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墨書 Inktalez
Carter leaned back in his chair, his eyes half-closed, listening to the angry voices echoing in his mind through the headphones. Johnny's voice was still sharp, filled with rage and resentment: "This country is being sold out! These damned politicians are groveling to outsiders, handing over our jobs! We work our whole lives, and they come in and enjoy everything without lifting a finger!"
Carter's fingertips unconsciously tapped on the table, moving gently in rhythm with the voices.
He felt little emotion towards these words, not even sure if he truly agreed with them. Yet he listened every day, as if it were a habit, an addiction to background noise he couldn't shake off.
Why?
Perhaps he simply enjoyed the anger of these people.
Anger was a force, something raw and primal. Compared to the packaged lies, the false hopes, and the insincere sympathy that surrounded him, pure rage felt more real.
When Johnny raged on, when guests shouted in fury, when anonymous callers voiced their grievances with trembling voices, it was as if he could catch a breath from this tempest of emotions.
It felt as though every curse they uttered allowed him to release a bit of the anger simmering inside him.
As if he too were cursing along without having to actually speak.
This feeling… was like listening to a prayer that spoke for him—a dark prayer filled with hatred. He didn't need to agree or respond; he just needed to let these voices seep into his ears, letting those fierce words burn in his mind until they slowly consumed the nameless fire in his chest, granting him a fleeting moment of peace.
But peace never lasted long because the anger had never truly extinguished.
It was merely suppressed temporarily beneath the weight of others' fury.
People came and went; time flowed silently in its cycles—neither fast nor slow—without any moments worth remembering.
Carter glanced at the clock on the wall; the hands pointed to five fifty.
Soon, it would finally be over—this damned day.
He lazily got up from the chair, stretched, and moved his shoulders a bit before picking up the flashlight, preparing for the final round of patrol. It was just a routine task, nothing that truly required his attention, but rules were rules; he had to go through the motions to get through the day.
He stepped forward, walking down the quiet, empty corridors, his shoes making a faint clicking sound on the overly polished marble floor. There were still a few people lingering in the building, several sharply dressed individuals standing by the glass windows on their phones, their expressions serious as if the world’s economy rested on their conversations.
Carter idly waved the flashlight around, casually shining it into a few dark corners. The beam swept across the edge of the elevator shaft, skimmed over the crack of a fire door, and passed through the storage room filled with neatly stacked boxes—nothing unusual; everything was as boring as usual.
He pulled out the inspection sheet from his pocket and raised his pen to sign his name in an elaborate flourish—Carter Black.
The patrol was completed without incident.
He returned to the security room, opened his locker, and skillfully removed the slightly rough security uniform, changing back into his old dark jacket that still carried the faint smell of smoke from last night, a scent that clashed with everything in this building. He closed the locker door without a second glance and turned to walk out.
It was six o'clock sharp.
Carter pushed open the heavy glass door and stepped out of Lianxun Commercial Building, taking a deep breath of air laced with a chill that seemed to belong only to the night of this city—a time that felt like it was truly his.
As he walked down the street, his steps were slow and mechanical, as if he were merely moving out of inertia rather than any real intention. His mind was blank, or more accurately, it was filled with a deadened numbness.
He felt like a ghost wandering through this city he knew so well yet completely disconnected from it all. The neon lights of shops flickered, pedestrians bustled along the sidewalks, laughing and rushing about with a fervor for life that he couldn’t comprehend. He merely moved among them, pushed along by the crowd but never truly belonging here.
He wasn’t even a screw anymore.
At least screws had their function; they could fit into machines and work. But what about him? Air was more important than he was; people needed air to live, but no one needed him.
No one fucking needed him.
This thought tightened his throat and surged an indescribable anger within his chest.
He was not always like this; he was once important, once regarded as a giant who protected the nation.
He enlisted at eighteen and saw battle at twenty.
When he was still a boy, he chose a military life, dedicating himself to this country without hesitation. For what? For glory, for faith, for justice, and for the party.
In that frenzied civil war, he fought alongside his comrades. He once believed he was a part of history, that he was a brick in the defense of this nation, carrying some greater mission. He protected the "justice" of this country, followed orders, bled, killed, and struggled to survive amidst mud and bullets. Until victory finally arrived, he still stood there, waiting for this country to give him what he deserved—
But what happened?
He was abandoned.
No one needed a soldier past his prime; no one cared about the scars he bore from the battlefield. No one remembered the responsibilities and sacrifices he had shouldered. After the war ended, he couldn't even find a decent job. Those who once wrapped their orders in noble words no longer remembered his name. He was merely a disposable tool, an insignificant old part, kicked out before the bloodstains from the battlefield had even fully washed away.
He could not understand why it had come to this.
His fists clenched unconsciously, his nails digging deep into his palms, yet he felt no pain.
The laughter on the streets, the neon lights, the distant sounds of music—all the urban splendor felt like a cruel mockery to him.
He had once fought for this city; now, it wouldn’t even spare him a glance.
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