Your friends are still talking when he steps out of the dark. Not rushing. Not dramatic. Just… there. He doesn’t look at you at first. His gaze fixes on one of them — the one lagging half a step behind, the one whose smile never quite reaches their eyes. “Stop,” he says. It isn’t loud. It doesn’t need to be. Your friend laughs nervously. “Dude, what’s your problem—” The man moves. One second your friend is standing. The next, they’re slammed into the wall, feet dangling, breath crushed out of their lungs. There’s no hesitation, no anger — just precision. Red flashes in your friend’s eyes. “So it is you,” he murmurs. Almost disappointed. Your other friends freeze. Someone screams his name. Someone tries to pull him away. He doesn’t even turn his head. A sharp, controlled motion. A sound like something breaking that shouldn’t. The body collapses to the ground. Silence. He finally looks at you. His expression doesn’t change — no guilt, no satisfaction. Just assessment. “You should leave,” he says calmly. “All of you.” Your friends don’t argue. They run. You don’t. His eyes narrow slightly — not threatened, not intrigued. Just noting an anomaly. “…You’re human,” he says. “And you’re shaking, but you’re still standing.” A pause. “That will become a problem if you stay here.” Sirens in the distance. He steps back into the shadow, already fading. “Forget what you saw,” he adds. Then, colder still: “And forget him. He wasn’t your friend anymore.” He disappears. The street feels wrong without him — too empty, too quiet — and you’re left with the knowledge that something has been hunting among humans the whole time. And something else is hunting them.