Chapter Text
Ronin knows.
Ronin knows. Shit.
You realize several things all at once. The first being the most obvious, that Ronin knows exactly who you are, and then subsequently how much of an idiot you’ve been to really believe a serial killer wouldn’t have thoroughly investigated you before inviting you to a private chatroom on the dark web, among fellow serial killer comrades to boot—-these people aren’t your everyday passersby, they’re highly intelligent masterminds of deception, how could you have been so foolish as to treat them as anything less?
This leads you to the realization that Ronin has been toying with you from the second you joined, has watched in amusement as you’ve fumbled through a pitiful attempt at playing a criminal. What’s perhaps the most chilling realization of them all, though, is that Ronin might have invited you to the chatroom with the intention to kill you after he was good and done with you. The thought puts goosebumps all over your arms and tickles at the hairs on the back of your neck.
It’s a betrayal. It’s an awakening. It’s a call to dig deep and connect with the darker parts of yourself that you’ve been too scared to nurture, that you might salvage something from Ronin’s revelation and come out of this on the other side, alive. After all, you are a writer, and who better an actress than a wordsmith?
You don’t get a lot of sleep that night, understandably, and it doesn’t help that your heart flutters every time a shadow passes behind the ruffles of your moonlit curtains, leaving you to think that this must be it, Ronin’s come to silence you. But nothing happens, and dusk becomes dawn just as you manage to close your eyes and find sleep.
Your day job is a sleepwalking nightmare, fueled with coffee, paranoia and grit, but you manage to drag yourself through your shift with the last dredges of give-a-damn left in you; you’re at the point of sleep deprivation where you’d welcome your untimely demise if it meant getting a few hours of rest. Let him kill me. I don’t care, I just want to sleep.
When you arrive home the only thing you can possibly think of is sleep, but you haven’t checked the chatroom since Ronin dropped that bomb on your head and it leaves an antsy feeling in the pit of your stomach to risk ghosting everyone for longer than you already have. The safest option you have is giving Ronin what he wants and going along with his ruse until you have the brain power to figure something else out.
Socks and shoes are the first to come off, left where they land, then the rest of your garments meet the same fate, swiftly replaced with loose-fitting, comfortable pajama pants and a crop top. Then, you don’t so much as crawl into bed as you collapse into it, willing yourself to pull your laptop into your lap, which you regrettably have to make yourself sit up for. You fight your sore, sluggish body to cooperate until you’re sitting on some pillows against your headboard. The black screen briefly reflects your corpse-like appearance before illuminating with the welcoming mambo jumbo.
Slaughterhouse.
You open the chatroom and find a slew of messages from Ronin already waiting for you.
<goreboy> —- hows the Story comin’ along darlin’ Writer?
<goreboy> —- got any New inspiration lately?
<goreboy> —- i can think of a Few Things to get the Juices flowing if ur strugglin
<You> —- Don’t think I’ll be needing any more inspiration anytime soon.
<You> —- I’ve got a surprise for you but you’ll have to wait until tomorrow before I can send it.
<goreboy> —- denying the Devil his sacrilege?
<goreboy> —- suit Yourself darlin’
<goreboy> —- got me sumthin Special did ya?
<goreboy> —- don’t keep me waitin Too Long now
<goreboy> —- wouldnt want The Devil to get bored
<You> —- Tomorrow. Keep an eye on your DMs.
While not entirely a reassuring conversation, it’s enough to put you at ease enough to sleep; Ronin’s not going to crawl out of the shadows and kill you overnight, at least, that much you’re (sort of) sure of.
Now that you’ve made an appearance in the chatroom you can put it out of your mind for the next ten hours. You snap your laptop shut without powering it off or plugging it up, slump over and fall asleep within minutes.