Taps in the Wall

The Cage was never loud, but it was never quiet either.

It hummed—through the lights, the pipes, the pulse of cameras. A machine pretending to be a prison. But Elias had learned to listen not just to the noise… but to what was *missing*.

That morning—or what they assumed was morning—Malik pressed his ear against the north wall.

“Three taps,” he whispered. “Then a pause. Then two.”

Elias mirrored him, heart racing. “That’s Sector C’s pattern.”

“Vesk said if we heard that rhythm, we respond with one long tap.”

Malik stood and tapped out the reply with his knuckles.

For five seconds, nothing.

Then:

*Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap. Tap.*

Six in total.

Elias and Malik froze.

“What does that mean?” Malik asked.

Elias turned to Vesk, who was seated cross-legged in the corner, scratching lines into the floor with a piece of broken tray metal. A calendar. Or a countdown.

Vesk looked up slowly.

“It means they’re listening. And ready.”

***

By now, Elias had memorized nearly every second of their days. The orderlies arrived only twice per cycle—once to deliver food, once to scan vitals. The rest was automation. Artificial chaos.

But no human system was perfect.The ventilation units—small, circular grates in the corners—operated on a six-hour interval. Once every six hours, the air cut off for twenty-three seconds before switching flow directions. During that window, the internal microphones distorted for exactly nine seconds.

Nine seconds of *silence*.

Nine seconds where sound couldn't be traced or recorded.

Vesk had used those seconds to start building something most thought impossible: a cross-cell communication web. Dozens of prisoners, separated by walls, could now pass plans, warnings, and updates using coded taps and knocks.

The resistance was real.

And Elias was now part of it.

***

Later that day, Elias was taken for individual processing.

A white-suited officer with a blank face escorted him down a long corridor—sterile and humming, each step echoing too loudly.

No other prisoners.

Only doors.

He was led into a small, clinical room with one chair and a single screen.

Commander Nera Vohl sat waiting.

She didn’t smile. She didn’t need to.

“Elias,” she said like it was still his name. “You’ve been adapting.”

“I’ve been *surviving*.”

She tilted her head. “Survival is a form of surrender. Adaptation is more… permanent.”

Elias didn’t respond.

She turned the screen on. A video played.A clip from a Dominion news broadcast. It showed Elias in a distorted montage—his voice twisted, his face pale and ghostlike. It depicted him urging citizens to riot, to burn down infrastructure, to incite chaos. A complete fabrication.

“This is what the world now believes,” she said flatly. “We’ve buried you, Elias. You don’t exist outside this room anymore.”

He looked at the screen, then at her.

“Good,” he whispered. “Now I have nothing left to lose.”

For a flicker of a second, she blinked. A crack in her polished veneer.

But she recovered. “We’ll see.”

She left without another word.

And Elias smiled.

Because he knew now: they were scared.

***

That night, he returned to the cell and repeated the new tap sequence Vesk taught him.

This one meant: *Phase One Ready. Confirm.*

Six minutes passed.

Then came the reply: *Confirmed. Initiate Disruption Protocol.*

Malik and Elias exchanged looks.

“What’s the protocol?”

Vesk stood and cracked his knuckles. “We start with confusion.”

***

At 0200 hours—according to Vesk’s internal clock—Elias began pounding on the metal food panel as hard as he could. Simultaneously, Malik howled and threw himself against the wall. Their screams were raw, chaotic, not performative.

Within two minutes, the guards arrived.But two cells over, prisoners were already beginning the second wave: short-circuiting biometric ports with spit, plastic fragments, and body heat.

In another block, someone hacked the water flow to flood a corridor.

It wasn’t about escaping.

Not yet.

It was about noise.

Overload.

The Cage’s perfect order cracked.

Alarms rang.

Guards sprinted past cells, barking commands. Surveillance eyes shifted focus. Vohl’s voice barked across the intercom: *“Lockdown Level Three. Isolate Zones C and D.”*

They were dividing attention.

*Exactly the plan.*

Inside Cell 42B, Elias sat in the middle of the chaos, heart racing.

They weren’t free yet.

But for the first time since the day they took his name…

They were *seen.*

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