything harsher than the silk of his shirtsleeves. He wore metal bands now, heavy and pinching and dark, suppressing what little magic he possessed—the only weapon, truly, he had to wield. Snuffed out, as much a prisoner as he.

Magic he’d used to kill a man.

Dead. The word repeated in his mind. The commander was dead, and soon, the scholar would be, too.

Quiet.

So quiet.

Too quiet.

He loved such stillness, usually—relished it. Most of the time, it meant solitude. Solace. The tender whispers of turning pages, muffled footsteps, and contented sighs.

Today, it meant something else:

Death.

He hadn’t meant to.

But he had.

I chose this.

He’d chosen her.

Soon the prince would arrive to decide his fate. He would know what his old tutor had done. He would pass judgment and, in all likelihood, sentence him to death.

I didn’t mean to.

The scholar had written the end of his own story, or rather, he had tried. He could never have imagined that this was where his life would lead him—to an empty, airless holding room, mere corridors from the dungeon cells that would no doubt become his tomb. And what for?

I did it for her.

If he closed his eyes, he could feel the ghost of her hands in his.

Don’t get hurt, she’d said. A promise he’d known—even as he agreed—he could not keep. He wondered what she would say if she could see him now. If she—more full of fight than he had ever been—would rage and rail to see him prostrate and shaking. Or if, instead, she would merely weep.

Get up, she would urge. Please.

The barest sliver of him wished his cruel, craven mind—soaked with pain and fear and shock and terror—would let him be, that his conscience would simply rest. He almost—almost—wished her voice would just stop.

But if it did, he would be left with the emptiness and silence of the room, and in a sea of fear and foreboding, he would drown.

If it did, the scholar knew, he would never again hear her voice, out loud or in his head, so when death came for him, he would be nothing more than a wretched husk of a man, despised and heartbroken and alone.

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[erikahenningsen]

Nobody prepares you for the things that get dropped on your desk when you work in government