The gates did not slam.
They swallowed.
Cedric stood in line with his hands at his sides, a thin plastic bag holding what little he was allowed to keep. Around him, men stared with the tired curiosity of people who had learned to expect nothing good from new faces.
A voice barked instructions. Shoes off. Belt off. Stand still.
He obeyed.
Every step forward felt like another layer of himself being peeled away—not violently, not dramatically—but efficiently. Names became numbers. Faces became files.
"Cedric Duncan," the officer read. "Eighteen. First intake."
The word first lodged in his chest.
They photographed him against a white wall that showed every tremor in his posture. He tried to stand straight, to look unafraid, but fear isn't something you can command out of your eyes.
When they handed him his uniform, the fabric felt heavier than it looked.
"This is temporary," he told himself. "They'll see the truth."
But the walls did not listen.
Amanda sat alone in her car outside the facility, hands gripping the steering wheel long after Cedric had been taken inside. She hadn't cried—not because she didn't want to, but because she didn't know how to start.
She remembered his first steps. His first book. The way he used to apologize even when he wasn't wrong.
My son is not built for cages, she thought.
The lawyer's words echoed in her head. Prepare. Brace.
She leaned her forehead against the wheel and finally let one tear fall.
Just one.
Then she wiped it away, straightened, and drove off.
Someone had to be strong.
Back at the house, life resumed with a strange, uncomfortable normalcy.
Monica supervised breakfast as if nothing had changed. Plates clinked. Chairs scraped. Naomi barely touched her food.
Ella watched their mother closely.
"You should rest," Ella said. "You didn't sleep."
"I slept enough," Monica replied. "What matters is that this family is safe."
Naomi flinched.
Across the table, the third daughter stared at her cereal, unmoving.
Safe.
The word tasted wrong.
After breakfast, Monica retreated to the study—Duncan's study. A room she rarely entered unless necessary. The shelves smelled of old paper and authority. She moved with purpose, opening drawers, flipping through folders.
She was looking for reassurance.
What she found instead was a thin envelope tucked behind a ledger.
Her name was on it.
Inside was a document—typed, dated, signed. Duncan's handwriting filled the margins with notes, careful and deliberate.
A trust outline.
Her breath caught.
She read faster.
Assets divided. Safeguards listed. Provisions spelled out with a clarity that left no room for doubt.
All children shall be treated equally, without distinction of gender or birth.
Monica read the line again.
And again.
Her hands began to shake.
There was no clause favoring a son. No secret elevation. No hidden path that led Cedric above her daughters.
Nothing.
She sank into the chair.
The room seemed to tilt.
All this time—
All this fear—
All this damage—
For nothing.
Her mind raced backward, replaying the scream, the command, the lie spoken into existence.
Outside the study door, a shadow lingered.
The third daughter had seen her mother enter. She had heard the silence stretch. She pressed closer, just enough to catch the sound of paper trembling.
Cedric's cell was smaller than he expected.
Not claustrophobic—just final.
His cellmate didn't speak. Didn't need to. Silence here was its own language.
That night, Cedric lay on the thin mattress, staring at the ceiling, replaying his father's words.
I know my daughters too.
He turned his face to the wall.
For the first time, he wondered if innocence was enough to survive this place.
Monica folded the document carefully and slid it back into the envelope.
Her chest hurt.
Regret came slowly—not as guilt, but as a creeping realization that she had set something in motion she could not reverse.
Down the hall, Naomi cried quietly into her pillow.
Ella paced.
And the third daughter stood at the top of the stairs, watching the house she had grown up in collapse from the inside—without a single brick moving.
Somewhere beyond those walls, a boy slept in a cell because blood had lied.
And inside the study, a woman stared at the truth she had been too afraid to learn.