The guards appeared without sound.
One moment Caleb was pressing the knife deeper into Ellen's throat, savoring her whimpers. The next, massive hands clamped onto his wrists with crushing force.
He spun, snarling, the knife lashing out toward whoever dared interrupt his kill.
The blade stopped mid-swing. Simply stopped, as if it had hit a wall.
The guard holding his wrist was enormous. Seven feet tall, built like a walking fortress, wearing a seamless black uniform that covered everything except his face. And his face was the worst part: perfectly human, perfectly proportioned, but completely expressionless. Like a mannequin given life.
"Violation of Rest Area Protocol: Physical violence against participants," the guard said. His voice was flat, mechanical, completely without inflection. "Mandatory isolation period: twenty-four hours."
Caleb tried to wrench free. The guard's grip didn't budge. It was like trying to move a mountain.
"Let me go," Caleb growled. The hunger was still burning in his veins, the whispers still urging him to finish what he'd started.
A second guard materialized behind Ellen and Soren, identical to the first. They moved Ellen away from the doorframe, checking her wounded arm with clinical efficiency.
"Minor laceration. Medical attention available upon request," the second guard announced.
Ellen was crying, clutching her arm, backing away from Caleb like he was a rabid animal. Soren stood frozen, blood still trickling from his nose where Caleb had hit him.
"I wasn't finished," Caleb said, still struggling against the guard's grip.
"Violence is prohibited in designated Rest Areas," the first guard repeated. "Compliance is mandatory."
Something metal touched Caleb's neck. A brief electric shock, and suddenly his muscles went limp. The knife clattered to the floor.
The guards lifted him effortlessly, carrying him away from the training room like a sack of grain. Behind him, he could hear Ellen sobbing and Soren's shaky voice trying to comfort her.
The whispers in his head screamed in frustration.
The isolation cell was smaller than the simulation chamber but larger than a closet. White walls, white floor, white ceiling. A cot, a small table, a toilet behind a privacy screen. No windows. No decorations. Just sterile emptiness.
The guards deposited him on the cot and left without another word. The door sealed with a soft hiss.
Caleb sat up immediately, testing the door. Solid. Unmovable. No handle on the inside.
For the first few hours, he paced. The whispers were still there, fainter now but persistent. They urged him to find a way out, to finish what he'd started. Ellen's terrified face flashed through his mind, and the memory sent electricity through his nerves.
He'd been so close. So close to seeing the light fade from her eyes.
But as the hours passed, something changed. The whispers grew quieter. The electric hunger in his veins began to fade. The knife was gone, confiscated by the guards, and without its warm presence against his leg, his thoughts started to clear.
Like coming out of a fever dream.
By the eighth hour, Caleb was sitting on the edge of the cot, head in his hands, trying to understand what had happened to him.
He remembered the simulation chamber. Remembered the blood, the violence, the pure joy he'd felt carving through enemies. Remembered Ellen's face appearing on the defenseless construct for just a moment.
And he remembered not caring.
By the twelfth hour, the whispers had faded to barely audible murmurs. In the silence, Caleb could hear his own thoughts again. His actual thoughts, not the alien hunger that had been driving him.
What the hell had he become?
He'd been about to murder Ellen. Ellen, who'd never done anything but follow his lead and try to survive. Ellen, who was seventeen years old and had already survived more trauma than most adults ever would.
He'd cut her arm and enjoyed the sound of her scream.
The realization hit him like a physical blow. He doubled over, retching, but his stomach was empty. Nothing came up but bile and self-loathing.
This was what the Tower did. This was its true purpose. Not to test them, but to break them. To turn them into monsters and reward them for it.
And he'd let it happen. More than that, he'd embraced it.
By the sixteenth hour, Caleb was staring at his hands. They looked normal. Human. But he could still feel the warmth of Ellen's blood on his fingers. Could still hear the wet sound of the knife parting her skin.
He'd been happy. That was the worst part. In that moment, with the blade at her throat, he'd been happier than he'd ever been in his entire life.
What did that make him?
By the twentieth hour, he'd made his decision.
When the guards came to release him, Caleb was sitting calmly on the cot, hands folded in his lap.
"Isolation period complete," the first guard announced. "Return to general population authorized."
"I want to write a letter," Caleb said.
The guard's expression didn't change. "Writing materials available upon request."
A sheet of paper and a pen appeared on the small table. Simple, functional, disposable.
Caleb wrote carefully, his handwriting steadier than it had been in days:
Ellen and Soren,
By the time you read this, I'll be gone. I'm climbing alone from now on.
What happened in the training room wasn't an accident. It wasn't the Tower controlling me. It was me. The real me, or what I've become. I was going to kill Ellen, and I was going to enjoy it.
You're not safe around me anymore. I don't think anyone is.
I'm not asking for forgiveness. I'm not apologizing. What I did was unforgivable, and apologizing would be selfish. I just wanted you to understand why I'm leaving.
The Tower changes people. But it doesn't make you into something you weren't already capable of becoming. It just gives you permission.
I gave myself permission to become a monster. That's on me, not the Tower.
Stay together. Watch each other's backs. Don't trust anyone who enjoys the violence too much.
Don't trust anyone.
Caleb
He folded the letter carefully and handed it to the guard.
"Deliver this to Ellen Morrison and Soren Anders," he said.
The guard took the letter without comment.
Behind him, in the general population area, Ellen and Soren were probably still trying to process what had happened. Still trying to understand how someone they'd trusted had turned into something that wanted to hurt them.
They'd be better off without him. Everyone would be.
Caleb fit right in.
He found an empty table and sat down to wait for the next floor to open. Somewhere above him, Floor Eight was waiting. And beyond that, ninety-two more floors of trials designed to strip away whatever humanity he had left.
He couldn't wait.
The whispers were already coming back, faint but growing stronger.