Mathias

And that catches us up to today! Sorry about all the rambling, I just wanted to make sure you were ready for what comes next now that you've accessed my backstory. My life officially began to go downhill once I started getting stalked. And no, this wasn't Lukas (he was nowhere near me at all times) and that was what was freaking me out. I know for one thing as well; Lukas hates other people, so it was not anyone that he'd ordered to do it- there was no one. It wasn't just the feeling of someone constantly watching me, I'd been receiving some pretty creepy letters with your average death threats, you know, as creepy letters usually have those. Things like: "How adorable would it be if your head came off of your shoulders?", making it sound flirty yet downright terrifying at the same time. By this morning, I was super on edge. And the fact that Lukas is completely ruled out only makes things worse. I could deal with this better if it were him, I'm used to how he operates (insults and taunts mainly - not stalking. This isn't his style, another factor which means he is not behind all of this). I definitely cannot deal with two people trying to kill me; there's only so much I can take!

I thought the situation I was in was bad enough. But then, it got so much worse.

Lukas

When you live a life like mine, it doesn't take much to ruin your day. Usually, the disappointment is when I wake up in the morning, again. That means I'm still here. On this planet. Alive. It sucks. However, life hadn't crashed my party just yet. I'd actually been having a solid few days (surprisingly)(I was waiting for someone to ruin it)(Mathias probably, knowing him) ever since my lillebror called to tell me he was engaged. This made the fact that I was still waking up every morning better, as there was a goal to strive for that wasn't death. Before the news, I was just going through life doing whatever, waiting for some being to finally smite me (I wish for the sweet embrace of death often, as you can see). Now, the thought of death is not so pleasant, seeing as I'm the best man and Emil is counting on me to be there (which means I have to stay alive for a year or more)(which means I've got a huge challenge). Unfortunately, life took this as the signal to start trying to kill me. Of fucking course. So typical. Just my luck.

I was out, walking around the city, as you do. I was on my lunch break and was trying to get bloody images out of my head (I'm a doctor) in order to eat food. I tend to have quite a strong stomach so not much could faze me but still it's hard to eat a sandwich when all you can see is a bone poking through someone's skin in your mind's eye. This was not abnormal for me, so I was still feeling relaxed. All the way up until my yin tattoo started burning like someone was poking me with a red-hot iron (being near Mathias certainly is not a fun experience, as you can tell). In situations like these, there are two options you have. Either try find your opposing force as quickly as possible so the pain goes away or run in the opposite direction, hoping that you get out of the zone, so the pain goes away. Option two rarely ever succeeds so the best thing is to try find Mathias. And you know what I said earlier about Mathias would be the thing to bring my day down? I told you so. My eyes were flitting to the side and then the other one. Behind me then in front.

There he is. The bastard. And of course, his stupid, blond, porcupine hair is glinting in the sun making it turn golden and pretty. Ugh, I hate him. And do not, do not tell me I am into him, I will deny it to the nail. You could stab me, and I would still never say the words "I like Mathias Køhler". It is insane. I will never admit it. Give up. Besides, the guy annoys the crap out of me. Imagine dating that! I'd think I'd either kill him or myself - wait, that's the whole point of this Hero-Villain thing anyway. See? I don't need to date him to feel that way. When I say I am attracted to him I mean the way he looks and honestly I have no idea why I even like that. If you give me one reason why I should like Mathias' personality then I will consider having a proper crush on him. In the meantime? Not. Happening.

Anyways... these things happen often so I have the perfect formula on how to keep myself alive during these encounters. One, we are out in the open so a murder will likely draw eyes (of course until they find out I'm the villain then everyone will celebrate). Two, (the main step towards success) I can just insult him until he gets so frustrated and flustered that he walks away. You would think that continuously provoking someone would end up with you having a fist slammed into your face. But no. Not with Mathias. He just walks away from it all. See? The perfect formula for survival. Not once have we actually inflicted pain onto each other (unless you count emotional pain).

Normally, my instincts wouldn't be telling me to run far from this place. Something inside me, some tingling feeling that something was off, was creeping me out. Mathias had never posed a strong threat even though one of these days he was going to kill me. The feeling couldn't be about him. That means that it's something around us. I start turning my head around again. What seems to be the reason that now every fibre of my being is telling me to leave? My breath shortens and my heart beats faster, adrenaline now pumping round my body, initiating the 'fight or flight' response. Everything appears to be normal, but that cannot be the case. The people don't seem to be here to cause trouble and there's no way that any natural disaster can suddenly appear and wipe us all out. So what? I look back at Mathias. He looks the same, headphones in, head slightly moving to the beat of the music. I glance around him, my fists clenched as a defense mechanism.

And then I see what is out of place. Someone, tucked into a corner, is eyeing Mathias with a dangerous look in their eyes. My opposing force moves forward and, in turn, so do they. Mathias Køhler has a stalker. The main question is, though, is this stalker a serious threat like my body is telling me? The stalker is moving closer to Mathias, a hood up with only a few strands of light brown hair visible, the rest all hidden. Black rectangular glasses positioned on their face, a face that is blurred from the distance between me and the stalker. Another thing comes to mind, if they are a serious threat then they pose harm to Mathias. Only I can be a threat to that idiot, it's the whole job description. I sigh, the realisation sinking in that I have to get involved now. Great. Just great. I briskly walk forwards, approaching him and the stalker (who is now reaching into their pocket, which is never a good sign). I reach Mathias and place my hand on his shoulder, causing him to pause and face me. He doesn't look relieved to see me. He never does.

Mathias

When I felt that Lukas was nearby, I was planning on ignoring that for a while, to either wait for him to move out of the 30-metre radius or come closer to me. It seems he went with the latter. I turn around and look into his indigo coloured eyes. Lukas has the sort of eyes that seem to stare into your soul, the kind of eyes that constantly look like he has no soul. "Lukas," is all I say, still staring into the depths of his eyes, trying to see how he's feeling but I just get nowhere. Much like the Norwegian himself, his eyes convey no emotions whatsoever. He leans in and for some weird reason I completely freeze up because my brain automatically assumes he's going to kiss me. He doesn't (much to my relief). But he does whisper into my ear, "Someone's following you, just pretend I'm your friend until we are away from here, ok?". As soon as he says that I remember all the letters I've been getting with the death threats and my breath hitches. I nod in response and he links his arm around mine and starts walking.

Minutes later, everything appears to be alright as Lukas glances around and drops my arm. "Right, I can't see them anymore so we should be safe. How are you doing?" His eyebrows are furrowed slightly, finally showing a slight emotion, but I can't tell what. "To be honest, lately I've been receiving these creepy ass letters containing death threats so this could be related to them," I reply, my face turning downcast. "Why didn't you call the police? That's their job isn't it? Dealing with weird shit like this?" He presses, lips pursed in annoyance. "It's also my job," I reply, "And besides, they would just assume it was you if they found out I'm... you know...." I trail off. We're still in a public place so I can't explicitly say my secret identity. "You don't think I'm behind this?" He cocks his head to the side, eyes widening slightly. "No. Not your style. If it were you, I would be receiving insults over death threats," I giggle slightly. "True," he mumbles and adds quietly, "Well, thanks, I guess." "For what?" I question, my mouth hanging open slightly after I finish my question. "For not assuming it's me. Everyone else in society would." I've never seen Lukas like this and besides, it's not like us to get this far into a conversation without yelling. I'm impressed with the both of us. However, this is not a normal situation.

"What did this person look like?" If I get a simple description, it will at least help me slightly try piece this together. "He was quite far away so I couldn't make out much, but he had brown hair and black rimmed glasses. He was dressed in sort of a cloak if that helps." Like I assumed, the description is basic and narrows it down to a few million people, I'm guessing. But I'd rather that than the greater figures that come with no description. "It does. Thanks." Saying thanks to Lukas feels weird, a new experience for both of us. "How far away are you from your work, Mathias?" His eyes meet mine again, still unreadable as to what his motives are. "About 10 to 15 minutes away, why?" Our eyes meet again and I feel weird about how nice it feels to have a conversation with him that doesn't involve him insulting me (plus me saying 'fuck off' before storming off) (I always resort to that when I know I'm losing an argument). "I doubt that walking back by yourself would be a good idea, considering what's happening even if we've lost sight of him. I walk you back."

Lukas

Roughly around 10 to 15 minutes later, we were outside Mathias' work. I felt uncomfortable, but not just because my nemesis was being stalked and sent death threats. This was a building full of many intelligent people whose jobs were to persecute criminals and, if they find them, Villains. I did not want to stick around for long. "Thanks for helping me out today," he bashfully says, cheeks slightly flushed from embarrassment, glancing downwards. It's a cute look compared to his brash, confident nature. And... I can't believe I just called him cute. Get it together, Lukas! "No problem. You're my pain in the ass and my pain in the ass only. No one else. Only I get to put up with your stupidity." His gaze snaps back to me, mouth slightly parted as if to say: 'oh, look, he's back to insulting me'. "Oh, ok," is all he manages and starts fumbling in one of his hoodie's pocket. He brings out a slip of paper and a pen. This then prompts him to place the paper against his work's window whilst writing on it with the biro, eyebrows furrowed. Once he's done he hands it to me. It contains a string of numbers that I soon figure out is a phone number. The fuck is he doin- "I thought it might be a good idea if I gave you my personal number, just in case any weird creepy shit starts happening to you. Stay safe, Lukas." With that, he walks into the building, leaving me baffled at what his motives could be.

I return home after work, but my gut is still very unsettled. I stay on high alert for the next couple of hours, right up until my brother and his fiancé arrive for our celebratory dinner. I greet both of them with hugs. I've always liked Leon; he's always taken great care of Emil and cared about him more than anything. So, this engagement is a huge success, I'm very happy that he will be my brother-in-law. Whilst in the middle of eating, I tell them what happened earlier, hoping that Emil had already told Leon that I'm the Villain. It appears he has because they seem more focused on the whole creepy ass stalker situation than me being the Villain. Emil then excuses himself for a minute, saying he needs to make an urgent call. He comes back and we discuss things further until it's time for them to go. We say goodbye and part ways. Since the sinking feeling is still there, lingering, I make sure to lock all doors and windows, then I double lock them using magic. Feeling a bit safer, I decide to go to bed.

Leon

Emil and I tend to walk in silence, even if there's something big to discuss. If you had a job like Emil's, the streets are not the safest to talk about anything. These types of conversations are saved for secure locations were you know no one else is listening in. So, instead I decide to stare at my fiancé, taking in every detail because I still can't believe this man said yes to marrying me. His amethyst coloured eyes seem to shine in the dark, but there's an alert, attentive look to them as well. Not surprising given our previous conversation with Lukas. His pale hair catches the moon's light, lighting up all of its snow-like colour. He's currently wearing contacts, given that albinos tend to have really bad eyesight – he usually doesn't put on his thick rimmed glasses in public due to self-consciousness. I know I'm sounding really fucking soppy, but he is definitely a sight to behold. His eyes meet mine, and I look away, embarrassed from being caught staring. Emil then decides to roll his eyes, as if he knew what I'm thinking about (which is possible due to the fact that he can do magic, so you never know).

Speaking about magical ability, I can do some magic but it's very watered down due to mages marrying normal people. My cousin Arthur, on the other hand, is very powerful. Me? Not so much. All my magic seems to be related to my career (I work in my family's Asian restaurant, so my magic is food related). It's helpful when it comes to my career but everything else... it's not.

Emil and I reach a fork in our paths, one leads back to my family's restaurant (we own/live in the apartment above it) and the other leads back to Emil's work/home. "I guess we go our separate ways now until I see you tomorrow?" I say. I tend to stay with Emil's team every other night but today's the day when I stay with my family. "Yeah," he glances downwards before leaning in and kissing me, "I love you." "Love you too. Are you going to yell at Mathias for not telling you about this though?" I ask. "Already have over the phone, that's the call I had to make. Well, stay safe." He kisses my cheek and walks away before I can tell him to stay safe as well.

It's after we've parted that I start having a sinking feeling in my gut. I feel alone, powerless, and helpless. This isn't good. If I know anything, if you have a feeling that something's wrong in your gut, you never ignore that feeling, it is almost always right. So, I'm super on edge like, you can't even fucking believe how tense I am right now. I cross into a dimly lit street. This is my regular route, but I want to run into the nearest building and hide. But I don't. Looking back on it now, I really regret not staying with Emil and going to his place. 'Stay safe', Emil's words echo in my head constantly. That's when I catch a silhouette walking towards me slowly and my whole-body freezes. The person gets closer and I make out brown hair with black rimmed glasses on his face. Not only that but he looks strangely like Lukas. And that part creeps me out more than I was before. He passes me though and, when he does, I exhale a sigh of relief.

His steps start to walk away from me, and I feel calmer... for a split second. His shoes thud on the pavement as he turns around and quickly comes up behind me. Before I know it, his arms are around me, restricting my movements, a hand cupped around my mouth. I don't struggle, it would be no use. "That's right," he whispers, "don't panic. This will be a lot easier for you if you just remain calm, Ka Lung Wong." I recall what I should do to get out of this hold, remembering the countless martial arts lessons I've had. With this sort of hold, my arms and any sort of backwards kicks are useless. I cannot swing my arms to hit him and I cannot kick my leg far up enough to seriously injure him (enough for him to let me go).

In these situations, what you've got to do is stamp your foot as hard as possible into theirs quickly. If you're lucky, you'll break some bones and they'll drop to the ground in pain (it also stops them coming after you). I get lucky. He lets go and falls to the ground. "You fucking bitch," he mutters, cradling his foot. "You'll pay, you'll fucking pay!" His hands come away from the obviously broken foot. He holds them out in front of him and magic sweeps out acting as if it were fog. It consumes me. My legs start to buckle underneath me and that's when I know that I've screwed up. I should have run away immediately after I injured him. It's a type of sleep magic. I don't stand a chance. Just as everything around me is going dark and I'm fading into unconsciousness, I hear him again: 'stay safe'.

I'm sorry, Emil. I've failed you. I'm sorry...

The next day

Lukas

As soon as I wake up, my head is still reeling from yesterday. I don't feel calm in the slightest. That immediately makes me feel unsafe. My mood definitely doesn't lift when I feel cold air blowing on me. I'm fucking freezing! It's as if the window's open but that can't be right as I locked all of them last night. Oh no. Please God, let the window be shut. Please. I turn my head and my stomach drops. The window is wide open. I even locked it with magic... Whoever did this must be really powerful. Oh God. I check my entire body. Everything appears to be fine, I'm still in one piece. But it also means something else is wrong. I remove my gaze from the open window and start to glance around my room. I feel sick to my stomach as soon as I see a classic horror movie thing.

A sentence is written in blood on my wall, just above my mirror: 'You'd look so much cuter with your insides removed, sweetie'. My heart speeds up, my eyes darting around to see if anything else is abnormal, my ears are alert, looking out for any noises that suggests someone is in my house. I hear nothing but the sound of birds outside. Glancing at the clock, I notice it's only six in the morning. Immediately choosing to ignore the time, I still pick up my phone and call the very number I was confused about receiving yesterday. Mathias fucking Køhler.

Mathias

I wake up to my phone ringing. It's not a nice sensation to jolt awake like that (the reason why I hate alarm clocks). I pick up the thing that almost gave me a heart attack and squint at the screen. It's barely even six and Lukas Bondevik is calling me. This better be good because I'm not in the mood to talk about small, unimportant shit. It had better be an emergency. "What?" I spit, holding it to my ear. "Hey... you told me to call you, and I quote, 'if any weird creepy shit is happening to you' so here I am. Calling you, I mean." His voice is shaky and quiet, and his breaths are quick and fast. Ah. My anger evaporates instantly. "Ok. What's happened?" I get out of bed and head into the living room, anxious to jot down whatever he says on our whiteboard. Yes, you heard me, we have about four or five whiteboards. The reason? It helps us organise evidence for separate cases. The one in the living room is currently blank. When I reach said living room, Tino and Berwald emerge from their room, probably woken up by my phone. Whoops. Berwald looks as blank faced as normal and Tino, the sweet little guy, looks like he wants to kill someone. You never want to wake up Tino if you can help it, especially not if it's early and he hasn't had his coffee yet.

Lukas finally responds, "My window's wide open. I know that seems normal, but I locked it last night. With a key and magic. Plus, there just has to be some creepy shit written in blood on my wall. Which is fucking brilliant. I really really needed this right now." Tino's headed into the kitchen, glaring at me the whole time. Berwald's looking at me like 'what the fuck are you doing up at this hour'. Emil? Emil seems to have slept through everything. Lucky bastard. "Yikes. What does the creepy shit say?" Berwald stares at me long and hard and I decide to mouth 'message in blood on his wall' to try explain why I got a call at six in the goddamn morning. "'You'd look so much cuter with your insides removed, sweetie'. It literally says that. Like, what the ever-loving fuck." His breaths are still shallow. He seems to be really shaken up. I thought I'd never see the day when that cool, calm, and collected mask broke. However, it's not as satisfying as I'd hoped. Dammit. "Is it definitely blood? Can you be sure?" I ask. "Mathias, I'm a fucking doctor. I know what dried blood looks like." New information about Lukas acquired. He is a doctor.

"Right. First things first, I want you to take pictures of the evidence and also, get me a sample of the dried blood please so I can test its DNA." Tino has surfaced from the kitchen looking confused. At least he doesn't want to murder me anymore. "Second, pack your things, you can't stay in that house – it's not safe. You're staying here for the next however many days. Third, I'll send someone to meet you halfway. This way you'll be safe." I glance over at my stepbrother and his husband, "Do I have any volunteers?" Tino puts his hand up, "I'll do it." I switch the phone call over to a videocall (after I've taken it away from my ear)(I may hate Lukas, but no one needs to see down there)(that's just too cruel). Tino walks over. "Tino, this is Lukas. Lukas, this is Tino, he'll be coming to meet you." Now that I see him, Lukas looks like crap. Which is fair considering what's currently happening. "I think I've covered all of it. We'll discuss this in further detail when you arrive." Lukas nods. "Bye, Lukas. See you later," the call ends and I let out a disheartened sigh. Great, now my mortal enemy is caught up in this too.

Lukas

I do everything Mathias has told me to do: I get dressed, I take pictures of the evidence and then collect a sample of the dried blood, I pack some clothes and any other necessities into a suitcase. Then, I head out. At least this time (when I'm out on a walk), I don't run into any creepy stalker. There's no one about, given the current time. The sky is a mixture of hues of red, orange, yellow and pink. I would stop and take a picture if it weren't for the circumstances. The good thing with all the lack of people is that I can tell if someone is following me. If there were many, the stalker would get lost in a crowd. But it also means I'm an easy target as there's no witnesses...

I've got to stop thinking like this. I was always a pessimist (still am) and the only good part of that is either you were wrong with your expectations (and something good happens) or you were right. I was right yesterday when I thought that Mathias would bring down my day, and also that life would try to get rid of me more now that Emil is engaged. Just my fucking luck.

Someone is walking towards me and I start to tense up. It's only Tino, the guy Mathias briefly introduced me to earlier. "Hey there!" He smiles. I don't return the gesture. My day has sucked so far, and it can only get worse from here. Plus, I haven't had my morning coffee so I am in a rubbish mood. "Hi." I add grimly. "Right," he says, "let's head over to my work then!" We start to head off. "So... you work with Mathias?" Might as well strike up a conversation. I don't trust myself to be left alone with my thoughts. "Yeah. Not only that, but he's sort of my brother-in-law." He looks far too cheery for the situation at hand. It pisses me off. However, he might not have had time to be briefed so I relax my dislike towards him a bit. "How is one person 'sort of' a brother-in-law?" He makes eye contact; his eyes are bright and shiny. It matches his personality I guess. "I married his stepbrother, so I don't really know if that counts as being a brother-in-law. Though we were best friends as teens so yeah. I am tied to him in many different ways!" Interesting. I've learnt more about Mathias' background now. His family life was always an enigma. He has a stepbrother, that stepbrother is married to one of Mathias' best friends, his parents probably aren't still in a relationship. "Does he have any siblings other than your husband?" The conversation is helping distract me, just like I hoped. "No. He's an only child. So's Berwald – my husband – if you exclude Mathias. And the same with me. It's a shame. I would have loved to have a brother or sister. Say, Lukas, do you have any siblings?"

"I do. My younger brother." I hope Emil is ok and made it home alright last night. I mean, he works in the same building as Mathias and Tino so he could get involved. I also hope Leon got home alright but if he was with Emil I'm sure he's fine. The both of them can fend for themselves. Emil has his job experience and magical ability. Leon is trained in many martial arts. "That's cool! What does he do for a living?" This guy is really chatty. If it weren't for a distraction from my thoughts, I'd throttle him. He reminds me of Mathias. As I said before, I haven't had my coffee so I am really irritable. "He works in the same building as you do." My answer is curt. I'll let Tino carry this conversation. "He does? Man, I probably know him. There's not that many individuals in our organisation and there's only four of us in my team, including myself. The others are Mathias, my husband and another friend of ours (granted we only met after he joined our force) named Emil." My head snaps up. "That's my brother."

"You're Emil's brother? God, it is such a small world. Well, you'll be reunited shortly. The four of us all share an apartment." Puzzle pieces start to click together in my mind. Last night I told Emil what had happened yesterday, mentioning the Hero (and I mentioned his name) and Emil excuses himself to make a call. A call to Mathias, no doubt. "You have no idea what's going on right now, do you Tino? You don't know why you're out at six in the morning, collecting me, don't you?" He stops, wondering why I changed the conversation topic so suddenly. "No. Mathias didn't explain much. I just know something's happened and it's not safe for you to stay at your place. I only heard his instructions to you." He doesn't look that happy anymore. "I'm only doing my job. He'll explain once we are there." He takes a couple of strides forwards and then stops, "Which we are." I glance at the building. Huh, he's right. My tattoo has started to hurt, meaning we're nearing Mathias which doesn't improve the aforementioned bad mood. However, I catch up and we head inside.

First, we go past reception. The receptionist, a pretty girl with long brown hair, parts of her hair held back with some clips shaped like pink flowers, greets us. She asks Tino who I am, probably because I don't work here. He answers that the 'Nordic group', whatever the fuck that is, has a development in a case they're working on and I'm brought in as a witness. He's telling some lies, but she doesn't know that and lets us through. We walk past some doors, spaced very far apart for some odd reason that I don't know. I see names written on the doors such as 'The Allies' (seriously what was with these stupid names?) and six names listed underneath. I don't get time to read them as we move on pretty quickly and keep walking until we reach a door saying 'The Nordics'. Underneath there are four names: Mathias Køhler (ugh), Berwald Oxenstierna, Tino Oxenstierna and Emil Bondevik. Honestly, if Mathias hasn't worked out that Emil's my brother I'm going to laugh so hard.

"Here we are!" He opens the door and we enter into a cute apartment. The colour scheme of the living room appears to be blue, white, and purple. It blends well. Two men are talking in front of an immense whiteboard. I inwardly sigh at one of them. Mathias. Ugh. The other must be Berwald, Tino's husband and my enemy's stepbrother. Since he's Mathias' stepbrother then he must have a yang tattoo on the side of his neck. They both turn. "Well," Mathias starts, "you look slightly less like shit now that you're dressed and have brushed your hair." God, I hate him so much. "Horrible to see you as well, Køhler, you're still as stupid as ever. Of course I look like shit, you absolute prick." He glares at me, his teeth clenched together. Tino looks surprised, clearly thinking that we genuinely got along or something. Ew, imagine that! "Um, guys, what's going on?" He adds. Berwald has a very serious expression but he did when we entered the room, so I don't know if it's normal or not. "It's fine, Tino," Mathias' face relaxes when he glances at him and becomes stony again when he makes eye contact with me, "Lukas and I are just natural enemies. This is how it's meant to be." Meaning fate has chosen us to hate each other enough that we would actually kill the other person if given the chance. And society has. "Hold up," Berwald says, his voice very deep, "Mathias do you mean that Lukas is, you know...?" The Villain. Just say it! Just say is he the Villain. I don't get why people try beat around the bush. Just be blunt. I always am. "Ja. He's the Villain." Thank you Mathias for being blunt. I still hate you though.

"Oh." Is all Tino lets out, most likely changing his opinion of me right there and then. People usually do. Berwald just goes "Hm," and that's it. Don't know what he's thinking. Mathias then goes on to explain what's happening to both of them. The result is a lot of shouting at Mathias for being an idiot and not telling them he was getting death threats and being stalked (It's quite satisfying to watch someone else yell at Mathias for being the stupid little shit he is). That all stops when someone steps into the room and raises his voice, "What the fuck is going on here?" My brother has entered the room. He raises his eyebrows when he sees me but doesn't vocalise his confusion. "Mathias didn't tell us that he was stalked and has received numerous death threats." Tino replies. "Oh. I already knew that," he turns to me, "have you had any coffee yet?" Thank you, Emil. Thank you so goddamn much. "No." He nods and starts walking towards the kitchen, "One coffee coming right up. Black, no sugar." My brother is the best. The others just look genuinely confused.

A little while later, Emil has given me my coffee and my mood significantly improves. Finally, something good has happened. Emil's phone rings and he excuses himself to another room, a mixture of confusion and worry on his face. It doesn't comfort me, and my mood starts plummeting again. Then, the apartment's phone starts ringing and Berwald picks it up. He tells us that it's the mail system and a package for Mathias has just arrived. Berwald then adds that he'll go collect it downstairs. This leaves just me, Mathias and Tino. Mathias starts writing on the whiteboard, something I now realise is to organise thoughts and leads on what is going on. He's got pictures attached and notes stuck on with blue tack. There's also two columns, one titled 'what we know', the other titled 'what we don't know'. It's very organised and efficient. "Oh, hey. I've got the sample here and the pictures on my phone." I hand him the sample and he gives me a small smile, "You can connect your phone to the printer over there and print them out. Then I'll add them to the board." I follow those orders and the whiteboard gains some new additions.

Berwald comes back with the large parcel. It doesn't have any big corporations labels on it which is odd. I have a really bad feeling about this. "This is weird. I have no idea why this parcel is here. I didn't order anything, and no one would send anything to me," Mathias mumbles. Thanks for making me feel so much better, Mathias. This is great. My gut doesn't seem to be wrong these past couple of days so whatever's in that box is not good. Brilliant. "Well, we might as well open it." Tino answers. Yeah, how about no. Let's not open the creepy doom box. But we still start fumbling at it anyway, acting as a group. We open it and...

We all let loose a bloodcurdling scream. Even Berwald. Sitting in the box is an actual severed human hand. Oh my God. I'm going to hurl. I do, right on the floor. Tino joins me. Mathias looks shaky and deathly pale, immediately sitting on the sofa. Berwald just stands there, but even he looks like he wants to puke. "What the fuck..." I start before puking again. That's someone's hand. Someone could be dead. In all my years as a doctor, this is officially the grossest thing I've ever seen. Whoever did this, they are not messing around.

We're in for a lot, it seems. And I for one hate and fear every second of it.

**********

I'm finally finished with the first proper chapter! This took forever. And wow, 6,000 words, I've never written that much for a chapter before so this fanfic is off to a good start.

I hope all of you enjoyed, let me know your thoughts in the comments. I'll see you next chapter!

~Peanutsfan1