"So," Major Krastev starts, as the elevator slowly descends into iron bowels of Magimax. "What was the sudden influx of testosterone like, Willow?"

  She scratches her arm, turning away. "Please don't ask me about that, sir. All I can say is it's worse than you'd think, and I'm never going to watch anything with body horror again."

  Krastev nods along, ignoring a sudden groaning from the elevator. "Then it's time for a topic change. Willow Valley. Lovely name."

  "Thank you, sir. I was raised by two hippies who were very into 'ascending their consciousness'. Willow Valley isn't the worst name I could have gotten, if you can believe it. My sister is Sally Valley... By the way, what's Vale's first name, sir? It wasn't on any of the documents you had me fill out, just her prisoner number."

  "She doesn't like to be called it, but Chad."

  "Huh. I take it she's tried to change it?"

  "Yep, but Stolatz insisted on not letting her legally do so. In fact, he only started calling her Vale when she refused to help anyone else with occult questions until he stopped calling her Chad. He's a stupid asshole, as I've said." Krastev goes quiet for a few seconds before speaking again. "Sergeant Valley, may I ask why you volunteered for this position? Supervising an occultist doesn't sound like something you'd enjoy."

  She shrugs. "She basically saved my life, and at her own expense. Figure I owe her. What the hell is wrong with Stolatz, anyway? ...Sir."

  "He's a stupid asshole, and I've said that to his face plenty of times back when he worked at MBR. People can be mean, or be stupid, but both at once makes for a memorably useless person."

  "Right there with you, sir. If you don't mind me asking, what's your impression on the occultist?"

  "Vale's... a strange case. She genuinely believes she's doing the right things, and she sometimes is. Through the worst possible methods, though. What got her, really, was her obsession with a bigger goal of her's. She stopped thinking about the steps she was taking to reach it."

  The elevator finally slows, and stops at the third level of Magimax. Krastev lets Willow out first, before walking by her side.

  Willow looks around at the dozens of iron cells, each with a clipboard attached explaining how to handle each individual prisoner. "This place is... I don't know."

  "Horrific?"

  "Yes, sir. I read Vale's file, she was sentenced to fifty years down here for what amounted to technicalities."

  His eyes drift over to Willow. Despite her being on the short list for dealing with occult issues in the area, she's still stunningly ignorant of what the occult actually is. That lack of knowledge she just displayed is why Vale is needed. "There are no technicalities with the occult. Don't mistake it for harmless esotericism: the occult is not forbidden because it's scary, it's forbidden because it's a loaded gun with no safety. Though, I understand what you mean. Her individual crimes weren't so heinous, but the media picked up her story and ran with it for a while, and the powers that be wanted to make an example out of the slowly growing interest in the occult. She was incredibly unlucky, and I sympathize with her position, but she brought it on herself... not that she deserves fifty years down here. I don't know if anyone does."

  "I'm happy she's getting a second chance, then. Let's hope she doesn't blow it... oh, here's her cell." She looks at a pair of worn buttons next to the door labelled "WALL" and "IMPLANT," along with a small tray of panic buttons that would activate her migraine-inducing implant.

  The pair of security guards leer at them both, standing in front of the door like lions defending their kill.

  "Major Krastev, Counter-Magic. Move."

  They both step aside, less willing to deal with him upon learning his rank.

  Willow opens the door, ignoring the 'WALL' button that would make Vale face away from the door. "Hey."

  Vale looks over at them both, and a wide smile starts to bloom. "Hey. It's you."

  "It's me. Sergeant Willow Valley, if I haven't told you yet. Come on, let's get out of here. It's been five minutes, and the place is already giving me chills."

  "Yeah... I... I can't believe this. I spent two years fantasizing about this, and figured I'd spend the rest of my life doing so... But I'm actually walking to the elevator without a gun to my head."

  She holds up a hand at hearing footsteps walking away. "Just a second, Vale. Major Krastev, are you coming, sir?"

  He turns around, faintly smiling in the hellish hallway of iron. "I have some business to take care of first. Good luck, Vale, and godspeed."

  The pair stand outside the exit door, the same imposing iron as every door in this place.

  Willow pats Vale on the back, and says, "Okay. Here we go. Are you ready?"

  "Yeah... Yes. I am. God, yes."

  "After you, Vale."

  Without any more delay, she pushes open the door, revealing a small parking lot and a bunch of rocks. Also, of course, the endless blue sky above.

  "I... I don't..." Vale looks around, tears welling in her eyes. "I don't have to decide between looking at the toilet side or the door side anymore. Sergeant Willow Valley, thank you."

  "I'm glad you're getting a second chance. Okay, my car is the red one. We have a bit of a drive ahead of us."

  "Ma'am..?" Vale cracks, interrupting her stride. She tries to speak, but her words get caught in her throat, and the tears truly start flowing.

  Willow awkwardly reaches out to pat Vale on the shoulder, but the occultist lunges into a long hug, bawling like a baby and soaking Willow's shirt with tears and snot. Not what she expected from an occultist, but better to not drop her guard.

  After a few minutes of the awkward hug, Vale's calmed down enough for Willow to gently guide her to the passenger seat of her car. With a determined smile, Willow begins the drive down the mountain and into town. "So... you hungry?"

  "Yes, but I probably shouldn't eat anything too filling yet, though."

  "Huh? Why's that?"

  "They fed me one of those food bricks every single day. I think a grain of salt would make me transcend."

  "Jesus Christ, that place is hell."

  The mountains slowly creep away, Willow's car racing the afternoon sun to the horizon. Vale is looking at the window, enraptured, eyes racing between every passing tree and boulder.

  Willow glances away from the rearview mirror. "Hey, Vale, what did you hex the guy you defended yourself from with? That's the only directly violent crime on your file."

  She clears her throat before mumbling out an, "...it's embarrassing."

  "Go on."

  "Okay. I, uhh... made him incontinent. The hex lasts a few months, too.

  That's less bad than she thought. The guy might have even deserved it, if it was actually in self-defense. "Yeah," she starts. "Don't hex people."

  Vale brushes a few stray hairs aside, faintly blushing. Willow hadn't noticed until now, but now that there's natural light, Vale's actually quite pretty. Her black hair is cut exactly above shoulder level, and it loosely flows around her head like water. She's not as pale as Willow expected, either. The light in her room must have mimicked the sun to some extent. What's most striking is her icy blue eyes that seem to pierce through everything she looks at.

  Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.

  Yes, quite pretty. At least, for a practitioner of a half-dozen illegal forms of magic.

  Krastev approaches one of the cells. He recognizes the name on it, too. A murderer that MBR's ijiraq caught and left on the mountain for a bit. This guy killed someone for stealing research, or something stupid like that.

  There's no special buttons on the door. No migraine inducers. He slides open the heavy steel bolts keeping the door in place, and steps inside.

  It's spacious. There's a carpet. Books. A small fridge. A sofa. A goddamn television...

  "Oh. Uhh, hello," the murderer says, turning around a corner from another room and wearing an old t-shirt and sweatpants. "Are you my new counselor? I can go get dressed."

  Willow pulls into the parking lot of a grocery store. "Okay, anything you want, on me."

  Vale is salivating at seeing fresh produce through the window. "I'll pay you back, I swear, I just-"

  "You just got plucked from prison. Relax. Eat something. Don't sweat the details right now."

  "Yeah. Okay. Uhh... if anyone recognizes me-"

  "Then I'll handle it."

  A few tears start to form in Vale's eyes. "Thank you."

  Every single cell made for humans that Krastev looks at is kept in fairly good condition. Not all equal, but none nearly as bad as Vale's.

  He takes the elevator down a floor, where magical beasts are imprisoned. Borrowing a security guard, he checks a few of the beasties' cells.

  This is the Magimax he saw with Vale. They're all kept in conditions similar to she was: cramped, sterile, depressing. So why is Vale the only human kept in conditions like that?

  A faint smile flickers across Krastev's mouth. He's always wanted to interrogate Stolatz, and this is more than enough reason to.

  Now where did that slippery bastard go...

  Willow isn't sure what to think as Vale carries four full shopping bags into her apartment. Technically, Vale has a temporary apartment, but Willow gets the feeling that leaving her alone in a small room right now isn't the best idea. Better for the occultist to get acclimated for a day or two before shuffling her off on her own, and for Willow to get a better read on her.

  Vale looks around the apartment, and starts crying yet again as she carefully places the grocery bags on the kitchen table. Once the tears stop, she carefully holds a green apple like it's some sort of sacred relic, cupped in her hand, and rinses it off in the sink. With a hesitant smile, she leans in, and takes a bite.

  Willow doesn't need some kind of magic to foretell what Vale will do next. Jesus, how much can one person cry before they run out of tears?

  With a patient smile, Willow guides Vale to a spare bedroom. "My sister used to live with me, but she got reassigned to Dover, so I have a spare room. Not much, but it's a bed."

  "Blankets, too..." Vale says, as though she's surprised to see them.

  Willow rolls her eyes. "Come on. No need to exaggerate. You had to have had blankets."

  "Suicide risk. No blankets for anyone. Just a foam cot... can I lie down, ma'am?"

  "It's your bed, do what you want."

  Vale slowly approaches the bed, and runs her hand along the soft, quilted surface of the thick, neatly folded blanket. She reverently pulls back the sheets, and carefully slides in, apple still in hand.

  "Don't start crying again," Willow says, half-jokingly. "I'm bad at comforting people."

  Vale doesn't make a sound, so Willow shuts off the lights and heads to bed herself. Two years is a long time, but for it to have affected her to the point where she sees apples and sheets as extravagant luxuries...

  Something must be very wrong with Magimax. Might not be a bad idea to get more information from Vale, because that is definitely cruel and unusual. She'd always assumed Magimax was bad, of course, but this... it's insane.

  "Just the man I wanted to see," Krastev says, grabbing Stolatz's shoulder as he passes by. "Let's talk."

  Vale slowly wakes up, but stays in place. Usually she can get a couple more hours to make the days go by faster. The cot feels absurdly comfortable right now. Did they change it? She shifts her legs slightly, and at feeling a soft touch, she bolts awake, scuttling back and looking down. Fuck. Where is she? What happened? Is this a dream? Some new way to fuck with her?

  Oh, right... she's not in Magimax. She wipes a mix of sweat and tears away, and brightly strides into the kitchen, where her supervisor is already making breakfast. She rubs her eyes a few times, and smiles. "Good morning, Sergeant Valley."

  "Mornin', Vale. Hungry?"

  "Oh, I already ate yesterday."

  "So did I. No breakfast at Magimax, either?"

  "Breakfast, right, I forgot. They gave us one meal a day: that dense tasteless brick I was talking about. You had one hour to eat it before you had to return the tray. Usually an hour, anyway. Sometimes, they-"

  Willow holds out her hand. "So how about we get you back to a normal eating routine, starting today?"

  "Yeah... I'd like that."

  Krastev steps outside into the sun. Being down there for even a few hours was soul-crushing. If he were in Vale's shoes... well, he wouldn't have made it a month. That girl is tough as all hell.

  Stolatz was, as expected, cagey and unwilling to give good answers about the conditions Vale was kept in. No matter. Krastev takes out his work phone, and calls someone he ordinarily wouldn't want to.

  The phone rings twice before being picked up. "Ximena Torres, Magical Beast Research."

  "Ximena," he says, keeping his tone neutral.

  "Major Krastev. What do you need, sir?" she replies, putting a little too much emphasis on the sir. No doubt she loathes him after all the arguing they've done since she took over for Stolatz at MBR. Especially in regards to the ijiraq, but also the kynde and a million other things...

  "Ximena, have you been to Magimax before?"

  "Obviously not. No one except senior military is allowed on the same floor as the cells without explicit permission from the warden, and Stolatz has yet to grant anyone that privilege."

  "I can bring a guest, or at least, they won't stop me from doing so. I don't know much about magical beasts, as you're well aware. I'd like you to evaluate some of their living conditions."

  There's a long pause, where Krastev can only hear the distorted sound of papers shuffling in the background. When Ximena speaks again, all her agitation is replaced by focus. "Name the time."

  "Vale?" Willow asks, knocking on the door to the bathroom. She's been in there a worryingly long time. What is she getting up to?

  After a half a minute with no response, she opens the door. Vale is naked, hands against the wall, dripping wet and turned away from her.

  Willow turns around, not wanting to invade Vale's privacy more than she has to. "Jesus, put some clothes on. What the hell are you doing in here?"

  "S-sorry, ma'am. I saw you had a bathtub and hot water, and-"

  "And you're against the wall because... right, habit. You don't have to do that. Just enjoy the bath, I guess."

  "Yes, ma'am," Vale replies, as Willow hears her slipping back into the bathtub with a contented sigh.

  Willow closes the door behind her, too afraid of the answer to ask how she bathed in prison.

  Krastev exits the elevator with Ximena, and once they reach the lower floors. He watches as Ximenas eyes widen just from the layout. "You haven't seen anything yet," Krastev warns, as he brings her to the first cell on the right. "This dog woman was imprisoned three years ago for killing someone in self-defense. She has seven years left in her sentence." He presses the button marked 'WALL', and after a moment, steps through with Ximena at his side.

  The dog woman is silently facing the back wall, hands against it, as Ximena looks around the tiny room. A small desk and chair with only a singular book, clearly read to absolute hell. A toilet and shower with a drain beneath it, no privacy barrier. A single foam cot, no sheets, no blankets, and torn apart near the base. A singular light bulb behind an iron grate.

  That is the entirety of the room's contents.

  Krastev closes the door behind him, and a chime sounds. The dog woman hesitantly turns around, eyes darting between the two.

  "Excuse me, Mabel," Krastev says. "Could you please tell Non-Human Persons Director Torres when you were last allowed outside of this room?"

  Mabel's fur stands on end. "...when I was first placed here. I'll say whatever you need me to, though, I swear, just don't press the button..."

  Krastev nods, and escorts Ximena back outside the cell. "Well," he says, swinging his arm out to the long hallway. "We have a couple hundred more identical cells to look at, if you'd like."

  At breakfast, a week after Vale's release, Willow gets an email. Time to get to work, it seems. Only a week after her release seems a little soon, considering the state Vale's been in. At least she has properly fitting clothes and shoes now. Mostly business casual dresses, simple jeans and t-shirts, sneakers. Clothes to help her blend in.

  Willow takes the final bite of eggs, and grabs her purse and car keys from her room. "Hey, Vale."

  Vale softly smiles as she chews, turning her head to look at Willow. Immediately, she freezes, drops her fork, and holds her hands up.

  "Vale? What's wrong?"

  She rapidly swallows her half-chewed food, wincing as it's forced down her throat. "Nothing, ma'am. I'm ready to serve."

  "I meant why you're holding your hands up..."

  "I- I can put them down, ma'am. Just say the word."

  Willow takes a moment to follow Vale's sight line, tracing it to her right hand. "Is it something about my car keys?"

  Vale pauses for a moment, then relaxes, letting out a few nervous laughs. "Sorry. Thought that was the button."

  "Oh, right. I'm still carrying it, but I'm not going to walk around with it in my hand. You really don't need to worry about it."

  "Sorry, ma'am."

  "Can you drop the ma'am? I'm thirty-two, and you're making me feel old."

  Vale nods, scratching the back of her neck. "Sorry, Willow. I'm thirty-four, if it helps."

  That's unexpected. Willow had assumed she was significantly older and had used some kind of youth-preserving magic, given how broad her understanding of so many forms of magic was. She must be a savant, or something. "Alright. Well, we're going to meet some of our little task force today."

  "Of course." Vale stands up, and picks up her half-finished plate with mournful eyes.

  "There's no rush, Vale, you can finish eating first."

  Vale sits back down, and starts eating quickly, as though she only has a few seconds to cram as much food in as she can.

  It's at seeing Vale's desperate eating that Willow makes a decision. If Vale does as asked of her, Willow's going to make sure she's treated fairly. The occultist could use an advocate.

  Ximena is curled up in her car, trying to come down from a panic attack. She assumed it was bad, but... The fact that it's that bad rips at her brain. They're treated worse than animals in there.

  She takes out her phone, sweating and teary-eyed... but who can she even call?

  Who would even care?