Anya opened her eyes. The light from the narrow slit near the ceiling was a pale gray. She’d gotten used to waking up five minutes before he came—her body had learned to read the vibrations of the floor above. But today the floor was silent.
Hidden-volume notes:
08:30. He’s not here. No breakfast. This doesn’t fit his manic schedule. Two options: either he’s testing my reaction to “being alone,” or something unplanned happened.
11:00. The tap water is gone for some reason… The toilet tank doesn’t work either. If this is a test, I have to stay calm. If it’s an accident, I’m trapped in a place no one knows about. Frankl wrote that in the camp, those who survived were the ones who found meaning in everyday life. My meaning right now is to conserve energy.
I’m looking at the false wall. One hit, and I’ll know what’s behind it. But if I’m wrong and it’s solid or packed with earth, I’ll give away my main secret. No. Too soon. I’ll wait. Freedom without a plan is just a fast road to the grave.
Evening, and he still didn’t come……. I don’t know what’s happening.
Morning. Strange—hunger goes first. It just leaves, making room for thirst. Thirst isn’t just wanting a glass of water. It’s when your blood turns into syrup, and every movement of your tongue against your palate feels like sandpaper. Frankl wrote that in the camp a person is reduced to basic instincts. I can feel “cultured Anya”—the one who loved arthouse films and almond-milk lattes—crumbling off me like old plaster.
I’m looking at the false wall again and again. My mind conjures an ocean behind it, then an ordinary garden spigot. My hand reaches for a board. Hit it? If I break it and see a dead end, I’ll die of despair before I die of dehydration. Hope is the most dangerous drug. As long as the wall is intact, there might be rescue behind it. If I smash it, there might be nothing. I choose to keep the illusion of an exit so I can wait for him.
Evening. I’m starting to hate him for not coming. Not because he’s my kidnapper, but because he’s my god. The horrible, twisted theology of the basement: he gives life, he takes it away. I catch myself thinking I’d crawl at his feet if only he’d open the door. And then I jerk myself back.
No. That’s what he wants. If I give up now, I’ll become that “doll” he dreamed of making. If I survive, I’ll use this agony. I’ll make him pay for every second of my thirst with his guilt. You won’t wriggle out of this, Viktor. You think you’re breaking me, but you’re just teaching me to hate you for real. And one day that hate will eat you alive.
The crash of the lock upstairs sounded like a gunshot. Anya didn’t even move—she lay on the couch, conserving her strength. Viktor stumbled down the stairs. He looked like a beaten dog—dirty jacket, darting eyes, shaking hands. He was carrying a five-liter bottle of water.
“Anya! Drink…”
He poured her a glass.
“God, I couldn’t—there was an accident at the station, they shut everything off…” His voice was trembling. “I almost went out of my mind!”
Anya drank slowly. The water tasted like divine nectar, but she forced herself to keep a mask of detachment. She pulled the glass away, looking at him with empty, scorched eyes.
“Why did you come back?” she whispered in a cracked voice. “To see how quietly I die?”
“What are you talking about?! I barely got away as it was! I even punched a guard in the face over a lost pass!”
Anya sat up slowly; a fine tremor ran through her body.
“You lied. Everything you said about ‘safety’… it was just preparation for a slow execution. You left me here without a drop of water. Do you know what I felt? I felt myself turning into a thing you’d simply forgotten on a shelf. Even a mugger would’ve killed me faster—and more mercifully—than you did.”
Anya waited. She waited for him to fall to his knees. For his apologies, his I’ll fix everything. Instead, there was silence.
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Viktor straightened slowly. His shoulders no longer shook. He set the bottle on the table and looked at Anya carefully, almost clinically. His face went still, like a plaster mask.
“Enough,” he said, suddenly in a quiet, frighteningly even voice.
Anya froze.
“What?”
He took a step back and folded his arms over his chest.
“Stop playing, Anya. I looked at you just now and almost believed it. I almost felt like the last bastard on earth. But you’re overacting. That tone… those measured pauses. ‘I die,’ ‘slow execution’… You’re not just suffering. You’re using your suffering as leverage.”
Her heart skipped, but she held the mask.
“My lips are bleeding, Viktor. I haven’t had a drink in two days. Is that a game too?”
“Your thirst is real,” he said coldly. “The house system shut the water off automatically. But the way you package it—that’s manipulation. You’re trying to make me feel guilty so I relax. So I open doors, hand over keys, make a mistake.”
He shook his head.
“So you’re still there. Still at war with me. You still hate me so much that even on the edge of death you’re making plans to break me.”
Anya felt something inside her snap.
“You’re… you’re justifying yourself!”
“No. I see right through you. Did you think I was stupid just because I kidnapped you? That I can be tamed like an animal if you pet me the right way and cry on schedule?”
He paused.
“I wanted to come in peace. I wanted to apologize. But now I see that giving you more freedom is the same as giving a knife to someone who dreams of cutting my throat.”
Anya snapped, losing her grip.
“Then what am I supposed to do?! Praise you for leaving me to die of thirst?!”
Viktor’s look iced over.
“Be sincere. But you’re not capable of that. You’re too busy playing the role of the ‘clever victim.’ If you think I’m a monster… fine. Let it be so. Monsters don’t leave doors open.”
He turned to go.
“You’re right,” she drew a deep breath; her voice trembled, but she tried to keep it steady. “I admit it. I tried to use my situation against you. I… I just…”
He cut her off with a short, dry laugh. He didn’t even look at her, only adjusted his collar.
“Anya, stop. You’re sacrificing a pawn to save your queen. You’re admitting a small manipulation to hide a bigger one. It’s boring. You’re like an open book.”
Anya went still; her face went pale. She felt the ground slipping out from under her.
“What?..”
He turned to her, cold triumph glowing in his eyes—the triumph of an analyst.
“You’re trying to sell me your honesty. But honesty isn’t something you sell, Anya. It simply is. And you don’t have it—only endless layers of strategy. You’re so afraid of losing control that even in defeat you try to build a new scheme.”
Anya stood in the middle of the basement. Her shoulders sagged. Her whole arsenal—tears, seduction, intellectual games—turned to dust. She felt completely empty.
“Then… what am I supposed to be, Viktor? Tell me.” Real despair rang in her voice.
“Be yourself.”
“What self? Who am I here? Out there, I’m me because I built that world. I had work, friends, my cacti, my coffee in the mornings. A person is the life they build around themselves. And here… here I can’t build anything.”
Viktor watched her with interest, like a rare insect under a microscope.
Her voice broke.
“I’m like a bird locked in a cramped box. At first it beats itself against the walls, then it tries to sing so it’ll be fed… and then its wings just atrophy. It forgets what flight is. And in a month it’s not a bird anymore. It’s just feathers and flesh. I don’t know how to be ‘myself’ in this box. There is no ‘me’ here. There’s only your reflection.”
Viktor took a long pause, savoring the moment. A faint, almost kind smile appeared on his lips.
“There,” he said. “Now you’re sincere.”
He turned and headed for the stairs. His steps sounded heavy and confident.
“That’s the best conversation we’ve had this whole time,” he threw back from the steps. “Sleep, Anya. Today you don’t need to make anything up.”
Hidden-volume note:
Failure… total failure. All my strategies turned out useless against his cold logic.
Frankl wrote: ‘Suffering has meaning only if it changes you.’ Viktor wants me to change in the way he needs. But his phrase ‘Now you’re sincere’ means he mistakes my weakness for the truth. So now my only power is in my complete, total helplessness. What a nightmare…
I’ll have to stop pretending to be in control—or to be the one manipulating him. I need to become what he sees—a broken bird. But even a broken bird still has claws. And if I can’t fly, I’ll crawl in the shadows until I find whatever’s atrophied inside him—and tear it to pieces.
The night silence brought Anya the bitterest and clearest realization she’d had all this time.
She lay there, staring at the web in the corner, and understood clearly: today she truly lost. This man hadn’t just locked her body away—he was a mirror that reflected any lie before she even managed to speak it. His embarrassment had been real, his desire had been real, but the predator in him was smarter than all of that.
She was an interesting case to him. And all this time, while she thought she was playing a game, he might have simply been watching with curiosity as she flailed.
If I can’t outplay his mind, she thought, then I have to become something that doesn’t need his approval…