“Do you know what it’s like to be locked up?”
“To be surrounded on all sides by nothing but cold steel while you toil away, your only company being the thoughts scratching at you from the back of your head?”
“I’ve put plenty of people behind bars. Took away their life, their liberty, and their happiness with the slamming of a door and the turn of a key. The looks on their faces conveying the feeling of dread in their hearts. They had no escape. Nowhere to go.”
“For years I always thought I’d never know that feeling.”
“I was on the right side of the law, the man with the key.”
“Yet… A mere few weeks ago, I saw the inside of a cell. Felt the steel on my hands, the hopelessness in my chest. When the latch clicks shut all of your confidence drains out of your soul and the only thing left is despair.”
“The feeling is… suffocating.”
“But you have no idea what it’s like to see the inside of the jailhouse, do you doctor?”
“No, you’ve spent every day of your life as a free man with the entirety of Arcadia’s wealthiest waiting on you for your medical prowess. From the moment your clinic opened its doors you were able to roam the levels with a sense of liberty unmatched by those on the floors below.”
“I’d ask how it felt, but it’s all you’ve ever known, isn’t it? Your door is always open, everyone is free to come and go as they wish so long as they have the credits. No lock, no key, no worries.”
“But the thing is, Doctor… At Olympus? Everything changes.”
“Because we’re not going to just be in the ring, we won’t have the freedom to leave between those ropes. No, we’re getting locked behind four steel walls and they’re throwing away the key. Except unlike when the APD closes the door, we’re getting a chance at freedom.”
“And the only way to get it is to fight for it.”
“You’ll need to want that freedom more than anything else in the world. Every moment you waste standing around is another moment closer to losing your freedom forever. One single misstep, a moment of hesitation, and you can kiss the outside world goodbye.”
“I know all too well what it means to slip up, how it feels to be trapped behind those bars. My stay was short, but it left a lasting impression in my mind.”
“I never want to go back.”
“Unlike you, I know why the caged bird sings.”
“Once the door slams shut, I’ll do everything in my power to leave. If I’m trapped, then that means my brother is trapped. Nothing could get in the way of saving him. Not you, not prison, and not the steel cage.”
“I’m going to escape, Doctor. I’m going to lock you up tight and show you what it means to lose everything you have.”
“And I’ll do it all by the book.”