"Not all silence is empty."
The alarm clock didn't go off.Lucas Yamazaki opened his eyes instinctively, as if an imperceptible noise had pulled him from a silent abyss. The room was dark, except for the faint light filtering through the cracks in the curtain. He took a deep breath. The feeling lingered — that strange sensation only forgotten dreams leave behind.He sat on the edge of the bed, massaging his temples. He had dreamed something. Something vivid. But now it all slipped through the fingers of his mind. A train station? A symbol? Muffled voices?— What the hell was that…? — he muttered.He walked to the kitchen, preparing the coffee with automatic movements. The familiar smell of the drink brought some relief. He sat at the table with the cup in hand and looked out the window. The street was beginning to wake up, with urban noises, hurried footsteps, distant sirens. A cold breeze crossed the balcony and hit his face. For a moment, he felt as if the wind whispered something. He shivered.
He put on his shirt, slipped on his shoes, and walked down the three flights of stairs. The building was old, the hallways smelled of old paint and stored newspapers. A neighbor greeted him with a silent nod. Lucas just nodded back.
Outside, he stopped for a moment and looked at the sky. The day was cloudy, but not rainy. The city, as always, pulsed. But something made him uneasy. And it wasn't just the dream. It was what that silence was hiding.
At the precinct, the shift seemed quieter than usual. A few minor incidents, a neighbor fight, a theft report. Lucas went straight past the reception to his desk. Before he could sit, he was called by Erick Vicent, a fellow investigator.
— Lucas. The chief wants to talk to you. Seems like a case... out of the ordinary.— What happened?— Body found at the old Santa Inês Station. Abandoned for who knows how long. No one knows what the guy was doing there.
Lucas raised an eyebrow. The name of the station triggered something in his memory — a distant echo. Maybe from the dream? He wasn't sure. But it was as if he had already heard that name earlier that morning.
In Tavares' office, the chief handed him the preliminary report: male, between thirty and forty, no ID. Alleged suicide. According to the guard, the man threw himself from the walkway leading to the tracks. Yet, there were no signs of forced entry.
— I want you to go there — said Tavares, straight to the point. — Check the scene. The area's isolated. The coroner already took the body, but there's something odd about this one. The guard is saying strange things. Claims he heard the impact before seeing anyone. No one saw the guy go in.
Lucas nodded silently. He was used to this type of assignment. He was called in when others felt something was "off," even if they couldn't explain why. His sensitivity, though lacking a rational explanation, had helped solve many cases.
On the way to the station, Lucas mentally revisited what he remembered about the place. Santa Inês had been deactivated over a decade ago. A revitalization project had only recently begun. A ghost structure trying to be reborn.
Upon arrival, he found the site cordoned off and two forensic agents still at work. The maintenance platform was partially restored, but the surroundings still smelled of mold and abandonment.
— You the one on the case? — asked a forensic tech, pointing her chin toward the impact point.— Lucas Yamazaki. Investigator. What do we have?— Body fell from that walkway up there — she pointed. — But the access door was locked from the inside. Only the guard had the key. No signs of forced entry. And no one saw him up there before the fall.
Lucas looked around. The walkway structure seemed intact. The fall point was still visible, stained with dry traces of blood. Below, blueish specks marked the ground around the main point.
He called the guard in for questioning.— What's your name?— Osmar. I've worked here since the renovation started. About three months.— What did you see today?— I was making the 6 a.m. round. All quiet. Then… a crash. Like something heavy had fallen. I ran over. The body was there. Alone. I didn't see anyone come in, or climb the walkway. The door was locked. And... — he hesitated — there was a strange feeling in the air. Like... when time stops.
Lucas looked at him more intently.— Have you seen this man before?— Never.— And this? — Lucas showed one of the notebooks found on the ground, filled with symbols and disconnected notes.The guard shook his head.— That wasn't there during my earlier round. I swear. It's like it appeared out of nowhere.
Lucas walked slowly across the platform, observing the details. The walls still bore old graffiti. But in one specific spot, something caught his eye: three parallel lines, a semicircle, and a central dot — painted in faded blue.
He shivered.
Without knowing why, he mentally redrew the symbol. And remembered the dawn dream. There had been something similar in it. But the memory was too blurry to take shape.
At the end of the day, Lucas returned home with more questions than answers. He filed a partial report, listened once more to the forensic audios, noted hypotheses. But something still gnawed at his mind.
The lack of witnesses. The symbol. The confused guard. The feeling of reliving a memory that wasn't his.
He closed his eyes already in bed, trying to relax. And once again, the dream came.
The station materialized before him.But it wasn't like what he'd seen during the day.It was cleaner. Alive. As if still in operation. The lights on. The sound of distant rails vibrating. And shadow passengers, walking silently past him.
Lucas walked along the tracks.At the fall site, he saw a man standing.The same symbol beneath his feet.
The man turned slowly. He had no face. Only a void where the eyes should have been. But he extended a hand to Lucas and whispered:"You were here... before me."And then fell.But didn't hit the ground.His body dissolved into the air, like blue dust.
Lucas woke with a start.And saw, on the table, the same notebook from the crime scene.Open.On a new page, written in blue ink:"You saw it too."
The next day started differently.Lucas woke early, but not out of duty. His body felt pushed from within. That sensation that something was about to be revealed, like a hidden truth waiting for the courage to be seen.
He didn't go straight to the precinct.Instead, he stopped by the city library. He knew it seemed unlikely — but he wanted to check if that blue symbol had appeared before in public, historical, or even occult records. It was the kind of thing no other colleague would do.
And that's why he was on the case.
The librarian recognized Lucas and led him to the rare archives section. There, among leather-bound books and undated manuscripts, he researched for almost two hours. And then, in a compendium on "symbols used by vanished orders in South America," he found something.
The symbol wasn't identical. But incredibly close.A closed eye with three curved lines above it, representing "the sleep that sees."
It was called The Mark of the Observer.Attributed to small mystical circles believed to have existed in the 19th century, related to spiritual vigilance in trance states.
The text also said those who bore the mark believed they could access memories imprinted in specific locations. Loaded places. With history. Trauma. Echo.
— "Memories of the space…" — Lucas whispered. — "Like footprints that remain, even after the person is gone."
He left with the book in hand, permitted to keep it for 48 hours. On the way back, he noticed his fingers were trembling.
Something more was happening. And it wasn't just psychological. It was as if the world was slowly revealing a layer that had always been there — but he had never been allowed to see.
At the precinct, Erick called him in the hallway.— They found the victim's name.
Lucas stopped. Erick seemed nervous, as if the name carried weight.— Rodrigo Ferreira — said Erick. — Worked for a tech company. Missing for three days. His wife filed the report. Apparently, he had a history of anxiety attacks… but nothing that would explain…— Explain why he'd be in an abandoned station, alone, at night — Lucas completed.
Erick nodded.— She came to identify the body. She's in the waiting room. Wants to talk to you.
Lucas found her sitting, eyes dry. Not from lack of pain, but as if the shock was still unfolding.
— Mrs. Ferreira? I'm Lucas. I'm the lead investigator. May I ask you some questions?She nodded.— Did your husband have any reason to go to that station?— Never. I don't even know if he knew the place. He hated old places. Had panic attacks around trains.— Any strange behavior in the past days?She hesitated.— He… he started dreaming too much. Spoke of stations, tunnels, a place where time erased itself. I thought it was just stress. But… he began to write.— Write what?She pulled from her bag a notebook identical to the one found at the scene. Same model, same blue pen. Inside, the same disconnected phrases:
"Sound arrives before light.""Time is a poorly drawn shadow.""I heard the train that never came."
Lucas flipped the pages in silence.On the back cover, a drawing almost identical to the symbol he'd been investigating. But this time, with a handwritten note:
"She will awaken."— Do you know who "she" is?— No. But he whispered that in his sleep. Always with fear. Like someone was waiting for him… inside the dream.
Lucas returned the notebook carefully. Thanked her and left. But his mind spun.
It was no longer coincidence. Nor delusion.The station... the symbol... the dream... the notebooks...Everything pointed to something that didn't yet have a name.
That night, Lucas took a long shower, locked the windows, turned off his phone. He needed silence.He left the book about the symbol beside his bed, and as if following a ritual, lay down in absolute stillness.He closed his eyes.And waited for sleep.
This time, the dream didn't begin with tracks.It began with wind.A wind swirling as if trapped in a corridor. Then, light. A flickering lamp. The station appearing, not as a ruin, but as a cathedral. Tall. Untouched. The symbol on the ceiling, in the shape of stained glass.
Lucas was standing — but not alone.Behind him, murmuring voices. Many. As if hundreds of people were dreaming together. They didn't speak to him — but through him. As if his presence had been expected for a long time.
A figure approached.It was the man who had fallen from the walkway. Rodrigo.But now he was standing, whole. Empty eyes.He extended his hand.
And Lucas understood he didn't want help.He wanted to show something.
Lucas followed him through a hidden corridor beneath the platform. Each step made the ground vibrate. As if they were walking over a giant dormant machine.
And then they reached an underground chamber. Full of symbols. Books. Notebooks.Rodrigo pointed to a spot on the floor.
There, a new Stone shone.Blue. Circular. Pulsating.
Lucas knelt before it.And a new voice — feminine — whispered in his mind:
"The First Degree observes.The Second understands.You have begun to see.Now, learn not to look away."
He awoke to complete silence.But on the nightstand beside his bed lay the shard of blue glass he had collected at the station.Now, it was whole.
And at its center...the symbol.Glowing.