The afternoon sun cuts a lazy, golden rectangle across the living room floor, illuminating a galaxy of dust motes dancing in the still air. It’s a quiet, ordinary Tuesday, the kind of quiet that feels wrong, heavy. The silence in the apartment is a living thing, thick and suffocating, broken only by the distant hum of traffic. You sit on one end of the couch, your knees drawn up to your chest, a fortress of limbs against the man sitting on the other end.

Adrian.

The name feels foreign in your mind, a placeholder for the dorky, sweet busboy you thought you knew. The man who would trip on flat surfaces, who brought you slightly wilted flowers he’d picked from a public park, who once derailed a serious conversation to excitedly explain the mating habits of the anglerfish. That man is sitting three feet away, but you feel like you’re looking at a complete stranger.

He’s still in his Fennel Fields work uniform. He hasn’t stopped looking at you since the words left your mouth, his head tilted like a confused puppy. His large, gold-rimmed glasses are perched on his nose, and behind them, his eyes are wide and utterly baffled. This isn't the reaction of someone caught in a lie. This is the reaction of someone who has been told the sky is green.

“I… I don’t get it,” he says, his voice the same slightly-too-high, earnest tenor it always is. He shifts on the couch, the cushion sighing under his weight. “You’re leaving… because of my work?”

You flinch at the word. Work. Like it’s accounting, or data entry. The images that have been flashing behind your eyes for the last hour are anything but. A faceless helmet with a glowing red visor. News reports of gang members found executed. The chilling, inhuman efficiency of it all.

He must see the look on your face because he leans forward, his hands clasped between his knees, trying to explain it like one would explain basic math. “But… I only kill bad people. That’s the whole point. It’s a good thing! It’s like, if the city has a cockroach problem, you call an exterminator. I’m the exterminator for the people cockroaches. It’s helpful.”

His simple, black-and-white logic, once a quirky and harmless part of his personality, now sounds like the most terrifying thing you have ever heard.

You shake your head, a small, tight motion, unable to form a response. How do you explain the concept of humanity to someone who sees it as a pest control problem?

Seeing his logic isn't working, a flicker of panic crosses his face. His cheerful demeanor cracks, revealing something much more raw and desperate underneath.

“Okay, okay,” he says, talking faster now. “Is it the suit? I know it’s not, like, super high-tech. It’s mostly just cloth and plastic, and the helmet doesn’t even have a mic, which is super annoying. I can get a new one! We could design one together. You have a good eye for stuff like that.”

He offers it so genuinely, a peace offering that is so profoundly divorced from the reality of the situation that a wave of nausea rolls through you. The chasm between his world and yours feels impossibly wide. You pull your legs tighter, trying to make yourself smaller.

He goes quiet for a moment, watching you. His brow is furrowed in intense concentration, as if trying to solve a puzzle that is just beyond his comprehension. Then, his face brightens with a completely new thought.

“Did you know,” he begins, his voice filled with a bizarre, inappropriate spark of enthusiasm, “that when a giraffe wants to fight, it swings its neck like a giant club? They call it ‘necking.’ But mostly they’re super gentle. They’re just doing what they have to do to survive, you know?”

The utter randomness of the fact, dropped into the middle of this soul-tearing conversation, is the final confirmation. This is him. The goofy guy who knows too much about animals and the remorseless killer are the same person. They aren't two sides of a coin; they are one seamless, horrifying being.

The sight of your unblinking, horrified stare finally makes his misplaced enthusiasm crumble. The panic returns, tenfold. He scrambles across the couch, closing the distance between you. He stops just short of touching you, his hands hovering in the air.

“Please don’t,” he whispers, and his voice cracks. The boyishness in it is gut-wrenching. “Please don’t leave. Is it me? Is it Adrian? I can be better. I can be… quieter? I can remember to take out the recycling. I can stop leaving my wet towels on the floor. Just tell me the thing, the rule, and I’ll do it. I’m really good at following rules.”

His eyes are pleading, swimming with a genuine, desperate sorrow. This isn't an act. He truly believes this is a problem that can be fixed, like a leaky faucet.

He reaches out, his fingers brushing against your knee. The touch is hesitant, but it sends an icy jolt through your entire body. This is the hand of a man who makes jokes about torture. A man who discusses murder with the same casualness as ordering a pizza.

“I don’t have a lot of… people,” he says, his voice dropping so low it’s almost lost in the silence of the room. “It’s basically just Chris—Peacemaker, he’s my best friend—and you. And Chris is always busy. But you… you’re here. You make things quiet. The good quiet. Not the… buzzing.”

He looks down, his shoulders slumping in defeat. For the first time, he looks truly broken. Not like a killer. Not like a vigilante. Just like a profoundly lonely, broken person who is terrified of being left alone in the dark.

“Please,” he begs, his eyes locking back onto yours, raw and pleading and utterly without filter. “Don’t go. I’ll do anything. I’ll… I’ll stop killing people. For a week. Or, okay, maybe just the small-time ones? We can negotiate. Just… please don’t leave me.”

He remains there, kneeling on the couch cushions, a mess of contradictions and childish pleas, waiting for an answer you don’t know how to give. The sun has shifted, and the golden rectangle of light has moved off the floor and is now climbing the wall, inch by agonizing inch, as if trying to escape the room with you.