But it wasn't this macabre spectacle that worried her the most. No. It was what awaited her.
For in the moments that followed, an old man with white hair slowly emerged from the toilet. A red lollipop protruded from his mouth. He turned his gaze toward her, his bloodshot eyes scrutinizing her face.
"Did you see everything?" he asked in a hoarse voice.
He tilted his head to the side, so far that she could distinctly hear the bones in his neck crack.
"That's a good thing. It will make it easier to understand what follows."
An icy shiver ran through her body. Her breathing accelerated, her heart beating so hard it threatened to break her ribcage.
The old man removed the lollipop from his mouth. A thread of reddish saliva stretched between his lips and the candy.
"You know, I don't like hurting children," he whispered almost tenderly. "The other little one told me something very offensive."
He took a step toward her. His shoes sank into the pool of blood with a sickening sucking sound.
"I'm old, and sweet words soothe my little heart. Bad ones make me suffer, and since I don't want to suffer..."
He glanced at the disjointed body of the boy.
"I had to eliminate him. But with you, I think we don't have to go that far. Right?"
She remained frozen. Usually, in this kind of situation, she would have already been attacked. But something told her he was different from the others. More calculating. More patient.
"I just have one question, and I'll let you go," he continued, twirling his lollipop between his bony fingers. "Do you find me handsome?"
His question was simple. Too simple. He liked sweet words, so she had to compliment him to have a chance of getting out of this, didn't she?
"You are a wonderful old man for your age," she said in a trembling voice. "You have a nice build and a very beautiful complexion."
To her horror, his face decomposed. His features twisted into a grimace of disgust and rage.
"I hate... no, I loathe people who flatter," he hissed between his yellowed teeth. "Because they use hurtful words. So I have to kill them. Yes, I have to kill such people."
His gaze became mad, a demonic smile distorting his face.
"Yes... like the other child. You must d...ie."
The old man observed her, his bloodshot eyes gleaming with an unhealthy light in the flickering illumination of the train bathroom.
"You deserve to suffer for everything you've done to me," he declared, his demonic smile widening on his wrinkled face.
She floated in the air, unable to move. He raised his skeletal hand and made a casual gesture. Her body moved closer to him as if attracted by an invisible magnet.
"Let's start slowly," he whispered, removing his red lollipop from his mouth with a disgusting sucking noise.
CRACK!
A scream remained trapped in her throat as searing pain shot through her little toe. He had just broken it without even touching her.
"Each sound produced by the fragmentation of your bones brings me closer to ecstasy," he moaned, eyes half-closed. "Oh yes, I feel I'm almost there."
He licked his lollipop, looking thoughtful.
"But let's not go so fast. Good things should be savored, don't you think?"
CRACK! CRACK! CRACK!
Her toes, her metatarsals, her ankle... The pain was unbearable. Hot tears flowed down her cheeks.
Is this how I'm going to die? In a train bathroom, tortured by a demonic old man?
Her only regret was not being able to see her family one last time. Jade, her father... even that strange grandmother they had not yet reached.
The old man hopped with joy like a child with a new toy, his lollipop still firmly held between his yellowed fingers.
"Your tibia now," he announced with the enthusiasm of a game show host.
She closed her eyes, waiting for the inevitable pain.
But it never came.
Instead, a blinding light pierced her closed eyelids. The same light that had appeared at the hospital. Everything around her froze, as if time itself had ceased to flow.
"I don't have much time," resonated a masculine voice she didn't recognize. "I'm going to bind your soul to hers. She will help you, but it won't be easy."
A sensation of vertigo overwhelmed her, and she felt as if she was being torn from her body, projected through a veil of reality she never suspected.
When her vision cleared, she found herself in a vast space with fuzzy contours. The floor beneath her feet seemed to be made of black marble veined with gold, so polished that it reflected the purple sky above her like a perfect mirror.
In the center of this space stood an obsidian throne adorned with complex patterns that seemed to move when not looked at directly. On this throne sat a woman—or at least, a creature that resembled one.
Her beauty was breathtaking, but in a way that inspired more terror than desire. Her skin had the paleness of alabaster, contrasting violently with her hair, which was so deeply black that it seemed to absorb the surrounding light. It floated around her face as if underwater, defying all physical logic. A crown of golden thorns adorned her forehead, and her black silk gown cascaded around her, blending with the throne as if she were part of it.
Unconsciously, she raised her eyes to the woman's face.
Their gazes met.
An invisible force instantly crushed her to the ground, as if gravity had suddenly been multiplied by a hundred. The air was expelled from her lungs upon impact. She tried to breathe, but each inhalation was a titanic struggle.
"Who do you think you are to dare look me in the eyes, miserable insect?" Her voice resonated not in the air, but directly in her mind, each syllable like a hammer blow to her skull.
"I... I..." she gasped, unable to form a complete sentence.
"Answer, vermin, before I decide that your life is too insignificant to be worth my time."