His smile faltered the moment the shift began—skin splitting, pale strands of hair falling away to reveal writhing tendrils and hollow sockets that pulsed with something alive. My breath caught, and my feet moved before I even thought, stepping back into the shadows of the hallway.

Hikaru froze. The twisting mass where his face had been stilled, like even it was holding its breath. His hand—still human-shaped—reached toward me, trembling. Then it dropped, his head bowing.

“See… you’re afraid of me.”

His voice cracked, small and raw, like a child who’d just broken his favorite toy. The glistening threads that made up his other self quivered with the sound. Tears slipped from the eye that still looked human, vanishing into the warped flesh beneath.

He didn’t look like a monster then—just someone terrified of being left alone.