"A/N: contains kidnapping"
THE brown wooden door creaked as it was pushed open, and heavy footsteps filled the silent space. Nox's nose wrinkled from the moldy smell of the place, which had been shut for almost a year.
She dragged Maxin inside and laid him on the twin bed. His body shivered when she took his hands and tied them to the dark wooden headboard, but he didn't wake up—lost in a strange dream that made his brows furrow.
Before crossing the threshold with Maxin slung over her shoulder, Nox had grabbed a shoulder bag from the passenger seat, locked the car, and headed into the isolated cabin. Now, with him asleep in bed, she rummaged through her bag and pulled out a candle. With a lighter she took from her front pocket, she lit the wick. A small flame illuminated the walls, aided only by the faint light of the sky outside, keeping the room from descending into complete darkness.
Searching through the small cabinet made of old wood, she found a saucer, where she placed the candle stuck in its own wax on top of the nightstand. The yellow light flickered over Maxin's face and, as if he felt the warmth of a light in the darkness, his expression softened, the discomfort fading into serenity.
The assassin sat in the wooden chair facing the bed. Her legs stretched out, her feet crossed, and her dark eyes never left Maxin for a second.
As if he hadn't breathed in a long time, Maxin woke with a start. Inhaling sharply, his head ached—as did his wrists. The wood-toned ceiling was unfamiliar, and the pain in his skull intensified as fragments of the previous night invaded his mind.
The awareness of what had happened made him go rigid, and panic began to fill every fiber of his being the moment he tried to move his hands and realized they were bound. Kidnapped. Heart pounding, Maxin opened his mouth and screamed as loudly as his dry throat could manage:
"HELP! SOMEBODY HELP ME!" His deep voice echoed through the sparsely furnished room. Trying to move his head, his eyes caught sight of the framed scene through the small, triangular-paned window.
A cloudy sky, dense trees with dark green leaves and trunks so brown they verged on black. A lake in the distance. An oppressive sensation hung over the place, merging with Maxin's fear, pushing him to the brink of a panic attack.
His face was flushed red, his chest heaving, and his mind dragged him back to the memory of his father's death. The same feeling of danger. The desperate act of hiding in the closet. His days in the orphanage, locked in the tiny bathroom by other kids. The loud sirens, the children's laughter, the sharp pain in his chest, his legs giving out—it all felt like it was happening again, right now.
Tears streamed endlessly from Maxin's eyes, and his body trembled so violently that his teeth chattered. The sound of his frantic attempts to free his bound limbs was loud and chaotic, making it hard to think.
"Please! Please! Someone help me! Help!" He kept yelling, shaking, pleading, his desperate voice drowning out the sound of the single door in the room opening.
The figure from the previous night looked at him with hollow eyes. Clearly accustomed to such situations. Her steps slapped the wooden floor, and her hand flew toward his face, amused by the wide eyes that stared back at her.
"We're out of water. So don't waste your saliva screaming into the wind." Her soft skin brushed against his lips. "So be quiet. I hate noise." She ordered flatly.
Stepping back, Nox saw Maxin bite his lip before speaking in a voice hoarse with fear.
"You..." he began.
"I...?" she prompted, clearly unbothered, guessing what he might say.
Maxin's red-rimmed eyes flicked about nervously, wanting and not wanting to voice his accusation. But under the cold, dark gaze of the woman before him, he gave in and pointed:
"You killed that man."
"Yes. That's right, I killed that man." She confirmed casually, as if someone had asked whether she'd eaten the last piece of cake in the fridge. Her indifference sent a chill down Maxin's spine.
Before him stood not just a woman with a distant expression, lips pressed in a flat line, and deep black eyes. Before him was a killer. A ruthless killer who didn't hesitate to point a gun at his head—or to shoot a man. She was danger incarnate. Death itself.Overcome once more by panic and despair, Maxin began to tug at his bound wrists, gasping.
The assassin only intervened in his frantic movements when she saw the blood beginning to form on his skin. The harsh friction of the nylon rope against his thin layer of skin had caused deep scratches that would only worsen if he kept pulling.
She walked over to him and grabbed his thin wrist with impressive firmness, quickly halting him. Maxin's eyes went wide, and he swallowed hard as he imagined the scene they were in. Lying down, his chest bare, hands tied above his head, and those piercing eyes locked on him. His heart pounded wildly. She pulled a handkerchief from the pocket of her black pants and began wiping the blood around the rope bindings.
"Funny. You should be lying in some empty lot right now. They'd probably run a huge headline trying to find the killer of such a pretty boy. And yet, look at you—here you are. Below me." Her tone dropped, the sound brushing Maxin's eardrums.
"You killed that man… and you were going to kill me too…" Maxin said, his voice cracked, his expression shattered. A sob escaped him. "Who are you...? Why are you doing this to me? I don't have money, I don't have family... I don't have a-ny-one..." Maxin's voice faded under the weight in his throat. A single tear slid down his cheek, caught by the assassin's fingers.
"So many questions..." she murmured. "In my defense, I don't usually kidnap people. I just kill them, as you've seen. So don't look at me like I'm some kind of monster." Nox sighed. "Okay, maybe I amamonster, because I still really want to kill you." That statement, delivered so plainly and up close, sent even more chills down Maxin's spine.
The tears kept falling from his face, and this time, she didn't wipe them. She walked away and returned to the chair. Sitting down, her gun once again resting in her lap, she stared at him with the same intensity as before. Nox, with finality, declared:
"But I'm not going to kill you. Not yet." Her target gasped.
Utterly tormented by those terrifying words.