The Present – A Message Left Behind
The motel room was still taped off when Damien returned early the next morning, before the forensic team was fully set up.
Jonas stood near the edge of the bed, staring at the small white envelope on the victim's chest—something they missed the night before.
It hadn't been there.
Jonas didn't say a word. He handed it to Damien with gloved fingers.
Damien opened it carefully.
Inside was a single slip of paper. One sentence.
"It's always fun to watch the game from the stands… but I think I'm ready to play now."
There was no signature.
No blood.
Just ink.
Damien's eyes narrowed, pulse steady. Someone was toying with them. Worse—someone was toying with him.
The Past – Silence and Freedom
After Damien disposed of his father's body, the world shifted. It didn't go silent like he'd expected—it came alive.
For weeks, he lived in an eerie calm. No shouting. No drinking. No bruises hidden under school shirts.
He told everyone his father had left for a job up north. No one questioned it.
His mother didn't even come back from wherever she had disappeared to.
Freedom felt... empty.
But then the dreams began. Violent. Visceral. Sometimes he was watching himself do it all over again. Sometimes he was the one on the chair, helpless.
One morning, he woke up with blood under his fingernails.
But he hadn't killed anyone. Not yet.
The Present – The Interrogation Room
Jonas sat across from a suspect in the motel case. A man who had been seen leaving the premises an hour before the body was found.
Damien stood in the corner, watching quietly.
"Why were you at the motel?" Jonas asked.
The man scratched at his beard. "Hookup. She didn't show. Swear to God."
Jonas leaned in. "You booked the room next to hers."
"Did I?"
Jonas smiled. "You paid in cash. But you used a store loyalty card five minutes earlier. We tracked you. You bought gum and two bottles of soda."
"Okay… okay, maybe I was there. But I didn't kill nobody."
Damien stepped forward. "Then why did you run?"
The man looked up at him.
And in his eyes, Damien saw it—he was lying.
Not about the kill.
About something else.
"Who put you there?" Damien asked quietly.
The man blinked. "What?"
"Someone sent you to that room. Didn't they?"
Silence.
Then he whispered, "I thought it was just a prank…"
The Past – The Missing Girl
In high school, Damien saw her every day in the hallway.
Natalie.
She was kind. The only one who noticed when Damien didn't talk much. She offered him a granola bar once. Smiled without fear.
And one day, she didn't come to school.
The whispers began quickly. Missing. Last seen near the woods. No signs of struggle.
Damien remembered standing behind her locker the day before, watching her. Not following. Just… observing.
He hadn't killed her.
But he felt something strange.
Relief.
Someone else had done it.
Which meant he wasn't the only one out there.
The Present – Cole's Progress
That night, Damien returned home to find Cole in the garage again, sharpening knives.
Not in secret.
In the open.
Like it was normal.
"You left the back door unlocked," Damien said.
Cole didn't stop.
"Were you followed?"
Cole looked up. "You trained me better than that."
Damien nodded. "And Elliot?"
"In his room."
"Good."
Cole tilted his head. "You look tense. Something happen?"
Damien stepped forward, closing the garage door behind him. "There's someone else in town. Someone who's trying to join the game."
Cole smiled faintly. "Competition?"
"Maybe."
"Want me to find them?"
Damien shook his head. "Not yet. Let's watch first. Learn their pattern."
"And if they don't have one?"
"Then we teach them one."
The Present – Elliot's Drawing
In his room, Elliot sat cross-legged with a sketchpad.
He wasn't drawing cartoons like he used to.
Now it was faces.
Twisted ones. Screaming ones.
And a new one—masked, half-hidden behind shadows.
He stared at it for a long time, then whispered to himself:
"Three players now."