Halls still hum. They should not. This was a corridor with a name on the door. Now the name sits a degree off the paint. Rusted valley through a window that does not face out. Drowned steel where the lot used to be. A town that forgot how to be quiet keeps practicing on the next street. I gave the arm they asked for. It came back with a different owner. I keep it because it keeps me moving. Stone turns to glass for a breath. A shape on the other side learns my pace and does not know I learned it first. Slightly wrong — the face, the floor, the hum in the wall. Slightly wrong — our shape worn a degree off true. Slightly wrong — the deeper I take, the more it wants back. Slightly wrong — and I am still in it. One heartbeat on the map. Then none. I read the silence the way I used to read weather. Distant burst. Not mine. Corner. The head meets the shot before the face finishes turning. Almost human. Almost enough to hesitate. I do not. WASTE THE FALLEN. Slightly wrong — the face, the floor, the hum in the wall. Slightly wrong — our shape worn a degree off true. Slightly wrong — the deeper I take, the more it wants back. Slightly wrong — and I am still in it. The arm opens the way a wound opens. What should have taken a magazine learns the floor. I keep moving. Designs that do not belong to daylight go down if I do not stand still. It looks through the place I left empty. It hits through the place I left empty. Hands full. Mind almost intact. The door is the only true thing in the zone and even that sits a little off the frame. Slightly wrong — the face, the floor, the haul on my back. Slightly wrong — the arm that brought me to the door. Slightly wrong — I take what is theirs Then leave through the Door.
