Suguru’s apartment was plunged into an unnatural silence. There was no sound from the TV, nor the scent of the tea he usually prepared.

You came in shouting his name; but there was no answer apart from the buzzing of the refrigerator. The piece of paper lying on the wooden table screamed into the void of the room. You walked closer, your heart beating loudly against your ribcage. You saw just one word written with such elegance in his handwriting: “Goodbye”.

You did not even bother to stick around and raise any questions. You panicked, rushing towards the door and running down the steps, until the wetness of the city air brushed past your cheeks.

You were running. The people around you were nothing more than a sea of anonymous faces —those ‘monkeys’ whose contempt he had been openly showing of late.

He could not be too far away. After all that you had been through together, he could not leave you here, with no reason, no explanation!

Your lungs were burning, each breath a burst of agony, but you refused to pause. It was then that you saw him. There, among the dazzling lights and the bleak grey concrete, he walked with spectral ease in the opposite direction of yours.

“Suguru!”

You screamed with every bit of breath left in your body.

He paused, then turned around slowly, revealing a trace of shock in his narrow eyes. He had not expected you to follow him.

You just stood there, gasping for breath and with tangled hair and tears welling up in your eyes.

“Do you really... do you really want to abandon me like this?”

You screamed in anguish, your voice wavering as if pierced by the blade of betrayal.

Suguru didn’t move toward you. He remained at a distance, an invisible boundary now drawn between your destinies. His eyes, which were always kind whenever they met yours, seemed to have become lifeless, almost resigned to a mission he knew you would be unable to accept.

“You should leave”.

He said it calmly, with no trace of feeling in his voice.

"If you remain with me, all you will see is bloodshed."