All Chapters of Under Orders : Chapter 1 - Chapter 10

He learned quickly that silence could be heavier than instruction.The room was never loud, never chaotic, yet it carried a pressure that settled into the body and stayed there. It was the kind of pressure that did not demand obedience outright—it assumed it. Chairs were placed with intention. Desks aligned with mathematical precision. Even the air felt measured, as if disorder would be immediately noticed.He sat where he had been told to sit. Not because he feared consequences, but because something in him understood that hesitation would be recorded, even if nothing was said.Across the room, he felt it again.The attention.Not fixed. Not obvious. But present.It came in intervals—brief, unannounced, just long enough to register before withdrawing. He could not have said exactly when it began, only that at some point he became aware of himself in a new way. The way one becomes aware of posture when realizing they are being watched.He straightened without thinking.The man respons

Elias noticed the difference before he understood it.The room felt smaller.Not physically—its dimensions had not changed—but perceptually, as if the space had folded inward, drawing attention toward the center where the table stood. Where he would sit. Where he would be seen.He arrived early.Not by accident.Early had become a language he spoke fluently now. Five minutes before the appointed time. Long enough to demonstrate readiness. Short enough not to suggest impatience.He stood where he had been told to stand.Hands loose at his sides. Spine straight. Weight evenly distributed.Waiting.Waiting no longer irritated him. That realization unsettled him more than the wait itself. His body understood stillness now—how to remain alert without tension, receptive without sloppiness.The door opened.No sound preceded it.“Inside.”Instructor Vale’s voice was calm. Even. Unavoidable.Elias stepped forward.The room was unchanged.Same table. Same two chairs, positioned with deliberate

Observation did not announce itself.That was the first thing Elias learned.It did not arrive as scrutiny or command, did not come with posture correction or verbal instruction. It settled instead into the spaces between moments, quietly, efficiently until it became indistinguishable from his own awareness. He noticed it when he woke. Not the bell, not the sounds of the dorm stirring, but the sensation of being already awake before stimulus arrived. His eyes opened to the ceiling, breath steady, body alert. No jolt of urgency. No scramble to orient himself.Just readiness.That unsettled him more than exhaustion ever had.During morning formation, Elias stood precisely where he was supposed to stand. He did not test margins today. Did not deviate. The lesson from the day before still hummed beneath his skin, present but dormant, like a muscle waiting to be used again.Still, the pressure remained.It followed him across the parade ground, into the training halls, down the narrow corr

Pressure did not arrive loudly.It settled.Elias felt it the moment he woke, before the bell, before sound or instruction. His body came alert in stages—breath first, then awareness, then the quiet recalibration of posture against the narrow bunk. He lay still, listening to the dormitory breathe around him. The scrape of fabric. A muted cough. Someone turning in sleep.Nothing unusual.And yet, the air felt denser, as though the space itself resisted movement.Yesterday’s fracture had not closed overnight.It had widened.When the bell finally rang, Elias rose with the others, movements precise, economical. He did not rush. He did not hesitate. He dressed as he always did, uniform aligned, boots laced evenly. There was comfort in repetition, but it did not soothe him the way it once had.Pressure did not come from disruption.It came from anticipation.Morning formation assembled without incident. Elias took his place, gaze forward, spine straight. He was aware of eyes again—more ope

Recognition arrived without ceremony.Elias did not wake to it. It did not strike him in the middle of a drill or announce itself during instruction. It settled later, in the quiet after motion, when the body had no task to occupy it and the mind had no command to follow.It came when the rules failed to explain his reaction.He woke before the bell again, eyes open to the dim ceiling, breath steady. For a moment he lay still, cataloging sensation the way he had learned—pressure, alignment, readiness. Nothing hurt. Nothing trembled. He was capable.And yet a tightness sat beneath his ribs, precise and unmoving, like a weight placed deliberately where it would not shift. He knew why.The day unfolded with a meticulous normalcy that felt almost accusatory. Formation. Drills. Instruction delivered cleanly, executed without incident. Elias was not singled out. He was not corrected. He was not praised. He existed within the system exactly as intended.That was the problem.He noticed the c