Her eyes opened to the same white walls she had done her best to get used to. She had expected, hoped for, the death penalty however a certain doctor had intervened. He insisted that psychological damage such as she had must be studied, that she wasn't aware of what she had done. That was far from the truth. She wondered if this was his punishment for not heeding his warning. Loomis presided over her now, although for the most part, she was confined to her room alone. Isolation was something she had grown accustomed to before Michael. It wasn't an easy process the first time. The nights were the worst, but this time she wasn't waiting for someone to return to her. No one would. Days blended together as they had before but there was no sun to watch rise and fall. The only indication a day had passed was when the lights shut off and the room went from pale white to pitch black. She tried her old methods of coping and slept as much as possible, but her dreams were becoming worse than this reality. Sometimes he would come to her. Taunting. She would fall asleep surrounded by those white walls and wake in that room again, greeted by peeling wall paper and the musty scent that clung to the furniture. He was always waiting. It was like he had seen what she had done. She was riddled with guilt for each bullet she had put in Michael and he knew it. He was deep in his grave by now but she couldn't hide from him.

"He'll never forgive you," he would say, "when he kills you for it, I'll be waiting."

His attempts to poison her mind and fill her thoughts with fear were working better than she wanted to admit. Michael's death, though not permanent, had effected her badly. The image of him lying there, bleeding from wounds she had dealt haunted her. His life was the first she had ever taken and he was the one she loved the most. Even if he could forgive her, how could she forgive herself?

"We're not so different, you and I," he taunted, "in fact, maybe you're worse."

"No," she replied, "I would never do that to him."

"But you did," he said with that smile she had finally come to hate, "you did him worse. He sees you for what you really are now."

Her jaw clenched as his form crept closer. He had always loved to invade her space, make her feel small. His breath fell hot on her ear.

"A monster."

"Ms. (Y/l/n)?" A voice cut through his form and erased him from her view.

The white room fell back into place around her. She lifted her head to see a nurse standing in the doorway with a concerned expression.

"Sorry," (y/n) said quietly, "yes?"

"Dr. Loomis will be in to see you."

"In here?" She had hoped that by the time he was ready to speak to her she would get a chance to leave this room.

"Yes, given your condition, the Doctor believes it's in your best interest you stay confined," the nurse replied.

Condition? She wanted to roll her eyes, but refrained. What diagnosis had he tagged her with for her to end up here? It felt strange to be seen as dangerous, well, criminally insane. With what she had done, she wasn't surprised that was the label she was given. Still, in the time she had been there, she hadn't once given any indication she intended to continue her rampage.

"Are you okay, Ms. (Y/l/n)?" The voice interrupted.

She realized she had been staring. There was clear discomfort radiating from the young woman's body as her eyes stayed glued to (Y/n). She was afraid. (Y/n) wondered if that would be the only expression she would ever be greeted with from here on out.

"Will you excuse us?" Loomis' voice said, causing the nurse to jump.

She scurried out of the room, but allowed herself one last prying glance back before the door shut. (Y/n) didn't move from her spot on the floor against the wall. She watched him put his papers down on the small end table next to the bed. He pulled the chair they had given her out from the corner of the room and motioned for her to take a seat. She gave no response.

"Very well," he said as he dragged it over and positioned it in front of her.

He sat down and studied her blank expression. She didn't quite understand why he was here, but she had no interest in fueling his psychiatric fire.

"Do you know why I'm here?" He asked.

He didn't receive an answer.

He let out a chuckle, "Silence won't get rid of me, you should know I'm well versed in that game."

He noticed the smile that tried to pull on her lips at the mention of his former patient. It was quickly replaced by a sadness he wanted to understand.

"What happened to him, (y/n)?"

She closed her eyes only to see the answer he wanted waiting there behind her eyelids. That pained expression she had put in Michael's brown eyes. She hung her head. Loomis studied each subtle movement she made and he could see there was guilt within her.

"It's perfectly okay to feel remorse for what you did, I encourage you to let it out."

Her expression hardened now, "This isn't about her."

"Then what is it about?" He quickly responded.

She resumed her silence.

"I know more than you think I know, Ms. (Y/n). It's my job," he said, "but it's also my job to help you. You're grieving and I need to know why in order to help you. What did you do?"

"Tell him," he whispered in the back of her mind, "say the words out loud. Say you killed him."

His hissing was making her skin crawl.

"Tell him what you are," he continued.

She wanted nothing more than to carve open her own skull and pluck him from her brain. His whispers were growing louder, more aggressive. She held her head in her hands.

"Ms. (Y/l/n)," Loomis prodded.

"Monster."

"I killed him," she cried.

Loomis leaned forward, unable to stop himself, "Your husband?"

"No," she sobbed.

Loomis' brow furrowed in confusion, "I don't understand, there was only one victim."

"She wasn't a victim," she whispered, "she was a monster."

"Hypocrite."

"Tell me," Loomis begged, "for god's sake let it out."

"Michael," she whimpered, "I killed Michael."

She pulled her knees up to her chest and let herself cry. Loomis watched as she fell apart on the ground before him. She was grieving for reasons he couldn't fathom.

"You can't kill it," he said, "it isn't human."

She looked up at him, her face stained and red from tears, "You know nothing about him."

"Then help me understand him," he said.

It was the first time he had referred to Michael with even a modicum of respect. She could see his desire for knowledge was more than just a psychiatrist trying to study his patient. She wiped her tears and pushed as much of her grief down as she could.

"He saved me," she began, "or tried to. I didn't do much to help his cause, he wasn't aware that with or without him I've been beyond saving for quite some time. I wanted him to kill me, I begged him to, but he wouldn't. He should have. All this time I've been trying to end my monster and in doing so I became his."

The doctor was silent as he took in her words. She has effectively erased years of research on a case he had deemed unsolvable. No matter how hard he had tried he had never been able to get under the mask and yet without effort, she had. This woman had broken each lock so many others had given up on. He was incurable, but not for her.

"I can't help you understand him, Doctor, because I dont. Out of everyone he's killed, no one deserves death more than I do. I betrayed him. I did what I was afraid my monster would do to me. He may be beyond physical death, but I killed him. He trusted me and I broke him. I couldn't forgive him for that, so why would Michael forgive me?"

"He loves you," Loomis said.

Silence fell over them. They pondered over those words, each dissecting them in their own ways. She knew he wasn't wrong. Though Michael had never spoken the words, she knew he did. It only furthered her pain. Loomis saw his old patient in a different light. He was more human than he had thought. Something so simple had been his kryptonite all along. He had a heart and it's breaking was the reason for Haddonfield's sudden reprieve of death. By hurting him she was preventing the demise of an entire town. The trade off was that his pain would be the death her. A sacrifice.

He studied her. She was trying hard to hold in her tears, he could see that. Her eyes were glassy and her lips pressed together tightly to stifle any sobs that threatened to come out. She was disheveled and he felt pity for her. He knew the right thing to do would be to let the two of them rot in their grief, however he felt sympathy for her. He felt sympathy for Michael. He hadn't felt that for him in years, not since he had first seen him as a boy. He wondered if perhaps the boy he had been before all the evil was still in there, trapped, but just on the verge of revival because of this woman. The man in him knew he should stop himself from furthering this story, but the psychiatrist in him was more curious than he ever had been. He needed to find Michael. He needed to see his heartbreak for himself.

He left without a word.