I'm stuck. Paralyzed.
My legs won't answer. My head screams, but my body refuses to follow.
Too much information. Too fast.
He's still talking — the one with the hood and the dead eyes — but I'm not listening anymore. I've got one objective: run. Get out of here. Escape. Any way I can.
But I can barely move.
— Hey, you two!
My breath stops.
A voice. New. Unknown. Maybe a chance.
I turn my head a little. Very slowly. My eyes meet those of a guy who looks even more lost than we are. Skinny, poorly dressed, glasses sliding down his nose, posture off-kilter.
Seriously… that's my divine backup?
He walks toward us like someone who still believes everything can be negotiated in this world.
— I'm looking for a guy named Heyo. That one of you two?
Fuck. Another one. Another mercenary?
My heart tightens. I don't even have anything to defend myself with.
The guy barely looks at me. He locks onto the bored kid. And then he grimaces.
— You… you're Kairo, right? The little mercenary at the service of the highest bidder. I've seen you before. Your Word… it's Slow, isn't it?
Kairo doesn't flinch. Barely a blink. He raises his eyes slowly, like this whole scene already bores him. He speaks without pressure, low voice, dead gaze.
— And you're who, old man?
Not an ounce of emotion. Not even a smirk. Just that jaded tone that says: you don't interest me enough to insult you.
The guy hesitates, readjusts his glasses, straightens like he's about to announce a revolution. He's got the build of someone inventing a life, not a hunter. But there's a strange spark in his eyes. Not madness. Worse. A kind of dirty confidence.
And me, I'm here. Still slowed. Spectator of my own abduction.
But I listen to them. Because if I get out of this mess… I want to know who to break first.
— Me? I'm a mercenary too. My Word is Kidnapper. And I'm offering you a deal. We team up. I help you capture him. I'll give you… let's say, sixty. No… seventy percent.
He smiles, convinced of his genius. A kid in an adult's body. Pathetic.
Kairo sighs, visibly bored.
— How are you planning to do that, you old wreck?
The guy pulls out an old backpack. Not a magic bag. Not a mythical artifact. Just a bag. Filthy. Worn. Frayed at the seams.
And he dares to say this:
— It's my power. The Kidnapper's Bag. I put people in it. They become as light as a pen. Handy for getaways.
Kairo shrugs.
— Make it eighty–twenty. As long as I don't have to carry him.
— Deal! the other one answers, all excited.
I'm dreaming.
I'm here, frozen, watching these two lunatics bargain over my head. As if I were already merchandise. Prey already folded, wrapped.
And I can't even talk. Can't even scream. My body is frozen, slowed, like it's trapped in a nightmare. This damn power… I can't do anything.
The old man steps closer. His hands touch me. Damp fingers. Trembling. Dirty. He grabs me by the hair like a worn-out doll.
A black anger rips through me. A brutal fire. I hate him. I hate him viscerally.
If he lets go of me, I swear I'll smash him.
But he talks, that bastard. With the smile of a happy pervert.
— It's for your own good, kid. You'll see, it's not so bad in the bag.
And then… nothing.
Nothing anymore.
Total black. Dense. Thick. Not a soft black. Not a night black. A suffocating black. As if I've been swallowed by the void. A bottomless grave.
Even my breathing feels false here. Even my consciousness dissolves.
How could a lunatic like that receive a power this terrifying?
And me? I've got nothing. Not even a Word.
I'm just prey here. Defenseless prey.
But he'd better watch out. Because if I get out of this bag…
I burn him.
I break him.
I erase him.
But if I remember right… that Kairo guy… he mentioned the Guild of Word Hunters. Said I was about to awaken one. A Word that interests them.
So if I manage it…
But how does it work again?
They say a Word awakens when you want something badly enough to die for it.
When there's no room left for doubt, for fear, for fake fronts.
When you've reached the end.
Okay. I am literally in a bag.
In. A. Fucking. Bag.
My name is Heyo. I'm sixteen.
I'm half amnesiac. I have the memory of a garden. My mother. Her hands in the soil. And then? Fog. Silence. Nothing. The void. The rest is emptiness with a crust of regrets.
Seriously… what kind of joke is this?
Who am I? A kid without a past, without a Word, without a future?
You want something to awaken in there?
What I need isn't a Word.
It's an instruction manual.
…
Fuck.
I'm sick of it.
Sick of being the guy they drag around like a bag of dirty laundry. Sick of waiting for the world to decide what I'm supposed to become. Sick of staying silent, docile, inert.
I want this to stop.
I want it to explode.
I WANT IT TO STOP.
…
Silence.
No Words.
No divine energy.
No miracle.
Just the smell of leather. The smothering. This sticky black that clings to the skin. And me, curled inside this nothingness.
Is that it? Is this the Awakening I deserve?
A cage with a zipper?
…
I'm lost. Completely.
I wish they'd leave me alone.
I wish I could live.
I wish I could understand why I'm still here.
I wish to be free.