The guard led her through a labyrinth of peeling brick corridors; each footfall echoed her passage. She smelled disinfectant, old food, and stale sweat. The building felt ancient, a colosseum packed with meat. Once the president reinstated the death sentence, human life had become a privilege, not a right. Alice hadn’t thought about it much—executions were something that happened to other people—but as she walked deeper, her ignorance melted away.