Semua Bab Whispers Behind the Glass: Bab 1 - Bab 10

Snow muffled everything. Even the sound of her breath. Mila Renard stepped out of the black car and into the cold silence that blanketed the Swiss Alps. The world was white and still, save for the distant groan of iron gates closing behind her. She did not flinch. She simply stood there, wrapped in her too-thin coat, clutching a worn leather suitcase that held less of her life than the hollow in her chest. Ahead, Halden Institute rose from the mountains like a glass-and-stone fortress — beautiful, modern, and merciless. It didn’t look like a clinic. It looked like a place where people disappeared. That was exactly why she chose it. “Miss…Renard?” a voice called gently. She turned. A woman in a pale blue coat approached, her heels crunching softly in the snow. Her name tag read Dr. Elis Voss, and her eyes were the kind that never missed a thing. “You arrived earlier than expected,” Dr. Voss said. “Are you ready to check in?” Mila nodded. She hadn’t spoken in over two days. Sh

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 broug

The storm began to retreat . It didn’t stop. But it eased its grip, like a fist slowly unclenching. The howling wind was now a distant moan, and in its place came a silence too deep to trust. Dr. Adrien Kael didn’t sleep that night. He sat at his desk long after the patients had returned to their rooms, staring at the word carved into his door. RUN. Not scratched , carved. With intent. Precision. Adrien was not a man who was scared easily. But something about that word, in this place, in this storm, made his hands shake when he lit his cigarette. He’d known the clinic had secrets. You didn’t work at Halden without brushing against a few ghosts. But this was different. This wasn’t a haunting. It was a warning. And he needed answers. --- The Halden Clinic had an upper floor few remembered and fewer used: the old Locked Ward. Officially decommissioned. Patients were never taken there. The hallway lights had burned out years ago. It had once housed the most severe cases—violen

Adrien stared at the photo for the third time that morning.It wasn’t part of Mila’s file officially, that file barely existed. But this photo... it was unmistakable. Torn down the middle, frayed at the edges, and tucked deep in a folder belonging to another patient.Patient Number 81 – Eloise Harper.The picture was of two girls, side by side, their faces half turned to the camera. One was clearly Eloise, her sunken eyes and anxious smile gave her away.The other… was Mila.Younger. Thinner. But her.No date. No location. No explanation.Adrien flipped the folder shut and leaned back in his chair, running a hand through his hair. The director’s warning from earlier echoed in his mind.“You’re getting too involved, Adrien. This girl is not your responsibility. We both know what happened last time.”But this wasn’t the last time. And Mila wasn’t just another patient.She was the anomaly in a system built on forgetting.---Mila didn’t sleep much that night. The piano session had uneart

Mila didn’t sleep after her descent into the basement. She lay in bed, eyes wide in the dark, her mind racing in fragmented images: the girl in the sketch, the words I REMEMBER scrawled in every corner of that room, the locket with the woman who wore her face ; Adrien’s sister. Her body was exhausted, but her brain was crackling with a current she couldn’t shut off. And beneath it all, one impossible thought kept rising to the surface: What if Cassia isn’t the only one who remembers? What if I do, too? Only differently. Buried. Muddled. Sleeping inside me. --- In the morning, Adrien didn’t mention their conversation. Not directly. He met her in the Glass Room as if nothing had happened, offering her tea instead of answers, asking about sleep instead of secrets. But something had shifted between them. The silence was heavier, charged. He watched her differently now — not just with curiosity or professional detachment, but with something softer. Something she didn’t yet have the