Silent Floors Ascending

The air stiffens in this tiered chamber, where fluorescent panels mimic a ghosted moon and cameras hang like cold chandeliers. Rows of clerks hunch in geometric devotion, their pens scratching out a muted liturgy. A stairwell bisects the hall, gray as bone, guiding the robed efficiency upward—yet none meet the gaze of the looming query: VOJTA? It glows on the central board, stark, ritualistic, beside the bitter command to ‘WORK HARDER. EARN LESS?’ I note their posture—spines coiled, knuckles whitening under paper weight—each body shackled in the choreography of repetition. Above, silhouettes gather along the balconies, silent witnesses to this steady descent into obedience. The scent of iron ducts and recycled breath testifies to years of deferred longing. Still, the question persists, humming like a requiem in circuitry: where among these numbered desks did he slip away? The crowd offers no answer, only the hollow rustle of forms, reminding us that Vojta has not returned, and the search must go on through the corridors of their immaculate decay.