"Soul unqualified. Continue enduring."
Leonard blinked.
The message vanished.
Gone like a cruel joke whispered by the void and swallowed by the dark.
He stared at the blank wall of his cell. His breath came slow and shallow, blood crusting on his lip. Pain pulsed through every bone like his skeleton had been forged from broken glass. His thoughts sagged under the weight of exhaustion, betrayal, and something heavier than steel bars:
Hopelessness.
Soul unqualified.
He'd endured humiliation. Public ruin. Lies sharpened into daggers and fed to the world. What more did the universe want?
His fingers curled into fists. Not from rage but from emptiness too thick to hold any other shape.
Then
Jingle.
The sound of keys snapped him out of it.
A guard appeared, smirking. "You've got a visitor. Let's go, celeb."
Leonard didn't answer. He didn't resist. He let them drag him down gray corridors where the paint peeled like dead skin and the cameras watched with unblinking apathy.
Every step echoed the truth:
The world no longer saw a man.
Only a monster.
The visitation room reeked of stale sweat and shattered futures.
On the other side of the plexiglass sat Jayce.
Leonard froze.
Jayce?
He hadn't seen the guy in over a year not since Jayce landed his podcast deal and started circling Mira's influencer orbit like a parasite drawn to a richer host.
Jayce wore designer sunglasses indoors, sipping from a canned energy drink like this was brunch at a rooftop café. His phone rested on the table, angled up camera already recording.
Of course.
Jayce looked up, grinning. "Damn, Leo. You look like hell," he laughed. "I mean, really. Jailbird chic is not your look, bro."
Leonard didn't speak. Just stared. Like watching a wolf parade around in sheep's cologne.
Jayce chuckled. "Come on, man. Lighten up. You're trending worldwide. #DaneTheStain's at six million hits."
"Why are you here?" Leonard asked, voice flat as frost.
Jayce leaned forward, flashing his fake-white teeth. "Checking in on an old pal. Innocent until proven guilty, right?"
Leonard's eyes flicked to the phone. Red light. Recording. "Cut the shit. You came for content."
Jayce raised his hands mockingly. "Hey, relax. I'm just… concerned. This is big. People are watching."
"Do you think I did it?"
Jayce paused.
Too long.
Then shrugged. "Does it matter what I think?"
It did.
It really, really did.
Leonard leaned back, something sour bubbling in his stomach. "You told Melanie I'd be at the anniversary dinner," he whispered. "You were the only one who knew."
Jayce flinched. A flicker. Barely a breath. But it was there.
Then came the smirk. "Wow. Paranoia looks good on you, Leo. You should podcast about it."
Leonard stared through the glass not with anger, not with hatred.
With vacancy.
Jayce stood, sliding his phone into his jacket. "Well, good luck in court," he chirped. "Oh and try not to cry on camera. Makes it harder for the editor."
He left.
And just like that, Leonard was alone again.
Back in his cell, he didn't speak. Didn't move.
He sat in the corner, slumped like a forgotten statue, mind spiraling into places darker than night.
Then came the memories.
Uninvited. Unforgiving.
Five years ago.
The Dane family on their knees in his cramped apartment.
Priscilla sobbing.
Ernest wheezing, clutching his chest.
Mira back then a trembling girl with cracked nails and hope in her voice begging him.
"Please, Leonard. I'll do anything. Just marry me. Help us."
He had drained his dead mother's inheritance to save them.
Made calls. Pulled favors. Signed over assets under his name to keep Dane Corporation afloat through a fraud scandal so deep the sharks wouldn't touch it.
And then?
They rose.
And he vanished into the backdrop. Into silence. Into utility.
The convenient ghost.
The perfect scapegoat.
Until now.
"Dane."
A guard appeared at his door, tossing a thick envelope inside.
Leonard opened it with slow, blood-scabbed fingers.
Inside
Photos.
His favorite leather jacket. The wristwatch his mother gave him on his eighteenth birthday. His old vinyls. The painting Mira once begged him to keep.
All in a pile.
Burned.
Ashes and cinders, caught mid-frame.
At the bottom scrawled in Mira's distinct, dramatic handwriting:
Clean slates require fire.
There was more.
A screenshot.
Max. His childhood dog. The mutt that used to wait at the door every night when he came home. The only living thing that had ever loved him without condition.
Listed for sale.
On a butcher's site.
Leonard froze.
Then trembled.
Then collapsed into the mattress, hands over his face.
"No…"
That night, he lay on the thin bedding like a corpse waiting to forget its heartbeat.
He didn't cry.
He didn't scream.
He just breathed.
Shallow. Mechanical.
Like a man digging his own grave with every inhale.
What was left of him?
His name was viral filth.
His wife had burned his life to ash.
His dog was butchered like sport.
The system had told him he wasn't even worthy of judgment.
What was left?
Then
The lights flickered.
Once.
Twice.
A cold breath slithered through the air.
He sat up.
There just outside the bars stood something.
A shadow.
Tall. Motionless. Wearing a porcelain-white mask with no features no eyes, no mouth just blankness carved into void.
Leonard's heart thudded.
"Who the hell are you?" he whispered.
The figure didn't move.
Then, a voice deep, slow, and genderless drifted through the bars like cold smoke.
"If you survive the next three betrayals… power will come to you."
Leonard froze.
"What… what does that mean?"
No answer.
The figure was gone.
No footsteps. No door creak. Just
Gone.
Leonard stood.
Slowly. Unsteadily.
Fists clenched.
Three more betrayals?
He should've broken.
Should've collapsed.
But something shifted.
Not rage.
Not grief.
Conviction.
Something colder than revenge.
Something ancient and quiet.
Because now finally he understood:
This wasn't the end.
It was the beginning.
They hadn't destroyed him.
They'd unlocked him.