"Now you're your own burden."
Just that sentence. On a yellowed piece of paper. The ink seemed to have dripped from his own blood.
And that was all he remembered. The rest... darkness. Emptiness. Twenty years—maybe twenty-one. Or perhaps time had never passed at all.
When he boarded the train, the night was silent. Like a frozen fear enveloping everything. The Uncodables. The system couldn't recognize them. Humanity no longer existed. Only shadow-like people remained. He was among them, yet still alone.
Fear, anxiety, hope. These three remained. Everything else had been erased by the system.
The train jolted. Then it moved. Heading beyond the map. To that region whose name you didn't even want to mention. The Federal Exclusion Zone.
Straight into the heart of a planned chaos.
And amidst all this turmoil, Langley remembered only one thing:
"Now you're your own burden."
He had awakened. At least, he thought so. The dream lingered nearby. Just behind his eyelids. Waiting. Patiently. Quietly.
To continue? Perhaps waking up was the real nightmare.
The ceiling hung low, as if about to collapse. Just like time itself.
He pulled himself up, holding onto the edge of the bed. Stood up.
The walls were cracked, resembling remnants of a silent rage. The static from the radio resembled words stuck in someone's throat; neither music nor silence.
There was a knock at the door. It wasn't a soft sound. It was more like an attempt to awaken the room than a knock.
Like metal fingers tapping on wood. Langley didn't move. He didn't even think about it.
He just waited.
As if that sound had come before. Maybe last night. Maybe twenty years ago.
Again.
Three knocks. Clearer. More deliberate.
He approached the door, dragging his steps slowly; as if walking in someone's dream, fearing not the noise but leaving a trace.
A voice came from outside. Low. But familiar.
"Open this fucking door, Plisskin."
Bagwell. The name seeped through the wall like moisture.
Langley reached for the doorknob.
His hand lingered on it a few seconds longer than usual. As if he were about to open not a door, but a rusty lock.
He turned the knob. The door opened on its own. Almost reluctantly.
Bagwell entered. His eyes were bloodshot. A code tattoo was etched on the side of his head. Its meaning was unclear, much like Bagwell himself.
He looked at Langley with a smirk.
"Plisskin," he said, as if savoring the sarcasm. "You're awake. That's good. Every surviving body gives us one more advantage."
Langley didn't respond. He just looked. He knew him.
As Bagwell entered, his shoes made dull sounds on the decaying concrete. He carried a small backpack on his shoulder; a cable, a revolver, a few batteries, and a yellow wet wipe protruded from it.
"The signal has been reset," he said. "Radio Zero is silent. The Dockmen are looking for someone for a job, big money. And I think that someone is you, my friend."
"You said something similar last time... I lost my arm in that job."
"And you're still working like my right hand. Don't complain. I've lost my best men in this dump. I know I can't bring back your arm... but you're still getting the job done."
Langley turned without saying a word. He opened the cabinet at the base of the cracked wall.
From inside, he took out a few items that seemed untouched for years: a dusty vest. A rusty knife. A red band.
The gun was at the bottom. It was always the last resort.
Bagwell didn't speak. He just watched.
Every movement of Langley was like a ritual summoned from the depths of the past.
He wore the vest as if he still had that arm.
He wrapped the band around his wrist as if it were about to bleed again.
"What's the job?" he finally asked. His voice was like something trying to rise from within. Tired. But not broken.
Bagwell lit a cigarette. His smile was more of a scar than joy.
"Before I tell you, there's something you need to know," he said. And he took something out of his backpack.
A small, black device with a cracked screen. Radio Zero's decoder.
Bagwell handed the device to Langley. It turned on by itself.
A word flashed on the screen:
"PLISSKIN: OFF THE GRID"
"TARGET STATUS: NEUTRALIZE – DELIVER ALIVE"
"AUTHORIZATION: LEVEL-5"
Langley gestured toward the device with his chin.
"Is this job going through me again?" he asked.
Bagwell didn't avert his gaze. "This time," he said. "What started with your name will end with it."
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