THE SHADOW I BECAME

The city burned like it had been waiting for the chance. Flames crawled along the skyline, feeding on glass, paper, and old promises. The air was thick enough to choke on. I could barely see beyond the square, but I didn’t need to. I knew what I’d done. The files were already gone uploaded, scattered into every corner of the network. It had taken only a minute. One minute to turn everything we built into kindling. One minute to end her faith in me. I don’t remember the shouting clearly, only the silence that came after. The kind that presses against your eardrums, heavy and unreal. I remember Leona’s voice through the static of the comms sharp, frightened, still trying to sound calm. Then a c***k, a rush of noise, and nothing. I told myself she’d made it out. That she was somewhere beyond the fire, camera in hand, already writing her next story. But the lie didn’t fit in my mouth. It never has. The streets were filled with people who didn’t know what they were dying for. Some carried banners, others stones. None of them knew whose truth they were burning for, whose hands had pulled the first thread. Maybe that’s what truth is something that kills too slowly to notice. I moved through the smoke like a ghost already half-made. Sirens wailed, boots thundered, someone screamed my name, but it didn’t sound like me anymore. I reached the alley behind the old press building the one with the flickering light Leona always hated. For a second, I thought I saw her shadow at the end of it. Then it moved, and the smoke swallowed it whole. The air was colder there, and I remember thinking it felt almost peaceful. The kind of peace that only comes when there’s nothing left to lose. I took off my badge, my earpiece, my name, and left them on the wet concrete. When I walked away, I didn’t look back. Somewhere behind me, the tower collapsed. The ground shuddered, glass rained down, and the city screamed again. But I kept walking, one step after another, into the kind of darkness that doesn’t end with dawn. That was ten years ago. The fire went out, but the smoke never left me. Even now, when the nights are quiet, I can still hear it the soft hiss of burning paper, and her voice caught somewhere between the flames.