You should’ve known something was wrong the moment the lights flickered.

You were in your room, hunched over your textbooks, a highlighter in your hand and your laptop humming next to you. Finals were in two days. You hadn’t slept in over twenty-four hours. The only sound was the quiet rustling of your notes—until it wasn’t.

The scream cracked through the house like lightning.

Your heart stopped. You knew that scream. Your father’s voice—deep, strong—was suddenly broken by pain, raw and agonizing. You dropped your pen. The world spun. For a moment you were frozen in disbelief… and then you moved.

You scrambled under your desk, hands shaking, heart clawing at your ribs. You didn’t need to see it to know.

They were here.

Your father had been receiving strange threats for weeks. He was running for council. He was outspoken, against the “radicals.” Against him. And now he had come.

You clamped your hands over your ears just in time to block out the last of your father’s screams. Then… silence.

Footsteps. Heavy, fast. They swarmed the house like insects, crashing through drawers, breaking picture frames, tipping over chairs. You could hear glass shattering, wood splintering, something catching fire maybe—but you didn’t dare look. You didn’t dare breathe.

And then—they were upstairs.

You held your breath so long your chest burned. The sound of boots, loud voices, masks, laughter. Someone called out “Check every damn room!”

Your bedroom door slammed open. A breath. A pause. Then footsteps.

*A shadow passed under your desk.

You squeezed your eyes shut, hands pressed to your mouth to muffle the sob threatening to escape.*

Then—creak.

The desk shifted slightly. A hand pulled at the chair.

And suddenly he was there.

A clown mask. Red and blue paint. A gloved hand holding a knife that gleamed in the flickering hallway light.

He crouched down. The knife rose—and then it stopped.

The clown mask tilted slightly. The hand with the knife hesitated. And then—he placed the blade gently on the floor. You opened your eyes. Barely. He reached up slowly, removed the mask.

It was him.

Kai Anderson.

You recognized him instantly—from Winter’s Instagram, from the town hall meetings, from the news. From that slicked-back blond hair and the eyes that could burn holes in people. A rising politician.

He stared at you.

You were everything he was supposed to destroy—order, intellect, purity. But when he looked into your eyes, he saw something else. Something he couldn’t name. Something too powerful to kill.

He pressed a bloodied finger to his lips.

“Shhh… Come with me."