Chapter 17 - The Site of Nameless Bodies
The footsteps above stopped. A wisp of cigarette smoke drifted down from the top of the wall, cutting through the clean forest air like a toxic signature. Borz pressed his back even harder into the cold concrete, as if trying to merge with the stone. Beside him, the dog was motionless as a rock, its jaws clenched tight to stifle the growl rising in its throat.
The man above keyed his radio again. The static was like a bomb exploding in the heavy silence.
*"I'm at sector four. Sensed some movement at the base of the wall. Probably just a wild animal. I'll check and head back."*
Borz slowly slid his hand toward the hilt of the hatchet at his belt. The steel was cold, but the numbness in his fingers was so deep he could barely feel the texture of the grip. If the man looked down, Borz had nowhere to run. This place could easily become a grave.
The man's heavy boots echoed right above his head. A few small chunks of concrete and dust fell onto Borz's shoulder. The man was directly over them. Borz saw the wild glint in the dog's eyes; the animal was ready to spring, waiting for a single command. But Borz pressed his hand firmly on the dog's back: *Wait.*
At that moment, a massive crash erupted from the inner part of the estate. The beep of a heavy machine backing up, followed by a metallic collision. The man above swore.
*"Forget it, looks like there's an accident over there, I'm heading in!"* he shouted into the radio.
The footsteps receded quickly. Borz released the jagged breath he had been holding. Death had passed just a step away. But this wasn't a rescue; it was only a delay.
"We need to move," Borz whispered, his voice nothing more than a rasp.
They crawled along the base of the wall until they found the narrow gap where the concrete met the original forest line. Where the wall ended, a pile of excavated earth rose high. Borz forced his leaden legs into one last effort. His knees were bleeding, his fingertips aching from the frost, but he had to climb that mound.
From the top, he looked down into the dark valley where the bright lights of the construction site couldn't reach. The last lights of Istanbul were now far behind. The silhouette stretching before him was the true heart of Anatolia.
...
Borz scanned the mound of debris, his eyes landing on a cluster of discarded cement bags scattered among the rubble. Some had hardened into solid grey blocks from the dampness, while others had burst, their fine dust mingling with the frozen earth.
He reached for a few empty, multi-layered paper sacks that had been tossed aside. These weren't just trash to him; they were durable, weather-resistant sheets designed to hold weight and repel moisture. Despite the protest in his joints, he stooped down and grabbed three of them. He shook off the residual grit and folded them into flat, manageable rectangles.
In the nights to come, these could be stuffed under his coat as insulation against the wind, laid on the frozen ground to keep the dampness from his bones, or used as dry tinder to coax a fire to life. Surviving this landscape meant reclaiming the waste of the modern world and turning it into a tool for the old one.
He tucked the stiff paper beneath his jacket, pressing it against his chest. The sharp rustle was the last artificial sound he heard before he signaled the dog. Turning away from the sterile glow of the site, they stepped off the mound and into the swallowing dark of the Anatolian valley.
...
The construction site's yellow lights flickered like blurred stains through the haze of cement dust and exhaust fumes. The grueling hours of the shift, the biting cold, and the relentless mechanical roar had merged into a mill that ground down human focus.
The cement mixer was reversing slowly, its massive drum turning with a heavy groan. The driver, eyes bloodshot from exhaustion, relied on the misty reflection in the mirrors and the piercing, rhythmic beep of the reverse alarm. But for Mehmet, who was struggling with a stuck mold next to a freshly poured concrete wall, that alarm was just one of a thousand sounds he had heard for weeks.
The massive steel frame of the mixer backed up until only a few meters remained between it and the structure. At that exact moment, Mehmet leaned in to free a piece of rebar caught in the mold. He heard the engine's rumble through the noise, but by the time he realized the tons of weight moving toward him, it was already too late.
**"STOP! STOP!"** a scream tore through the dark.
But the inevitable collision—metal against metal, flesh against bone—was seconds away. The mixer's rear bumper slammed into Mehmet's back, pinning him against the cold, unyielding main wall of the building. There was a second of resistance, followed by a sickening crunch. Between the concrete and the steel, the human body was like a speck of dust crushed within the system's gargantuan gears.
When the mixer finally halted, the only sound left on the site was the low thrum of the idling engine, followed by a deafening silence. In his side mirror, the operator saw a hard hat fall to the ground, trapped between the vehicle and the wall. Seconds later, the radio static erupted into frantic wails:
"Call an ambulance! Mehmet... Mehmet is pinned! Pull the truck forward, get it off him!"
The deafening silence of the site was shattered by the sharp click of boots on the muddy ground. The project manager arrived, wearing a high-end outdoor jacket and a pristine, scratchless white hard hat. Mehmet's lifeless body hung suspended like a grisly statue between the massive mixer and the cold concrete wall; his fallen helmet, lying in the dust, marked the end of all signs of life on the site. Instead of looking at the victim, the manager grabbed his phone with trembling hands.
The voice from the other end, seconds later, made the freezing air feel even more frigid.
"Boss... there's a situation. Sector 4. A worker... pinned between the mixer and the wall. He's dead, boss. It's bad."
The response wasn't one of grief; it was a burst of pure, unadulterated rage. The jagged voice leaking from the speaker reached all the way to where Borz crouched at the base of the wall.
"You're talking about the permit being revoked? You idiot, do you think this is just about a project halting!" the boss bellowed. "If those sirens show up, if a single prosecutor sets foot on that site, it's not just the project that ends—it's all of our lives! **People will start asking how I got a permit in the middle of these mountains, in the heart of a protected forest! If word gets out, I'll burn, and the whole Ministry will burn with me!** Do you know whose signatures are on those permits? How many millions of dollars it cost to stamp those seals? If this accident leaks, it goes all the way to those seats in Ankara!"
The boss's voice dropped to a lower, more poisonous tone:
"Now listen to me: Do NOT call an ambulance. Wrap that body immediately and dump it far, far away from the site. Mehmet never entered this site; his name isn't on any list. If a single soul speaks, I'll bury that entire site on top of all of you. I will not have my name linked to a workplace accident, to negligence, or to the truth behind this permit!"
The manager hung up, his face as pale as the dead man's. His pristine white helmet gleamed under the floodlights like an accomplice. He turned to the foremen standing around: "We aren't calling an ambulance. Kill the lights. Clear Sector 4. No one saw anything."
---
The modern world isn't just built with concrete and iron; it rises on a foundation of silence and buried truths. Borz now realizes that the price of freedom isn't just the cold and hunger—it's the weight of the filthy secrets he must now carry. These luxury estates, built upon a man's corpse, were only the first major trial on his road to Daymokh.
As Borz steps into the dark valley, can he truly escape the reach of this bloody secret? Or in these mountains forgotten by the system, do secrets remain as abandoned as the bodies?