It began as a recurring thought.
A shadow among shadows.
Feitan didn't believe in memories.
He believed in removal.
In cutting.
In burial.
And yet, she remained.
Ayumi.
Not her name.
Not her face.
That moment.
In the dark. On the floor. Trembling.
Hands clasped. Eyes swollen.
Breath shattered.
"Please. I don't want to die."
She had pleaded.
With him.
A man who didn't believe in bonds.
Who had never received anything but fear or hate.
She had spoken to him.
Not just to survive.
She had tried to reach him.
She had believed in him — even if only for a moment.
Feitan hated to admit it, but…
that voice kept returning to him.
In silence.
In the moments between waking and sleep.
When he cleaned his weapons.
It wasn't attraction.
It wasn't compassion.
It was obsession.
He had started following her.
At first, for control.
For safety.
To see if she talked, if she told, if she said his name.
But then no.
Then it was for something else.
He watched her from a distance.
Always from afar.
From the tree behind the school. From the black unmarked car. From the alley across from the gym.
He knew everything.
When she left home.
With whom.
Where she went.
How long she stayed.
What she wore.
Never alone.
Never.
Always with someone.
A friend. Sometimes her mother.
"She's afraid," he thought.
But not with satisfaction.
With irritation.
Like a child who breaks a toy and can't put it back together.
He wanted…
He didn't know what he wanted.
To possess her, perhaps.
Not in the carnal sense.
To possess her fragility.
Her kindness.
Her weakness.
To make her his.
To pin her into silence.
Like a butterfly under glass.
The cookies were still on the table.
The box — the one with the white ribbon.
She had left it there.
Untouched.
Now it was full of mold.
Green and white layers, like diseased skin.
The smell was both sweet and rotten.
He looked at it sometimes.
He had never thrown it away.
It was the only thing anyone had ever left him.
The only gesture not paid for in blood.
And he…
didn't know what to do with it.
He wanted to see her cry again.
But he also wanted her to look at him the way she had that night,
before she knew who he really was.
With those eyes.
The ones that didn't entirely fear him — not yet.
Because in her…
there had been a moment of faith.
And Feitan couldn't bear it.
But he couldn't extinguish it anymore.
Feitan had never written a letter.
Not like that.
He had left instructions. Codes. Threats.
But words — direct, real, personal — never.
The idea irritated him.
The need to be understood by someone made him furious.
And the fact that that someone was Ayumi… was intolerable.
And yet, every time he watched her — from a distance, through the leaves or behind the window —
the obsession grew.
He didn't want to touch her.
He didn't want to take her.
He wanted to be remembered.
To make sure she knew he was still there.
Still present.
Still capable.
He didn't sleep for days.
The imbalance wasn't weakness —
it was focus.
A rope pulled tight between two extremes:
the need to stay in the shadows
and the brutal desire to be seen.
In the end, he found a gesture.
No blood.
No threat.
Just one thing. One only.
One night, when the house was dark and no one was watching, he crossed the garden.
Silent.
Like time passing.
He left a thin little box on the doormat.
Inside, a single item:
A photograph he had found in Ayumi's backpack when she was kidnapped.
She and her mother, embraced.
Clean. Serene. From another time.
But Feitan had not returned it intact.
The photo had been cut in half.
Only her.
Cut out. Separated.
Her mother — erased.
And on the back, written in tiny, neat, glacial handwriting:
"Now you are mine. But not how you think. — F."
No full name.
Just a letter.
Like a fingerprint.
Like a bite mark on skin that will never heal.
Feitan walked away with calm steps.
He knew she would find the box.
He knew she would open it.
He knew she would understand.
And he…
he didn't want an answer.
He wanted a reaction.
Fear.
Confusion.
Memory.
Power.
That was what he really sought:
Not love.
Not revenge.
But a twisted sense of belonging.
She was the only one who had ever offered him kindness.
And now, that kindness would become a debt.
A noose.
A signature.
Feitan wasn't seeking forgiveness.
He wasn't seeking redemption.
He only wanted to exist in her eyes.
Forever.
---Ayumi...---
She found it on the doorstep at seven in the morning.
A thin black box — the kind used for jewelry, but colder.
Left there with disturbing care.
Too much precision.
Too much calm.
Ayumi stood still for a moment, bare feet on the tatami behind the entrance.
She stared at it for a long time.
No one around.
Just wind. Silence.
The house across the street — that house.
She took a step back and gently closed the door.
Her mother was still asleep.
She opened the box on the kitchen table.
The photo.
Her heart leapt to her throat.
It was her.
Her and her mother.
Taken a long time ago, on a peaceful day — one of the few. She had kept it in her wallet.
They had taken it… during the kidnapping.
Now it was cut.
Just her.
Her mother removed.
Erased with surgical precision.
And on the back, the message.
Small. Precise. Ice-cold.
"Now you are mine. But not how you think. – F."
A cold shiver ran from the nape of her neck to her ankles.
Feitan.
He had been there.
He knew where she lived.
He was watching her.
Always.
She sat down. The table trembled under her elbows.
She clutched the photo. Cold hands. Shallow breath.
Panic.
It wasn't over.
It had never been over.
For a moment, she thought of calling the police.
Then she stopped.
What if he saw? What if he found out? What if he hurt her mother?
She had already seen what he was capable of.
She had felt the knife at her throat.
His hands on her face.
The smell of metal.
It was real.
Soon after, her mother woke up.
Found Ayumi's gaze empty, lost.
"What's wrong?"
Ayumi showed her the photo.
Her mother turned pale.
"We have to leave…" Ayumi whispered.
"I can't stay here. He'll hurt you. I feel it. I know it."
But the response was a cold blade piercing her chest:
"Ayumi, we can't. Not now. Not with what I earn. I… I can't do it alone."
The words hit like stones.
Ayumi nodded.
Didn't protest.
She couldn't let her mother feel guilty.
But she had to do something.
Something.
That night, she didn't sleep.
She stared at the ceiling. Hands clenched under the pillow.
Tomorrow?
Would he come to the door?
Would he ask: Why?
Who are you really?
Why do you haunt me?
Even the thought made her sick.
And yet… it was the only thing she had left.
To face him.
To look him in the eyes.
To show him she was no longer the girl tied to a chair.
At dawn, when the sky was still a dirty blue and the birds had not yet begun to sing, she got up.
Opened the drawer.
Took out the gun.
The metal was heavy in her hand.
But she didn't tremble.
Not this time.
She got dressed.
Closed the door quietly.
Crossed the courtyard with her heart pounding like war drums.
The house was there.
Silent.
As if nothing had ever happened.
She approached the front door.
And knocked.
Three times.
Hard.
Precise.
Ayumi knocked as if her knuckles could break through the wood.
Her heart pounded in her chest, the gun heavy as a stone in her hand.
Her face tense, throat dry.
But she didn't look back.
Not this time.
Then… the door opened.
Slowly.
And behind it — him.
Feitan.
As always: upright, small, still.
Silent.
Black eyes. Empty.
No flinch. No movement.
Ayumi raised the gun.
Pointed it straight at his face.
The metal nearly touched his skin.
But he…
didn't move.
Didn't blink.
Didn't take a single step back.
As if he were used to it.
As if he had lived this scene a thousand times.
As if it didn't matter.
Ayumi screamed.
"Why?!
Why do you keep tormenting me?!
What do you want from me?!
You destroyed me…
You ruined everything — my life, my peace, my mind!
Why won't you disappear?!
Leave this place!
GET OUT!
GO AWAY!"
Her voice burst from her throat like a reversed blade.
Tears streamed down her face.
Her breath broke in her chest.
And he…
nothing.
Just those eyes.
Dark. Motionless. Unchanging.
He stared at her like one stares at a wall.
Or like one looks into a mirror — without emotion.
Ayumi trembled.
Her hands stopped responding.
Then Feitan took a step forward.
Slow.
Without threat.
Without anger.
Just… with that sick calm that never left him.
He approached the gun.
Until his forehead pressed against the barrel.
A whisper.
Dry.
Pure.
"Pull the trigger."
Ayumi's eyes widened.
"W-what…?"
The words died on her lips.
He repeated:
"Do it.
If you're afraid of me.
Do it.
And it ends.
Now."
It wasn't a provocation.
It wasn't a game.
It was the truth.
Feitan wasn't afraid.
He didn't want to live.
He wasn't seeking justice.
Only… an end.
Ayumi looked at him.
And only then — in that single instant —
she saw everything.
Not the killer.
Not the executioner.
But a hollow boy.
Fragile.
Rotting inside from hunger for nothing.
A body standing with a soul in a coma.
And something broke in her.
Not pity.
Clarity.
That boy would never ask for forgiveness.
Would never redeem himself.
Would never love anything.
Not even himself.
And so…
she lowered the gun.
Looked at him.
Shook her head.
"You're not alive," she whispered.
"You're just… still here. But you're already dead."
Then she turned.
And left.
She didn't run.
She no longer trembled.
She didn't cry.
She had looked into the void.
And walked out.
Not healed.
But stronger.
And as she walked away…
Feitan remained there.
At the threshold.
Forehead still warm from the metal that hadn't killed him.
And for the first time,
in that senseless absence,
he felt something.
Not pain.
Not relief.
But a deeper emptiness.
The void left by someone who leaves…and lets you live.
He closed the door.
No noise.
No hurry.
The house returned to silence, as always.
Bare walls, cold, almost blind.
Lights off. Empty rooms.
Only the soft click of the lock sliding into place.
Feitan stood still for a few seconds, his back against the wood.
Eyes open.
Mouth shut.
Chest unmoving.
Her scent still hung in the air.
Sweat. Metal. Cheap soap.
Fear.
Fear had a smell. And he knew it well.
And yet, that wasn't what had left a mark on him.
It was the choice.
The refusal.
The look.
Ayumi had pointed a gun at his head…
And then let him live.
Not out of pity.
Not out of weakness.
Because she saw.
She understood.
And didn't give him what he wanted.
Feitan stepped away from the door.
Took a few steps.
The house was bare.
It always had been.
A bed. A table. A chair.
Gray walls, like the inside of a coffin.
The cookies were still there.
Moldy. Stale.
Like a poorly healed wound.
Feitan stared at them.
Then picked them up.
One by one.
Dropped them in the sink.
Watched them sink, slowly, soaked, like soft carcasses.
Turned on the water.
Let them rot away.
Not out of anger.
But because they no longer meant anything.
He sat in the chair, in silence.
There were no clear thoughts.
But under his skin, he felt a noise.
A rustle.
Like something crawling.
An insect skittering across bone.
An image:
Her eyes.
Not when she begged him not to kill her.
No.
When she looked at him and lowered the gun.
Feitan had seen that scene a hundred times, with other people.
Begging, screaming, fake mercy, knees on the ground.
But no one had ever looked at him like that.
Like a broken human being.
Not as an enemy.
Not as a monster.
Not as a victim.
Just… as someone who had nothing left.
And Ayumi… hadn't needed words.
She had understood.
And walked away.
Feitan clenched his fists.
He didn't feel pain.
He didn't feel shame.
He didn't feel gratitude.
But something — something beneath the skin — cracked.
Like old wood, finally giving way under the pressure of a fault line.
He was no longer afraid of death.
But he was beginning — slowly — to feel the weightof still being alive.
One more time.
He stayed there.
In the dark.
Eyes open.
Staring at the empty wall.
And in his mind, like a dirty echo,
Ayumi's words:
"You're not alive. You're just… still here. But you're already dead."