Chapter Three – Therapy Begins

The storm announced itself in murmurs.

A restless wind howled along the eaves, tugging at the iron bones of the clinic. It rattled shutters and whispered through vents, like something alive, something watchful. Snow fell in heavy, wet curtains. Whiteout.

Halden stood at the edge of the world, and now the world was pulling away.

But therapy began anyway.

Mila sat across from Adrien Kael in the pale green therapy room a space designed to be calming, neutral. Neutral, she thought, was just a fancy word for nothing. No books on the shelves, no color on the walls. Even the clock ticked in silence.

She sat stiffly, back straight, hands folded in her lap. Watching.

He never offered small talk. That was something she noted.

Instead, Adrien leaned forward slightly, elbows resting on his knees. “You’re not obligated to speak today,” he said. “But I do want you to think. Intentionally.”

She tilted her head, unimpressed.

“About why you're here. What you’ve left behind. What you’ve brought with you.”

A pause.

“And what you’re afraid I’ll see.”

That caught something in her. A twitch in her eyebrow. Small, but enough.

He smiled faintly. “Fear isn’t shameful, Mila. It’s just another form of preparation.”

She looked away.

He let the silence bloom. He was patient, frustratingly so.

Outside, the storm moaned louder. A nurse knocked to deliver tea, but Adrien waved her off. He preferred the tension uninterrupted.

After a while, Mila shifted her gaze back to him.

She raised one hand and tapped three fingers slowly against her thigh deliberate. Rhythmic. As if testing the air.

Adrien noticed, of course.

“Is that a code?” he asked.

No response.

“Or a memory?”

Still nothing.

He didn’t press. He didn’t need to.

---

By noon, the storm had consumed the mountain.

Emergency generators kicked in with a hum. The lights dimmed, flickered, steadied.

Staff paced like shadows. Phone lines crackled and died. No signal. No internet. No way out.

For most patients, it triggered anxiety. For a few, full-blown panic.

For Mila, it brought something eerily close to relief.

No more visitors. No more questions.

No more searching.

She stood in the corridor outside the therapy room, watching the wind lash against the windows like an animal clawing to get in.

Behind her, Adrien joined her silently. His voice was low when he spoke. “Most patients hate this kind of isolation.”

She didn’t answer, but he noticed the way her shoulders dropped, subtly. Less tension. As if the walls tightening around them made her feel safer.

“You’re not like most patients,” he said.

This time, she looked at him directly. Her eyes were clear, dry, and far too steady.

He offered her a chair in the corner of the hallway. She sat, legs tucked beneath her, gaze drifting once more toward the storm.

Adrien didn’t leave.

Instead, he sat beside her, a respectful distance away.

After several minutes, he asked, “Do you want to play a game?”

She didn’t move.

“I’ll tell you one thing about myself. True or false. You guess which.”

She blinked once. That was something.

He nodded, taking that as consent.

“I broke my left wrist at seventeen trying to rescue a kitten stuck in a chimney.”

A beat of silence. Then, Mila slowly raised one hand and turned her thumb down. False.

He smiled. “Correct. I broke it falling off a roof during a prank gone wrong. No kittens involved.”

The corner of her mouth twitched. Almost a smile.

Progress.

“Your turn,” he said gently.

She didn’t speak but she lifted her hand and tapped three fingers again against her knee. Then stopped.

Adrien watched carefully.

“Code for something?”

Her silence was louder this time.

He leaned back, giving her space. “I don’t need to solve you all at once,” he said. “But I’d rather you not disappear.”

Mila stared ahead. Then, as if to prove something, she stood and walked away slowly, deliberate steps back to her room.

She closed the door behind her without a sound.

---

That night, Adrien reviewed his notes by the glow of a desk lamp.

The subject resists traditional verbal engagement but shows deliberate interaction through body language. Highly controlled. Possibly rehearsed. Trauma signs obscured, not absent.

He rubbed his temple.

Something about her silences didn’t feel like retreat. They felt like a strategy.

She was protecting something.

Or someone.

He opened the redacted portion of her file again , fire trauma, no family, no known contacts.

Too clean.

No one’s life just vanished.

Unless they made it vanish.

A knock interrupted him—soft, uncertain.

He opened the door to find Nurse Layla, pale and tight-lipped. “We’ve lost radio contact with the valley,” she said. “Satellite lines are down. Storm’s grounding everything.”

“How long?”

“They’re calling it indefinite.” She hesitated. “Dr. Voss is considering a patient lockdown.”

Adrien glanced toward the hallway. “Mila?”

“Already in her room. Calm.”

“Too calm?”

Layla nodded once. “Like she knew this would happen.”

Adrien closed the door slowly.

Not like most patients, indeed.

---

In her room, Mila lay awake, eyes wide in the dark.

The snowstorm howled like a feral thing. The generator throbbed beneath the floor.

She reached under her bedframe and retrieved a small object wrapped in cloth a matchbox, old and worn, smudged with soot. Hidden the moment she arrived.

She opened it and stared at the single matchstick left inside.

One spark.

One reminder.

She wouldn’t light it.

Not yet.

Not until the time came.

Not until he arrived.