Hamilton County Morgue – 4:06 AM
Max Hamilton stared at the message written on his fogged mirror:"She's still breathing."
He hadn't touched the mirror in hours. No one else had entered.
Yet the letters clung to the glass, freshly etched with a finger that didn't belong to him.
Max blinked once.
Not from fear — from understanding.
Julian had been here.
Not metaphorically. Not in his head.
Here.
In his home.
In his most sacred space.
FLASHBACK – Cambridge, 13 Years Ago
Max held a textbook, pages fluttering as wind burst through the half-open window. Julian sat cross-legged on the lab table, flipping a scalpel in the air like a coin.
"Do you know what separates us from serial killers?" Julian asked without looking at him.
Max didn't answer.
Julian smirked. "Only the purpose of the incision."
Present – Max's Lab, 4:17 AM
Max flipped open the black notebook and traced a route on the map pinned to the wall. The spiral was tighter now — bodies forming a Fibonacci sequence around a central point.
And that point?
The old Rothwood Surgical Theatre.
Abandoned.
Condemned.
Forgotten.
Except by two men who used to study there under candlelight during blackout drills, reciting the names of bones like sacred prayers.
It was where Julian once called death a masterpiece.
Max grabbed his keys.
Rothwood Surgical Theatre – 5:03 AM
The doors groaned open, their rusted hinges shrieking like wounded metal. Max stepped inside, flashlight in hand. Dust hung like smoke in the air. The floor creaked beneath his boots. The theatre hadn't been used in over a decade.
But tonight, the air was sterile.
Too clean.
He swept the light across the rows of wooden benches that circled the dissection floor.
Then he saw it:
A surgical table.
Fresh white sheet.
A body beneath it.
Max's pulse ticked up.
He descended the steps slowly, boots echoing with every move.
He pulled the sheet back.
It wasn't the woman from the Polaroid.
It was a mannequin.
No — not a mannequin.
A reconstruction.
Real organs placed inside a silicone mold.
Max leaned closer.
There was something written on the inside of the chest cavity, smeared in iodine:
"Autopsy this."
He froze.
Julian wasn't just challenging him.
He was testing him.
Max's Voice Recorder – 5:19 AM
"Subject appears to be a constructed cadaver. Real human heart, lungs, liver. Dissected from multiple donors. Sewn into artificial mold. Ligature marks suggest symbolic restraint. All incisions mimic precision of Y-shaped thoracotomy."
He paused, breath quickening.
"Within thoracic cavity… an object."
He reached in.
Fingers touched paper.
A sealed envelope — waxed with an anatomical heart pressed into the seal.
He opened it.
Inside: a photograph.
It showed Max, sitting on a bench, reading. From last week.
Julian had been watching him.
Stalking him.
And with the photo was a single sentence typed in red:
"It ends where it began."
Max stepped back, mind reeling. He dropped the photo. The flashlight beam caught something carved into the wall behind the table.
Coordinates.
Police Station – 6:12 AM
Detective Lena Monroe slammed the envelope on her desk. "You went into Rothwood without backup?"
"I had to," Max said calmly. "He's ahead of us. And he's turning every body into a clue."
She pointed at the photo. "This isn't a clue. This is obsession. He's not just copying you — he's constructing your biography in flesh."
Max's jaw clenched. "Because I let him live."
Lena studied him. "And how do I know you're not still protecting him?"
He turned to face her fully.
"I'm not protecting Julian West," he said, voice like ice. "I'm hunting him."
Unknown Location – 7:01 AM
Julian West watched Max on a flickering monitor. The security footage was grainy, but his subject's movements were elegant. Precise. Still careful after all these years.
"You always did love control," Julian whispered.
He reached for a scalpel on the tray beside him, twirling it in his fingers.
"Now let's see how you handle chaos."
He pressed a button.
Max's Car – 7:08 AM
The phone buzzed.
Another blocked number.
He answered. "Julian."
Julian's voice was calm. Almost amused.
"How does it feel, Max? Knowing the next incision I make… might be on her?"
Max froze.
"You know the coordinates. But hurry. She's running out of breath."
Click.
Max floored the gas.
Old Institute Library – 7:34 AM
The coordinates led to a forgotten wing of the Cambridge library. Long abandoned, its entrance boarded up, sealed behind a façade of restoration. Max broke through.
Dust. Mold. Darkness.
And on the central table — a breathing mask. Connected to a tank.
He followed the tubing.
It disappeared into the wall.
He kicked the door open.
There she was.
The woman from the photo. Gagged. Tied to a gurney. The tubing wrapped around her neck like a python, slowly tightening as the tank drained.
Max rushed to her, slicing the restraints with a scalpel. He pulled the tubing free just as she began to choke.
She gasped. Air filled her lungs.
Then she screamed.
Behind Max, a screen flickered on.
Julian's face, masked, appeared.
"Bravo, Max. But this was only a rehearsal."
Then static.
End of Chapter 4