“Funny seeing you without the gun. Where is it?”

“Somewhere. Fuck if I know; dropped it a while back”

“And you didn’t think to pick it up?”

“If I knew where I dropped it, we wouldn’t be having this conversation, Angela.”

“Fair enough.”

Jonathan Wicker Abhrams collapsed unto the cold, stone floors, back to the wall and head hung low. He watched as all four cameras propped up on all four corners of the ceiling blinked a distinct red, very much so observing and very much so recording. They too watched him.

They always did.

God's Eye did not blink.

It was the perfect system in a long line of perfect systems, keeping tabs on all of Cerberus all at once.

“How’re you holding up?” The Hunter whispered; his voice carried over, still.

“Same old, same old, John,” the good doctor returned to her book, and to the comforts of her one and only bed, tossing and turning in place. “I need to get out more — get some fresh air. I can’t think straight in here. Plus the food’s really gone downhill lately. What the hell is even pickled sardines anyway? What moron eats this — willingly?”

"It's fish."

"It's disgusting is what it is."

"Some places consider it a delicacy."

"Well, some places are stupid."

“Is here stupid?”

“Here is very stupid.”

John gave a chuckle.

That's Angela, alright — just like the child she is.

Figuratively, literally, metaphorically speaking.

“And the other one?" the Hunter said. "How’s she holding up?”

“I told you, John, I don’t like talking about tha — about her.”

“Right. Sorry.”

"It's fine. Go on, tell me about your day."

The good doctor was, in the eyes of Jonathan Wicker Abhrams and so many others, a rather exceptionally extraordinary individual. She had yellow-golden hair which glinted in the afternoon sun; bright, blue eyes that seemed to shine through even the darkest of darks; and, perhaps most notably, a rather odd looking set of canines, which were far more pronounced than any regular person’s.

Unfortunately, sunlight seldom crept its way into the prison cells.

There was no glint in her hair, nor light in her eyes.

Not anymore, at least.

They were long gone.

Angela herself was something of a gift to the Heimer Republic medical society. Prior to her rather unexpected — and violent — imprisonment, the good doctor was quite the upstanding figure, winning award after award; making new, groundbreaking discoveries on an almost daily basis; and being the pride and joy of Republic Science itself.

By all means, she was clever.

She was determined.

She was so full of life and vigor.

How, exactly, she managed such incredible feets remains still a mystery.

That is, to everyone but the Hunter and Cerberus.

They knew.

They knew all too well.

See, Doctor Angela Prince wasn’t really only Doctor Angela Prince. Most of her peers and much of the Heimer Republic had long since recognized her diagnosis: severe split personality disorder. The good doctor oftentimes tabbed in and out — switched between her two personalities — almost erratically. There was Doctor Angela Pierce: proclaimed scientist, famed biologist, and Jonathan Wicker Abrahm’s personal therapist.

And then there was the other Angela.

The one that wasn’t quite so kind.

The one that wasn’t quite so concerned with the moral boundaries of science and the preservative nature of medicine.

The one that wasn’t quite so. . .

Human.

That one was the reason both were locked up here.

That one was a monster.

That Angela also happened to possess knowledge incomprehensible to the feeble human mind. She could bend mother nature to her will; reshape the human body how she saw fit; read the stars; read the world; read the future itself, even. For better or for worse, she was the very definition of walking, living, breathing knowledge, and she didn’t quite care one bit for “doing the right thing.” It was as if she knew everything there was to know about anything.

All the experiments. . .

All the human subjects. . .

All the horrors that day, when they found her amongst the bodies, laughing, grinning, smiling ever so widely. . .

And dancing.

Suffice to say, there were plenty of resignations following suit.

Zeiffar.

Doctor Angela Zeiffar.

She was the other one.

She was the other half.

“You look like shit, by the way, John,” Angela said, flipping through the pages of The Morality Boundary two at a time. Her name was on the cover. “What’s got you like that?”

“Oh, you know,” Jonathan Wicker Abhrams went from sitting to lying down, and from lying down to making himself right at home on the cold, unfortunately uncarpeted, stone floors. “Just work is all.”

“Busy day?”

“I guess. Almost fucking died.”

“What?”

“I said I almost d—”

“I heard you the first time, damn it. Don’t I always tell you to be careful, John?”

The Hunter snickered. “Well, yes — duh — but I can only be so careful, Ange. Shit happens; you know how it is. It’s not a big deal. It’s just work. Just another Tuesday is all.”

“Not a big deal? John, I—”

“Angela, please. Enough with it. I’m here, aren’t I? I’m alive, aren’t I? Got my arms, my legs, and my head, still. Can we talk about something else? Work pisses me off.”

The good doctor gave a long and exasperated sigh, before rolling herself into one, magnificent blanket burrito. “What about your nightmares? Are they getting any better? You had better stayed on your medication. I know you think they won’t help, but trust me, they do. I’d know; I made them.”

Jonathan sighed too. “They’re expensive.”

“Well, yes.”

“And they don’t help.”

Doctor Angela Pierce was quiet for some time, staring way off into the distance from within her cocoon — possibly thinking, possibly finding new ways to reprimand her friend and patient, but also possibly trying her damndest to find the most comfortable position. All three demanded concentration, and the good doctor was known to blank out when she did any amount of concentrating. She poked her head free from the blanket. “I thought so.”

“What?”

“We’ve had this conversation many times, John. I’ve told you over and over again, and everytime it seems like you don’t listen — like you don’t want to listen — but for your sake please let’s just try it one more time.”

“Oh, god. Not this again, Ange.”

“It’ll help.”

“You keep saying that.”

“John. . .”

"It. Never. Helps."

"Please."

“Look, I’ll level with you, Ange; I’ll be dead honest with you. Just because you’ve said something a million times, and you’ll keep saying it a million times more, doesn’t mean it’s what’s happening. All this medication you have me on, all this fucking shit doesn’t ever fucking help. I almost missed rent last month because of this; I almost got kicked out, as a matter of fact — so I’m sorry, but no more pills, yeah? I can’t keep doing this.”

“John.”

“It. Doesn’t. Fucking. Help. It doesn’t fucking help, Ange — get that through your head. I can’t do this anymore; I won’t do this anymore. Everyone keeps trying to convince me I’m crazy, but I know fucking better—”

“Just listen—”

“I’m not fucking crazy! I’m not crazy and I’m not having you, or anyone else tell me otherwise!”

Jonathan Wicker Abhrams swallowed, hard. He wasn’t at home on the floor anymore; he was standing full and upright and balling his fists up altogether, and his face was most definitely red.

Angela didn’t say a word.

She simply sat there — still in her blanket burrito — smiling almost out of sympathy.

Or rather. . .

Was it pity?

Whichever one worked, honestly.

The Hunter could never tell the difference.

Didn't matter either if he could.

It wouldn’t matter much.

He let the silence ring.

And the cameras watch.

And the dust settle.

And back to the floors he went.

“Sorry," the Hunter whispered. His voice had lost itself. “Didn’t. . . Didn’t mean all that. It's been a rough day.”

She heard him anyway, from all the way within her glass cage and all the way within her exceptionally well-crafted blanket cocoon. “It’s alright. I understand.”

Silence, once more.

“I'm sorry too, John.”

Angela looked up at him, and slowly, she began to wiggle free from the constraints of her bed. Her lab coat was a mess.

“Please don’t cry.”

But he did anyway.

For the first time in a long, long time, Jonathan Wicker Abhrams, cried.

And he cried long and hard.

"I'm trying, Ange."

"I know you are."

Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.

"I'm trying my best."

"I know. . ."

***

Jonathan Wicker Abhrams was not one to shed tears quite so easily, which made the sobbing and sniffling and weeping that much more shocking. Even to the good doctor, this was a first; she had never seen him cry — not this hard, at least.

It made sense, after all. Jonathan Wicker Abhrams was a soldier, and soldiers were specially trained from a very young age. They were trained to view the world differently, as perhaps a means to an end. They were trained to see others not as friends or families or fellow comrades, but as tools and leverages. Above all, they were trained to cull the weak in their minds. They were trained not to feel — only to listen and act.

Thus was the ideal Heimer Republic soldier.

And he was one.

Was.

The Hunter wiped a stray tear from one cheek. “Sorry.”

Angela smiled still, from the other side of the glass. “What for, exactly, John?”

“All that.”

“All that?”

“Didn’t mean to. . . Thought I just. . . Couldn’t hold it in, was all.”

Doctor Angela Prince gave a chuckle. She dusted and patted and tugged her coat back straight and into its former, messy glory. “Don’t you ever apologize for crying, John. It’s human to express such emotions.”

“Well,” John too gave a chuckle, still very much so sniffling. “If you haven’t got the memo yet by now, I’m not quite one. The term’s ‘Hunter.’ We’re pretty far from human.”

“With that kind of fashion sense? I find it difficult to disagree.”

“What’s. . . What’s wrong with the coat?”

“It’s outdated.”

“It’s nice.”

“Maybe a few decades back.”

She laughed.

He laughed.

God’s Eye laughed with him.

And so did Lieutenant Colonel Schneider, from the other side of the monitor.

And the man next to him.

The Hunter blew his nose clean with a darkened handkerchief in hand. There were bits of ash and perhaps even cement scattered within and throughout. It was, fortunately, gray. No one would take notice. “I’m a mess.”

The good doctor returned to her bed, one foot dangling off the edge. The book too was back in her hands. “Yep.”

“You weren’t supposed to agree with me.”

“It’s the truth.”

“A little harsh, don’t you think?”

“It’s important for us to accept reality, wouldn’t you agree? Don’t see the world as what it can be, John, see it as it is. It’ll save you a lot of pain, trust me.”

“So you’re a life coach, now?”

“At this point, am I not?”

“Fair enough.”

Angela pulled a notebook free from within her lab coat, scribbling onto the yellowed pages indiscernible, almost alien-like words. Jonathan Wicker Abhrams pried open one eye, saw what the good doctor was up to, then returned to the floor once more — closer to the glass cage this time.

This was it.

They started.

Already, and so early.

“What’re you writing?”

“Some things about this one patient I’m seeing.”

“What things?”

“How he’s stubborn. How he has unresolved traumas stemming from childhood. How he refuses to see them as traumas, and portrays them as something more — something like a. . .”

The good doctor hesitated.

She looked to the Hunter, and found him sitting directly opposite of the glass cage, way past the warning lines. He was looking at her, almost nervously.

And then, there was the nod.

“If you’re not comfortable, John, we could—”

“No, no. You said this’ll help.”

“It will, but if you’re not comf—”

“Then it’ll help. I trust you.”

Doctor Angela Prince lost her smile.

“Are you sure?”

The Hunter did too, even if he never had one to begin with.

He shrugged.

“Yeah. Go on.”

And so she did.

Painfully.

“Tell me, John. . .”

Jonathan Wicker Abhrams gulped.

So it began.

This was the part he hated most.

The Organic Deconstructor didn’t compare.

“Tell me about the Man in the Shadow.”

***

"Tell me what he looks like, John."

"He's. . . Uhh. . ."

The Hunter swallowed hard. A stray bead of sweat rolled down the side of one cheek, thereafter dripping onto the floors below. Jonathan heard it hit.

"He's — He’s tall."

"How tall, John?"

"Maybe. . . E-Eight feet? Nine?"

"Mmm. Continue."

"He's got a suit on, and — and this hat that covers part of the face, except for t-the. . ."

"Except for the what, John?"

Jonathan gulped. He found the words incredibly hard to spit out, as if someone had gone and tied his tongue into knots. His throat was not helping; neither was the cold in his bones and skin, prying and jabbing and stinging. "The f-fucking. . ."

Angela waited. "Take your time; I've got all day."

"The smile, Ange."

Scribble, scribble went the good doctor's pen on her notebook pages. "The smile?"

"The sm-smile."

"What about it?"

"It's from ear to ear, and if you look close e-enough you can see the — the fucking skin split and tear and — fucking. . ."

"And?"

"And see the. . ."

"The. . . Keep going, John. You're doing good."

"The flesh."

"The flesh. Splendid."

Scribble, scribble.

"What about the rest of him?" Angela said, flipping to a brand new page altogether. "What does he do?"

"He stands there."

"And does. . . What?"

"Nothing."

"Nothing, John?"

"He stands there, and looks at me."

"Looks at you, very nice. Elaborate, please."

"He doesn't ever do anything. He just stands there and stares at me and smiles. He always just fucking. . . Smiles."

The good doctor looked up from her notes. "Does he ever hurt you, John?"

"No."

"Does he ever touch you?"

"No."

"Move?"

"No."

"And when do you see him?"

"Only at night. Only when I'm. . ."

"I'm. . . What, John?"

"Only when I'm. . .”

“You have to say it for me.”

"I'm. . ."

"Almost there."

“Alone."

The word was cold.

Scribble, scribble.

"So," Angela was twirling the pencil in hand. "Let me see if I can get this straight."

"You see this tall man every night when you're all alone, and he doesn't ever do anything other than stand there and stare and smile."

The good doctor paused.

The Hunter nodded.

She went on.

"He's never hurt you, he's never spoken, he's never so much as even moved. He has this suit on, a hat covering the face, and tears all over the skin."

Another wait.

Another nod.

"Oh, also, he likes to smile."

Scribble, scribble.

"Close enough?"

A final nod from the Hunter.

"And how does he make you feel, John?"

"Scared."

This time, the answer came without hesitation.

"Scared as shit, Ange."

"Interesting."

"It's slow, at first. . ."

"What is, John?"

"And I try to ignore it but that only ever works for so long."

"John?"

Jonathan Wicker Abhrams was leaning against the glass, barely holding himself together, both figuratively and literally speaking. His fingers had gone and scratched at the stone floors, trembling and shaking and most positively bleeding — if just a bit. There was not so much as a trace of frustration in the Hunter's words.

No, the frustration and anger was gone.

She sensed something else in him.

Something Jonathan Wicker Abhrams, Hunter and soldier, was not supposed to feel.

It was fear.

Primal.

Unbridled.

Pure.

Fear.

"Wherever I go, whatever I do, it — he's always there, watching and staring and smiling. It doesn't matter where I go, it doesn't matter where I look—"

"Wicker."

"He's always there, Ange. He's always there and I can't ever run from this fucking thing and I'm going to tell you this right now: he's not just in my fucking head. He's out there and he's waiting and the moment I get home, he'll be there."

Jonathan Wicker Abhrams was staring way off into the distance. He was not blinking. "He's always there."

The good doctor remained silent.

"He's always there and he's never going away. He'll never leave me."

Scribble, scribble.

Angela watched as her one and only friend crumpled back down unto the cold, stone floors, cradling himself, and she could offer nothing but her sympathy and solace.

And only in words.

She couldn't even give him the one thing he so desperately sought: a hug, perhaps.

"I should have died today, Ange. I'm not supposed to be alive."

"But you are."

"But I'm not supposed to be. It was just dumb fucking luck, is what."

"But you still are, Jonathan, and that's the most important part. You're still here and you've still got all of yourself and you're still you. Nothing else matters one bit."

The Hunter wanted to cry yet again, but this time, he was all out of tears.

Way, way out of tears.

None left whatsoever.

"Do you think he's keeping me alive, maybe?" Jonathan Wicker Abhrams said, shivering in place. The night was young, and it was getting colder and colder still; the air conditioning certainly did not help. "Do you think he wants me alive?

“I think what he wants is what you make of it, John.”

Scribble, scribble.

“And what’s that mean?”

“You know what it means.”

“Maybe I don’t.”

“You really want me to spell it out for you? Again?”

“Maybe.”

Angela sighed.

“Listen, John. Take my opinion with a grain of salt, but I’m under the impression that perhaps this thing in your head — this man in the shadow — doesn’t really exist at all. I’m under the impression that you perhaps imagined this character as a way to cope with your. . .”

The Hunter didn’t say anything.

The good doctor did, though. “Do I keep going?”

The nod came.

And so she continued.

“I think this man in the shadow is your way of coping with the death of your parents, John. I think this thing doesn’t really exist; after all, he does bare an uncanny resemblance to that—”

“Man.”

Pause.

Silence.

“Yes, precisely. That man, John, is no more. You saw it for yourself, even.”

“Ange, what if—”

“They caught him, John. They caught him that night with the knife in his hands, and blood all over.”

“But what if—”

“And then they charged him.”

Angela retreated to her desk, opening a drawer not particularly gently.

“They locked him up.”

She rummaged within.

“And they threw away the key.”

The good doctor slapped a handbill against the glass.

“He’s as good as gone, John. He doesn’t exist anymore — anywhere. He only exists—”

“In my head?”

“Exactly.”

“In my head.”

“In your head.”

Angela breathed in, hard. “They made Séverin disappear, John, and I think it’s time the Shadow Man went too. I think it’s time Séverin stops living rent free in that little mind of yours, and you stop making him out to be something more than what he really was.”

Jonathan Wicker Abhrams pried his eyes open. He stared at the paper, and it stared right back, through his eyes and into his soul. The smile was there — the hat and the suit and all. This time, there was a face, too.

“He’s a killer, Jonathan, that’s what Séverin was. He’s not some Shadow Man in your head; he’s not some phantom or ghost or Creationist thing. He’s just—”

“A man.”

"Yes."

"All he ever was. . ."

“And that thing you call The Man in the Shadow? He’s nothing but your traumas manifest. He’s nothing but a remnant of the past you let live on. That’s what he really is, John — a childhood tragedy you couldn't accept.”

Angela went on.

"A death you didn't understand."

"A loss you weren't allowed to grieve."

She paused.

"A monster you met too soon."

The cell was quiet once more.

So was the Hunter.

So was the good doctor.

So was God's Eye.

And Lieutenant Colonel Guzmán Schneider.

The man beside him was not, however.

He was smiling, though you could never tell.

"Oh, Mr. Wicker, you poor, poor thing."

***

The Hunter glanced at his watch, knowing full well it was pointless. Both hands, minute and hour, were spinning round and round and round, much like a loose carousel. He was not surprised.

"Looking for the time?" The good doctor said. She was drawing something.

"Mine's all fucked."

"Magnets in the earth; messes with the mechanism and whatnot. It'll fix once you step out."

"That doesn't sound right."

The good doctor gave a snicker. She didn't expect Jonathan to believe such lousy, cockamamie reasoning — not fully, at least. Still, it'll suffice.

"It's late, if you're wondering, John."

"Yeah."

He stood up.

And then sat way, way back down.

His watch wasn't the only thing spinning.

The world was too.

"Maybe you shouldn't stop by the liquor store tonight."

"You know I have to, Ange."

"You need help."

"Clearly."

"I mean real help, John. Doctors, counselors, psychiatrists — professionals. Real help from real people out there, not here."

Jonathan Wicker Abhrams stood up once more. This time, he was not backing down. "There's no people out there, Angela."

He turned and went, keycard in hand.

"Just monsters."

Beep, beep.

“System Alert, Door 12-8, green."

The metal grinded open, and out stepped one Jonathan Wicker Abhrams, still woozy, still hurt, and very much so still cold. God’s Eye watched him leave.

"Some I can kill, some I can't, and some I just have to live with."

Beep, beep.

“System Alert, Door 12-8, red."

That was that.

That was the end of his solace.

The end to his moment of peace.

"Wicker!"

Jonathan turned just before the door shut, and right then and there, he saw it.

He saw the red in her eyes.

The fangs.

The claws.

The stare.

The blood dripping down the side of her lips.

The crimson mist slowly coming to inside the cell.

And the air stirring, darkening.

"Do come again. I like your face."

The Hunter couldn't help but laugh.

Good thing there was the glass separating them.

Good thing she was inside a cage.

A very tough cage.

A cage meant to never be opened.

It was a very good thing.

"Will do, Zeiffar."

Zeiffar let out a wicked, wicked cackle.

"Good to see you too, John!"