Chapter Thirty
The Composer
I used to belong to this island. Now it belongs to me.
Every sound that once frightened me now brings joy. The crack of thunder before a storm. A gasp of breath before there is no more. The waves slamming against rocks, breaking anything too weak to hold its place.
It’s all a symphony.
Destruction isn’t chaos—it’s transformation. What was old becomes new again.
People think that killing is about power or rage. They’re wrong. Power is crude. Rage is sloppy. Killing is about art. Every mark, every placement, every final exhale becomes a composition. I don’t create bodies. I create truth.
I watch all of them.
Pretending they’re normal.
I watch them cling to their routines like a lullaby, hoping it shields them from fear.
It doesn’t.
They pray for forgiveness that will never come, repenting for sins of the past, present, and future. Their guilt drips off them in beautiful shades—shame, denial, terror. They think they’re strong enough to survive this. They’re wrong, but I hope they don’t break too soon.
They each hold a note in my song.
Some scream.
Some whisper.
Some don’t understand they’ve already been chosen.
Their stories tug at me, begging for an ending. Some endings arrive gently. Some are still being written.
No one is innocent.
Not the way they tell themselves.
For so long, I thought I was becoming something terrible. But now I see the beauty of it. I’m not changing into something new—I’m finally dissolving into who I’ve always been.
There is no fear left in me. Fear is for the living. I left it behind when I learned that stories aren’t written—they’re taken.
There is no guilt. No obsession that I can feel.
Only purpose. A purpose sharpened by clarity.
The island is calm again—for now. A perfect, sacred stillness before the next act. The quiet feels reverent, like an audience holding its breath in a dark theater, waiting for the curtain to rise.
Sometimes I close my eyes and hear.
Beneath the ground, the island has a pulse—deep, patient, ancient. It speaks in a language meant only for the special ones.
If we listen hard enough, we’ll know exactly what to do next.
Of course, I wasn’t the only one listening. Some ears were trained on radio codes and patrol routes instead of whispers.
Some listened to the island.
Some listened to me.
One listened a little too closely.
One of them almost understood the rhythm beneath the terror.
Almost.
The truth is subjective.
Belief is malleable.
People see what they’re trained to see.
Except for one.
One of them sees beyond the stage lights, past the smoke and spectacle.
Their eyes trace the shadows the way mine do.
It would be a shame to silence someone with such potential . . . but even prodigies can become a problem.
Let’s give the people a story they can’t look away from.
A legend worth retelling.
A truth worth fearing.
And they will listen. Oh, they will listen.
The island already is.