He twisted, clawed at the mud, at Ruslan, at anything, desperate to pull away, to survive.
Ruslan didn’t flinch. Not a muscle. Not a twitch.
His calmness was more terrifying than the violence itself, a predator in full control, waiting, calculating. He could have ended it. Any second. And Marcus knew it.
The panic in Marcus’s chest exploded into chaos, every heartbeat pounding with the realization that he was utterly at Ruslan’s mercy. And in that mercy—or lack thereof—Ruslan held the ultimate power.
Ruslan suddenly lunged, his fist smashing into Marcus’s face again—then again, each blow harder, faster, relentless. It was as if something inside him had snapped, a past he had buried foryears now devouring him, driving him forward with merciless force.
Marcus flailed, weak, panicked, trying to shield himself, but Ruslan’s strikes were surgical, unstoppable. Each impact made his world shatter a little more—teeth rattling, skull throbbing, vision swimming in red and rain.
Finally, Marcus crashed backward, slamming into the muddy wall of the grave. His skull struck the packed earth with a dull, sickening crack that echoed through the hollow night. Blood poured immediately from the wound, mixing with the rainwater, swirling around them in a dark, sticky pool.
Marcus gasped, choked, and tried to scramble away, but Ruslan didn’t stop. He hovered over him, a predator feeding on the fear he had cultivated for years—every blow a reckoning, every strike a message.
I watched from the edge, frozen.
Rain plastered my hair to my face, soaked my clothes through to the skin, but I barely felt it. My entire body trembled—not just from cold, but from the violence unfolding before me, from the knowledge that this man was capable of ending lives without hesitation... and that some part of him believed he was justified.
Ruslan looked like a devil forged in storm and grief.
Rain beat down on his bare shoulders, his hair plastered to his forehead, his eyes burning with something beyond rage—something ancient and feral.
“You...” His voice broke, low and guttural. “You allowed my wife to be—”
The word caught in his throat.
Wouldn’t come.
His jaw clenched so hard I thought his teeth might shatter.
Instead, he surged forward again.
He seized the therapist by the throat, fingers digging deep, yanked him close, and slammed his forehead into the man’s face with a sickening crunch. The therapist screamed—high, broken, animal—before Ruslan drove a knee into his groin.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
The man’s body convulsed violently, legs buckling, mouth open in silent agony as the last of his strength drained away into the rising water.
Ruslan held him there.
I stood frozen at the edge of the graves, arms wrapped tight around myself as though I could keep my body from shaking apart.
Rain lashed my face in cold, stinging lines, ran down my spine, soaked into my clothes until they clung like a second skin.
The world felt narrowed to this circle of mud and death, to the man standing inside it, delivering justice in the only language he knew.
Ruslan punched again.
And again.
And again.
Each blow landed with ruthless precision, driven not by frenzy but by something far older and more terrible—years of unspent grief, betrayal calcified into muscle memory. He wasn’t flailing. He was executing. The therapist’s face collapsed beneath his fists, bone and skin giving way until it no longer looked human, until it was only blood and ruin and soundless surrender.
