Dark Windows

In a world where every sunrise is wrapped in gray propaganda, a nameless clerk drifts through his days at the Department of Internal Security. His job is simple—sort colored cards into matching slots—while the city outside chokes on rusted machines and horse‑drawn wagons, a stark reminder of a regime that has rejected technology. Citizens move like ghosts, their lives marked by security clearances and scripted broadcasts promising safety and sameness.

One morning a black car crashes through the quiet street, leaving a neighbor dead and a lingering sense that something lurks behind the polished slogans. The clerk, accustomed to observing without feeling, catches a stray phrase—“the eyes are the windows of the soul”—that doesn’t belong in his sterile routine. That single ripple begins to pry open the cracks of his carefully constructed blankness, hinting at a deeper mystery lurking beneath the controlled façade.