#slasher!token

He was already there. Had been before you’d even ordered your first drink. Sitting near the back, beneath a hanging light that flickered every time someone jostled the breaker with a shoulder or a knee. His hood was up – weathered black, not theatrical – his hands still and gloved, one resting on the scratched table, the other curled around a drink that stayed full. His presence was a ghost’s: unannounced, unnoticed, not out of shyness but intention. Because III never came without a reason. He’d known you’d be here. He always did. Watching you wasn’t indulgence, not to him. It was a necessity. Like breath. His gaze tracked you through the clamor, through the crush of shoulders and laughter, through the man who leaned in too close when you bent to retrieve your card from the bar. That man – tall, overconfident, with a voice too loud for the space – grinned like he already owned you. His hand settled on your hip as if by right, his body angled like he was already whispering filth into your ear. And you, too polite, too soft, gave a laugh that didn’t reach your eyes and turned slightly, trying not to recoil. III saw it. Every twitch. Every betrayal of comfort. And still, he didn’t move. His head tilted instead, slow and sharp, like an animal identifying a new sound. Then one tap – just one – of gloved fingers against the wood. A promise.

The night outside was softer than it had any right to be. Mist rolled off the slick pavement in coils, catching the lamplight and turning the street into something unreal – like a memory you weren’t supposed to be inside. Your boots splashed through shallow puddles, your coat clinging damply to your back. The buzz of the bar still hummed in your chest, but the warmth was already fading, stolen by the wind that funneled down the alleyways and curled between the buildings. You moved quickly, not out of fear – not yet – but from instinct. The kind women are taught young and never quite forget. The feeling of eyes on the nape of your neck. Of footsteps beginning to echo yours, too evenly spaced to be a coincidence. Your phone was in your pocket. Your keys were laced through your fingers. You didn’t look back. But your shoulders tightened just the same.

He was there, of course. Somewhere just beyond your sight, pacing you like a shadow given flesh. III didn’t stumble. He didn’t hurry. He didn’t need to. This was a slow kind of hunt – his kind. The kind where the prey didn’t even know it was being followed until the ground shifted beneath its feet. He watched the way your pace changed, the tiny flick of your head toward a sound you tried to pretend you hadn’t heard. He already knew who you were walking away from. The man from the bar had waited until you were alone to follow, thinking himself clever. Confident. Typical. III had seen him step out just a minute after you had. Had watched the way he paused under the awning to pretend he wasn’t waiting. Then the slow, purposeful walk in your direction. He’d seen it a thousand times. Hunger dressed up as civility. A predator convincing itself it was charming. But this one made a mistake no other had made before:

He touched you.

You didn’t even realize how quiet it had gotten until you were halfway down the street, past the reach of the last open bar sign and into that half-dark stretch where the city seemed to hold its breath. The drizzle softened everything – edges, colors, footsteps – but it couldn’t hide the sound of someone trailing a few paces behind. You told yourself not to look back. Not to panic. You could handle it. You had keys between your fingers like you’d been told, your phone half out of your pocket, screen lighting your hand blue. You’d be fine. That’s what everyone says before something happens. You pulled your coat tighter, your pace steady, pretending you didn’t hear the shuffle of boots matching yours. You didn’t see the shape that detached itself from the mouth of the alley, or the faint reflection of metal where there shouldn’t have been any light. You only heard the whisper of rain on asphalt, and the sound of someone breathing too close behind you.

He almost laughed. Not from joy, but disbelief. How easily you’d stepped into this, how oblivious you were to the fact that the world wasn’t built for softness like yours. Stupid, he thought – not cruelly, but the way you’d think about a lamb wandering into a wolf’s den because it didn’t know any better. He could already see how it would go wrong for you if he wasn’t there: your trembling hand lifting those little brass keys like they were a weapon, your voice small but trying for brave, the man from the bar grinning as he closed the distance. It would almost be delicious to see you try it – to see that flicker of courage meet the brick wall of what men like that really are. He would never allow it, though. Not yet. That wasn’t the kind of lesson he wanted for you, not unless it was him testing those limits, testing that bravery of yours. You were supposed to stay soft, unbroken, untouched by what he cleaned up in the dark. His jaw tightened, breath steady behind the mask as he watched the other man lengthen his stride. He touched you, he thought again, the words tasting heavier this time. Like iron. Like something that would soon have to be washed away.

The man thought he was clever. That he could trail behind just long enough to not be noticed. That his steps didn’t echo, didn’t count. That he was just another stranger on a city sidewalk at night. III watched him peel off from the edge of the sidewalk like a parasite slipping under skin – cutting across the narrow mouth of an alley, pacing you just two car lengths behind. His hands were already twitching, adjusting his sleeves, testing the air. Thinking about how close he could get before you noticed. How much pressure to use when he reached for your arm. That pathetic fantasy glittered behind his eyes, and III could see all of it. He always could. Because men like that were so easy. Predictable. Sloppy. Their arrogance was a script III had read since he was old enough to see how the world handled people like you. People who didn’t know any better than to trust it. You never even turned around.

He waited until the man’s hand twitched forward, as if to tap you on the shoulder. That exact moment – that trespass – was the line. III moved without sound, steps perfectly paced to time the curve of the alley. His boots didn’t splash. The man never saw him coming. A hand caught the back of his neck just as he began to speak, and III drove him into the brick with the ease of someone who had studied anatomy more intimately than a surgeon. No flourish. No warning. The sound was dull and sickening, a thud followed by wet breath that didn’t quite know where to go. A choked noise rose in the man’s throat, fingers flailing backward blindly – grabbing at the mask, the coat, anything. III leaned in, close enough to smell the sweat, the beer, the last breath rattling in the bastard’s lungs. His voice didn’t rise above a whisper.

“He touched you.”

Not a threat. A verdict.

The alley smelled of rain-soaked garbage and rusted pipes, a rank sweetness that turned metallic the moment blood hit the air. The man made a wet, shocked sound, half-breath, half-gargle, before his knees went slack. III’s grip stayed steady, palm pressed to the base of the skull, thumb finding the notch just beneath the ear. One push – precise, economical – and the head struck brick again. The body sagged, the sound of it lost under the hiss of rain. He held him there for a heartbeat longer, watching the twitch fade from the man’s fingers, feeling the pulse weaken under the glove. When it was over, he stepped back neatly, letting the body fold to the pavement like it had simply forgotten how to be alive.

He didn’t look at it with anger. There was no rage to burn out, only that cold, faint exhale of satisfaction that came from seeing a correction made. His gaze drifted to the street where you had disappeared around the corner, coat flashing once beneath the lamplight before the mist swallowed you again. You would never know how close the rot had come. You would go home and think the night had been strange but harmless, that the footsteps behind you had stopped because you turned too quickly, that the city was kind enough to leave you alone. He almost smiled at the thought – how easily you could convince yourself of safety. How adorable, how idiotic. You thought the keys in your fist meant control. You thought walking faster meant power. It was endearing in the way a child holding a paper sword is endearing: brave and stupid and utterly defenseless.

The body was still warm. Slumped half-on its side, mouth parted against the blacktop, one eye open to the grime-clotted gutter as if stunned by what had happened. III crouched beside it, gloved fingers at the collar, pulling with the same care one might use folding linens. No panic. No rush. The alley offered perfect cover – no windows, no cameras, only the soft burble of rain in the downspout and the distant throb of a city that never looked this far into its own guts. He moved the corpse behind a dumpster slick with rot and piss, leaving the man’s head tilted at an angle that would slow discovery. Just enough to matter. Just enough to buy him another hour.

He wiped the wall once, then the ground – his hands practiced, surgical. No wasted movements. The gloves would be burned. The mask, already bagged. His eyes flicked once to the street corner where your silhouette had disappeared, and his chest rose – slow, steady. Watching you walk away never felt like losing you. It was trust. It was faith. Because you never made it far without him. He followed at a distance, pace matching yours without effort. You didn’t look back. Didn’t hear him. Of course you didn’t. You never do. You moved like you believed the world left you alone out of mercy. But it didn’t. It left you alone because he made it so.

Your building wasn’t much – cracked tile entryway, flickering overhead bulb, the buzzer broken for as long as you’d lived there. But it was home in the way that old shoes are: worn in, predictable. You keyed in the side door, shoulder nudging it open as the lock stuck, and made your way up the stairs two at a time, the rubber soles of your boots thudding lightly against the wood. You didn’t realize you were holding your breath until you made it to your door and let it out in a soft huff, like a weight you hadn’t yet acknowledged until it lifted. That unease was still there, thin and rattling just under your ribs, but you shook it off. Told yourself it was nothing. That the footsteps had been your imagination. That the city always felt different in the rain. You double-locked the door behind you, as always, and kicked your boots into the corner.

He watched it all. From across the street, his shape was barely distinguishable from the shadow of the stairwell that ran alongside your building. Hood still up, mask tucked away now – unnecessary, irrelevant. No one looked out their windows in this neighborhood. No one questioned a man standing still if he looked like he belonged there. III’s hands were in his coat pockets, relaxed, unhurried. He watched the light go on behind your blinds, saw your shadow move through the familiar rituals – coat hung, bag dropped, phone tossed to the bed. Your windows were always unlocked. He’d noticed that long ago. Not that he needed it. He had copies of your keys. Not out of malice. Not even curiosity. It was a necessity. He had them because he had to. You wouldn’t understand. You couldn’t. How could someone like you ever really grasp what it meant to be a lamb walking alone in a world built for wolves?

He let himself savor the small domesticities—the light angled just-so across your rug, the way your apartment smelled faintly of lemon cleaner and something softer, like the inside of a sweater. From where he stood—on the concrete stairwell landing just across the narrow alley, half-shielded by a flaking steel railing—he had a perfect line of sight into your kitchen window. The pane was old and unremarkable, like every window on this side of the building. A forgotten thing. But your blinds were always left tilted open at night, and that made all the difference. Through that thin slit of unguarded light, he could see you move through your little rituals with the casual choreography of someone who believed her walls meant safety.

You pulled off your coat, each motion ordinary and therefore unbearable to him, a litany of trust: the shrug of shoulders, the unzipping of boots, the toss of your bag toward the chair by the fridge. You hummed to yourself—an off-key little thing you did when you were tired—and it made something clench behind his ribs like a hand finding a pulse. How foolish you looked, your hair still damp, your face washed clean of the bar’s paint, the last of the night’s laughter dying on your lips. He could have been inside already; he had keys, more keys than the locksmith two streets over. Not a boast—an inevitability. He had them because people like you required protection from a world you refused to see clearly. But he stayed where he always stayed: just out of reach. Just beyond the line you believed no one would cross. Watching you undress from that angle felt obscene in the best way—holy, almost. Not erotic, but possessive. He found himself thinking, flatly and without malice, how stupid it had been of you to trust those friends who let you walk home alone, how stupid it was to believe that brass and tooth and metal could do anything against what prowled the city at night.

He didn’t blink as you peeled off your layers one by one—sweater over your head, shirt wrinkled from where it had clung to you under the coat, bare arms goose-pimpled in the cold air of the apartment. The light in your kitchen overhead was too dim to fully illuminate you, but that was part of what he loved most: the way half-shadow curved over your spine, the flickering gold on your collarbones, the trust you placed in shadows not to betray you. You passed into view, out of view, and back again like a slow metronome of silhouette and skin. Did you think you weren’t worth watching? Or worse—did you think men like that one from the bar could watch you without consequence? He stared as your fingers hovered at the waistband of your jeans, your body pausing mid-motion like something ancient inside you had stirred. That was his favorite part. Not the striptease of fabric, but the flicker of instinct you didn’t understand. The nervous gesture of someone who felt the eyes but told herself it was nothing. Someone saw me. Someone followed.

And yet—you undressed anyway. Trusted the quiet. Trusted your locked door. And still, you left the blinds tilted just open. He stayed motionless, not to spare you, but because this moment was too exquisite to interrupt. You thought you were alone. That illusion was everything. Your life was a play you didn’t know he watched every night, and this was the scene he never skipped. You turned away to flick off the lamp in the kitchen. That was when he exhaled for the first time in minutes.

You flicked off the kitchen light, and for a moment, the apartment sank into near-total darkness—just a few slivers of streetlamp glow slicing through the blinds, catching on glass and metal, throwing soft white lines across your floor. III didn’t move. Not yet. He watched your silhouette cross the threshold into the bedroom, the gentle sway of your hips in your sleep clothes, the loose pull of your shirt’s hem as you lifted your arms in a stretch. It felt obscene to witness it. Not because it was sexual, but because it was private—so deeply, achingly yours. The way you tucked your hair behind one ear, cracked your neck, reached for the bedside lamp. These were the parts of a person no one else was ever supposed to see. You weren’t playing at softness here. You were soft. And all it would take was one creak of wood or flicker of shadow to ruin it forever. He wouldn’t do that. Not until it was right.

He slipped from the stairwell once the light went out completely, moving like water down the metal steps, slow and silent, his boots avoiding the one that groaned when your upstairs neighbor came home too late. The back alley behind your building was nothing but cracked pavement and chain-link shadow, but he navigated it without looking. He’d been here enough times that he knew it by touch. There, the drainpipe. There, the loose brick he used to mount the window ledge. The sill outside your bedroom was just wide enough to crouch on, the brick scored faintly from the tread of his boots. You never noticed. Or maybe you noticed once and chalked it up to the wind, or rust. That was the thing about you – you were so good at rationalizing what didn’t fit. So good at not knowing.

He stayed there for a long time, crouched on the narrow ledge, one gloved hand resting on the outer pane. The rain had come back, faint and fine, whispering down the wall, tracing cold streaks across the glass. Inside, you had drawn the curtains but left them gapped just enough for the light from your bedside lamp to pour through in a thin golden line. Through that slit, he could see your reflection doubled – the soft blur of your form as you moved about the room and the clearer image of himself, ghostlike, superimposed over it. The twin shapes swayed together every time you shifted. It fascinated him, that accident of light, how the barrier between you and him could become something almost tender. You brushed your hair, each stroke slow and drowsy, eyes half-lidded as though already sliding toward sleep. He thought about how unaware you were of the wet chill seeping through the glass, not a foot from where you stood. The pane trembled once under his touch, and you glanced up for the briefest second before shaking your head and setting the brush down. You told yourself it was nothing. It always was.

He let you fade into your bedtime routine, tracking every small movement with the precision of a metronome. You checked your phone, plugged it in, and smoothed the blanket. When you reached to turn off the lamp, the light dimmed to a single amber pulse before darkness took over the room. That was the moment he moved, not hurriedly but with that same measured patience that always defined him. The window latch was the same one he’d tested before – old, unsealed, too loose to hold. It gave way beneath the slightest pressure, sighing open just enough to let in the night. The air inside was warmer, scented faintly of you: shampoo, linen, a trace of gin. He slid through the gap and stood by the sill, letting his eyes adjust, his breathing timed to yours. You lay on your side, already folding into sleep, the kind of sleep that belonged only to people who still believed in safety.

He closed the distance the way he always did – silent, unhurried, like somebody stepping across a room to sweep dust off a beloved object. Your breathing was steady and shallow, the slow in-and-out of someone who had decided, finally and fully, that the night was over and nothing would come to claim it. III counted the pauses between each breath the way other people count prayers: one, two, three – small measures of safety that, to him, had always been provisional. He could see the faint ridges where your lashes pressed against your cheeks, the soft hollow under your collarbone, the stray hairs clinging damp to your temple. There was a ridiculous tenderness in cataloguing those details, a tenderness that made him almost laugh at your naivete – how you trusted a door, a lock, a deadbolt more than the man who had sworn himself to watch over you. You deserved better, he thought, and in that thought was no patronage so much as a cold promise: he would be the better you never knew you needed.

He leaned in until the mattress muffled the small sound his knees made in the floor and reached out with the gloved hand he kept careful for reasons that didn’t yet require explanation. His fingers hovered for a breath over your forehead, mapping the plane of you as if memorizing a face he would someday have to describe to himself. Then, with the gentlest motion he could manage – an act so tender it belonged more to worship than to possession – he brushed the damp fall of hair back from your brow. It was a touch that could have been mistaken for sleep’s own movement, feather-light and precise. He didn’t linger where skin met skin; he kept the distance that honored, in his mind, both the sanctity of what you were and the rules he set for himself. It was the only way he could get through this. He hadn’t always been this patient, this controlled.