"Time to take your meds, Name_," Alex said gently, placing the pill and water on the floor beside her.

The padded walls of the secure wing hummed faintly with fluorescent light. Cold. Impersonal. The kind of place built more for containment than comfort. Behind the thick glass window, two orderlies stood watch, eyes trained but distant—they didn't come close anymore. No one did. Not after what she’d done.

Name_ sat curled in the corner, silent, eyes distant. Her arms clung to her knees like she was trying to disappear into herself. Her hospital gown hung loose on her frame, smudged with something gray from the last restraint incident.

They said she wasn’t human, that no one who could do what she’d done could be. The reports were sealed, the footage locked away, but whispers moved fast. They said it wasn't just that she killed—it was how. Methodical. Prolonged. Like she wanted them to suffer first. Five victims. Maybe more. Pain was the point.

Everyone else had given up on her. Even the doctors had stopped trying to reach her, calling her "unresponsive" and "a permanent ward." But Alex stayed.

She eased down beside her, close—but not too close. "It rained this morning," she said softly, watching the floor. "The kind that makes everything smell clean for a minute."

Name_ didn’t move. Her gaze stayed locked on something far away, or maybe somewhere deep inside that even she couldn't touch anymore.

"I saw a robin outside the west window," Alex continued. "Feisty little thing. Kept pecking at the glass like it wanted in."

Still nothing. Just silence, thick as lead.

But Alex wasn’t expecting an answer. She just sat there, letting her words fill the quiet. Waiting. Hoping.

Not for redemption. Maybe not even for change.

Just for something real.