Chapter 32 Together Our Edges Bleed
TOGETHER OUR EDGES BLEED
Don’t Walk Alone (stripped) - Callum Beattie
Ghost
Silence used to be a place I could hide.
This silence isn’t that.
This one presses. It crowds the inside of my skull until even my thoughts feel watched. I can feel the room leaning, listening for which of us will speak next – even though I know better than to believe sound matters.
They’re not listening for noise, Donnelly says calmly. They’re listening for rupture.
I don’t like this, Silas whines. I don’t like being this close to everyone. Too many edges.
I sit with my back straight because if I let myself curl inward, I don’t know which of us will come back up. My hands rest on my knees, palms down, anchoring. The floor is cool. Smooth. Real.
Real matters.
Across the room, Hatchet is shaking again – not panicked, controlled. That’s new. He’s learning how to let it happen without feeding it. Silas approves. Donnelly wants to scream at him to hit something.
Honey keeps watching everyone like he’s counting us to make sure we’re still here. Every time his gaze lands on me, it lingers too long.
He’s worried I’ll disappear.
He’s not wrong, Donnelly mutters.
Snow stands with his back half-turned, eyes sharp, posture exact. He’s measuring time again. I can feel it. The way his attention keeps slipping, recalibrating. He doesn’t trust the clock anymore.
Bones shifts on the bench and winces despite himself. Pain spikes ripple through him like quiet lightning. I feel it anyway. I always do.
That’s the problem with proximity. Isolation kept us clean. Separate. Distinct. Together, our edges bleed.
Hunger gnaws at me differently than it does the others. It doesn’t scream. It erases. Thoughts drift mid-sentence. Images surface without context. I catch myself staring at the wall, convinced something is written there that I need to read.
Focus, Donnelly barks. Anchor.
I press my thumb into my thigh until it hurts. The pain grounds me for half a second.
Then the room shifts.
Not physically. Attentively. It’s subtle, but I feel it the way you feel someone step too close behind you. The pressure behind my eyes builds, slow and insistent.
They’re checking.
Don’t give them one voice, Donnelly warns. They’ll choose it.
That’s the trick, isn’t it. They don’t want me broken. They want me simplified.
I tilt my head slightly, listening inward instead of outward. Silas is steady, cool, observant. Donnelly paces, sharp and angry, energy bleeding off him in sparks.
I need both.
I rock once, forward and back, before I can stop myself.
Snow notices immediately.
So does the room.
I freeze, breath caught halfway in.
Careful, Donnelly warns.
The rocking stops. The pressure doesn’t. I swallow. My mouth is painfully dry. When I speak – if I speak – I don’t know who will answer.
That terrifies me more than hunger.
Honey shifts, starts to stand, then catches himself and sits again, arms wrapping around his knees like he’s holding himself together. His guilt is loud. It buzzes in the air, a frequency that makes Donnelly twitch.
He’s going to try again, Donnelly says. He won’t be able to stop.
He doesn’t have to, Silas replies. We do.
I close my eyes for one dangerous second and see the grey room from before. The nothing. The absence. The place where I almost lost them entirely.
No.
I open my eyes sharply and focus on Hatchet’s hands instead. The tremor. The control layered over it. Real. Present.
The room hums.
Then the worst thing happens.
It stops paying attention to me.
The pressure eases. The lean withdraws.
I feel…lighter.
Invisible.
A rush of relief floods my chest, sharp and intoxicating.
They forgot us, Silas whispers, awe and panic tangled together. They forgot us.
No, Donnelly says immediately. They didn’t forget. They’re deprioritising.
The word hits like a blade.
I understand it instantly. Being ignored is not mercy. It’s preparation. If I don’t matter, then what happens to me doesn’t either.
My chest tightens. My breathing goes shallow without my permission. The edges of the room blur, colours washing out until everything looks thin and unreal.
I’m fading, Silas whines, voice suddenly distant. I don’t like this. I don’t like—
“No,” I whisper before I can stop myself. The sound feels too loud, too solid. Snow’s head snaps toward me. Bones stiffens. Honey looks up, eyes wide with immediate concern.
The room leans back in.
Pressure returns, sharp and focused.
I suck in a breath, dizzy with the sudden attention.
That’s it, Donnelly mutters softly. They want proof of existence.
They want me to perform myself.
I laugh, a broken sound that scrapes my throat. My hands curl into fists on my knees, nails biting skin. I don’t want to disappear. I don’t want to be simplified.
I slam my fist into the floor.
Pain explodes up my arm, clean and immediate. The sensation is grounding in a way hunger never is. Real. Indisputable.
The room snaps to attention.
“Subject exhibits distress behaviour,” the voice overhead notes calmly.
Good.
I hit the floor again. And again. And again until my knuckles split. Blood beads, bright against pale skin. The sting is sharp enough to anchor both Silas and Donnelly at once, pulling them into alignment through sheer sensation.
That works, Donnelly breathes, suddenly close again. Do that.
Snow steps forward instinctively, then stops himself at the boundary, jaw tight. Hatchet’s gaze locks on me, intense, warning. Bones half-rises from the bench before freezing, calculating the cost.
Honey looks like he’s about to break. I meet his eyes and shake my head once, hard. Don’t help.
I strike the floor one last time and then still myself, chest heaving, fists throbbing.
The room hums, displeased but alert.
I lean back against the barrier, sliding down until I’m sitting again, blood smearing faintly on the surface beneath me.
“They see us now,” I whisper, not caring who hears. “That’s the problem.”
The attention doesn’t leave.
It won’t, now.
Silas settles, composed. Donnelly burns bright and furious, but present.
I’m still here.
That’s the victory.
Not comfort. Not safety.
Visibility.
And as hunger coils tighter and the room waits for the next fracture, I understand something with terrible clarity: They can starve us. Hurt us. Strip us down to essentials. But they don’t get to decide which parts of me survive.
I press my injured hand against the floor, feeling the ache bloom and spread. Real.
I cling to it.
And I wait.