She rose from her chair, moving to the narrow window that overlooked an unremarkable street.The black curtains were drawn, allowing only a sliver of light to penetrate the room.Outside, the world continued in its oblivious rhythm—people going about the regular rhythms of their day.Sarah had lost that rhythm a decade ago.
“After I was fired, I had nothing,” she continued.“No career.No references.No future in law enforcement.My colleagues—people I’d worked alongside for years—wouldn’t return my calls.As if evidence tampering was contagious.”A bitter smile crossed her face.“As if they’d never bent a rule, never made a judgment call that skewed outside procedure.”
She returned to her seat, picking up a glass of water from the table.Her hand remained perfectly steady—one of the few things that hadn’t changed about her since the Academy.“I tried to find work with private investigation firms, security companies, and even law offices.But the story always got out.The disgraced FBI evidence tech who falsified documents.Who couldn’t be trusted.”
Sarah took a measured sip of water.“When Cindy Hoffman was killed, the media dredged it all up again.My name was in the papers, linked forever to her death.‘Woman murdered by suspect previously released due to evidence tampering.’They made it sound like I’d handed Bishop the weapon myself.”
Olga made another sound behind her gag—something that might have been sympathy or might have been a plea.Sarah couldn’t tell and didn’t remove the gag to find out.
“I had to start over.Completely.New name.New city.New life.”Sarah gestured to the sparse apartment around them.“First, I was Catherine Wells in Baltimore.Then Rebecca Tanner in Philadelphia.Emma Burke in Richmond.Fawn Waller …” She gave a short laugh devoid of humor.“I became quite good at reinventing myself.Cleaning houses, tutoring high school students in chemistry and biology.Cash jobs, no questions asked.Moving whenever someone looked at me too closely or asked about my past.”
She leaned forward, elbows on her knees.“Do you know what it’s like to be constantly running from your own name, Olga?To flinch every time you hear it spoken?To lose not just your profession but your very identity?”
The room fell silent save for Olga’s rapid breathing and the distant hum of traffic.Sarah allowed the quiet to stretch, watching emotions flicker across her captive’s face—fear, yes, but curiosity too.The human need to understand, to find meaning in horror.Sarah recognized it; she’d spent years searching for that meaning herself.
“About two years ago, the running, the distress—it all caught up with me,” she continued finally.“I couldn’t sleep.Couldn’t eat.My mood would swing wildly, manic energy followed by crushing depression.I’d work for days without rest, then couldn’t get out of bed for a week.”Sarah tapped a precise rhythm against her thigh.“A psychiatrist in a free clinic told me I had developed bipolar disorder, likely triggered by prolonged stress and trauma.He prescribed medication I couldn’t afford and therapy I couldn’t risk.”
Sarah rose to her feet again.From a nearby drawer, she withdrew a folder and returned to her seat.
“Then I found Dr.Marcus Berridge,” she said, opening the folder to reveal a printed screenshot from a website.“Online therapy.Group sessions via video conference.Affordable, anonymous.”Her mouth curved in what might have been a smile on someone else.“Perfect for someone who needed to keep her face hidden, her past buried.”
She turned the folder so Olga could see the image—a professional website featuring a middle-aged man with a thoughtful expression and the words “Finding Balance Through Art Therapy” emblazoned across the top.
“Berridge specialized in impulse control disorders.His theory was that creative focus—specifically origami—could help patients channel their chaotic impulses into something structured and beautiful.”Sarah closed the folder, setting it aside.“I joined his group therapy sessions as Fawn Waller, my face always pixilated, voice always deliberately modulated.And there I met Brittany and Rachel.”
Sarah’s eyes drifted to the origami swans on the table, each one a perfect replica of the others, each representing a life she had taken.“Brittany, with her explosive anger.Rachel with her manic decisions.Both of them finding peace in the precise folds of paper, just as I was beginning to.”
She picked up one of the swans, turning it carefully in her hands.“The first time I completed a successful figure—a simple crane—I felt something I hadn’t experienced in years.Control.Order from chaos.Each fold a decision that couldn’t be undone, only incorporated into the next step.For those moments, the noise in my head quieted.The guilt subsided.I could breathe.”
Sarah placed the swan back on the table, arranging it alongside its companions.“But it never lasted.The peace would fade, and I’d remember Aaron Bishop’s face as he walked from the courtroom.Cindy Hoffman’s family weeping on the news.The finger trap that had destroyed us all.”
Olga made a muffled sound that might have been a question.
“The finger trap,” Sarah repeated, looking directly at her captive.“Have you ever played with one as a child?The more you struggle to pull free, the tighter it becomes.The only escape is to do the counterintuitive thing—push your fingers together first, then carefully withdraw.But even the solution is tricky.Even after you push your fingers together and loosen the trap, you have to pull them apart again.”
She leaned closer, her eyes suddenly intense.“That’s what happened to me, Olga.I was caught in a trap of procedure versus justice.The harder I tried to free myself—to ensure Bishop was punished, to preserve the case—the more tightly the system constricted around me.And in the end, the very thing I tried to prevent happened anyway.”
Rising once more, Sarah moved to a small desk in the corner.She returned with something in her hand—a small bamboo cylinder woven in a diamond pattern.The Chinese finger trap she had photographed and sent to Riley Paige.
“I met Riley Paige once,” she said, holding the object out.“Years ago, in a seminar on ethics.She was intense, focused, the kind of trainee instructors remember.The seminar leader used this—” she held up the finger trap, “—to teach us about investigative dilemmas.About choices with no good outcomes.”
Olga’s eyes followed the object, confusion evident beneath her fear.
“It’s so appropriate that Paige was assigned to this case,” Sarah continued.“The gifted profiler who can see into killers’ minds.Who follows her instincts when others cling to procedure.”She placed the finger trap beside the swans.“I wonder if she remembers that lesson.If she’ll recognize what I’m trying to show her.”
Sarah fell silent for a moment.
“As you know, I found out about your origami group from the bulletin board at the Mosaic Community Center,” Sarah continued, turning back to Olga.“When I met you, I knew you were another woman seeking control through the discipline of folding.Another soul trying to quiet the chaos inside through precisely placed creases.”Her voice took on a note of genuine gratitude.“You welcomed me—or rather, you welcomed Fawn.You didn’t question my disguise, my reluctance to speak much.You just handed me paper and showed me new techniques.”
She moved closer to Olga, crouching before her bound form.“I watched you help others.Patricia, who came to your group struggling with her anxiety, found such peace through your guidance.The others too—all of them battling their own demons, all finding temporary respite in the origami figures you taught them to create.”
Sarah reached out toward Olga’s trembling hand.“You understand the transformative power of taking chaos and imposing order.Of making something beautiful from something plain.That’s why you’re so perfect for this final demonstration.”
Sarah peered closely at the syringe that was already in the victim’s arm, attached to a device that would press the plunger and release its poison at the scheduled moment.
“I chose them carefully, you know,” she said.“Brittany, Rachel, Patricia.Women who, like me, struggled with the tempest of their own minds.Who found in origami what I found—a temporary shelter from the storm.Their deaths weren’t cruel, Olga.They were demonstrations—carefully constructed scenarios to show how impossible choices destroy lives.”
She turned back to her captive.“The first victim had a warning not to unfold the fan.The second held a crane treated to disintegrate when touched.The third held a different message inside a swan.”She smiled slightly.“Each one a lesson in how procedure and intuition conflict, how either choice can lead to failure.”
