Page 98 of The Arbiter
He leans down, his lips brushing against the shell of my ear, his breath cold against my skin.
"Cruelty is a matter of perspective, Madeline. I call it structural reinforcement. I am simply ensuring that nothing distracts you from your new purpose."
He pulls back, his eyes scanning my face with a terrifying, clinical detachment. He doesn't offer comfort. He doesn't offer a reason. He only offers an order.
"Go back to your office," he commands, his voice dropping to a low, authoritative rumble that leaves no room for debate.
"Write your report. Keep your records clean and your mind occupied. Your work is done here."
I stare at him, my legs trembling, my gaze darting to the cooling, limp form of Bryan on the table, the man whose life I ended in a desperate attempt to save him. The irony tastes like bile in my mouth.
"And what about him?"
I gesture weakly toward the table, my voice thick with tears. Deimos barely glances at the body.
"I will handle the disposal. You have done your part. Do not concern yourself with the cleanup; I am an expert in erasing errors."
He releases my waist with a sudden, forceful push that sends me staggering back toward the door. I try to steady myself, my heart screaming at me to run, to bolt for the exit and never look back.
"If I go," I manage to choke out.
"If I do this... you leave her alone.”
Deimos turns his back on me, walking toward the table with a fluid, predatory grace.
"Her safety is directly proportional to your obedience," he says, his voice not even turning back to face me.
"Every slip, every defiance, every attempt to involve the authorities will be reflected in her world. Go, Madeline. Before I decide that her proximity is as much of a liability as his was."
I don't look back. I can't. I turn and stumble into the dark hallway, the silence of the morgue pressing in on me like the weight of a burial mound.
Every step toward my office feels like I’m walking further into a grave. I realize that Deimos was right. There is no "normal" anymore. There is only the darkness, and I have been pulled into the center of it.
I sit at my desk, my hands hovering over the keyboard, but I can’t type. I can’t even look at the monitors anymore. I know if I glance at the feed for the Autopsy Room 4, I’ll see the clinical, heartless way he’s "erasing the error" of Bryan’s existence.
It’s the realization that scares me more than the blood. Deimos hasn't just reverted to the killer; he’s fractured. The man who held me in the bunker, the one who showed me the silver cross and spoke of his mother’s trembling hands, that man has been incinerated by a white-hot, vengeful fury. By leaving him, I didn't find safety; I triggered a landslide.
He isn't protecting.. He is conquering me.
I stare at the blank "Cause of Death" field on the digital form. Every second I spend in this office, Lucy is a pawn in a game shedoesn't even know she’s playing. Deimos is using her like a leash, tightening it every time I breathe the wrong way.
How much further will he go? If he could do that to Bryan. A man who was nothing more than a friendly face in a hallway, what would he do to Lucy, the person who knows me best? The person who represents everything he can never have?
A shudder racks my body, and I wrap my arms around myself, trying to stop the trembling. He’s completely switched off his humanity. He’s operating on pure, jagged resentment. He feels betrayed, and a man like Deimos doesn't grieve, he retaliates. He builds cages. He eliminates "distractions."
I look at the door to my office, half-expecting it to lock on its own. I am a prisoner in my own workplace, performing a post-mortem on my own life while the man I thought I could finally trust turns into the very monster he spent years running from.
The flickering hum of the fluorescent tubes overhead suddenly cuts out, plunging the office into a thick, suffocating void. I sit motionless, my fingers still resting on the mechanical keys, frozen by the sudden absence of light.
Then, the sound begins.
A heavy, rhythmic dragging. The unmistakable friction of something being hauled across the industrial tiles of the hallway.
Each pull is slow, deliberate, accompanied by the faint, metallic clink of a gurney lock and the heavy slide of a reinforced body bag. He isn't rushing. He is moving with the calm, terrifying precision of a man who knows he is the only ghost left in the building.
I sink deeper into my chair, my eyes straining against the darkness. I don't go to the door. I don't look.
The dragging resumes, a dull thud-scrape that marks the final departure of the man who once bought me coffee. The heavy steel doors of the service elevator groan open, then hiss shut with a finality that vibrates in the floorboards.
