You are alone, in a very small room. You knew how small the room was already, because there's no way of knowing it, in the pitch darkness, the motionless air. Not entirely motionless, because you can hear a very soft breath, close to you. Making you not-alone. An infinitely soft breath, which you keep thinking to be your imagination; stopping your own breathing doesn't help, because it is softer than the noise blood makes while rushing through your ears.
After a long, long while - though not quite so long as to let you cease worrying - the thief speaks. What he speaks, you do not know, save that it is meant to be reassuring, that it is a shy apology. His voice is almost as soft as his breath, and his movements are entirely soundless. Not cat-like, for even the ragged suede of an alley-cat's paw makes some sound, and the thief makes none.
He comes closer - his voice sounds closer in the black, motionless dark. Close enough that you think you should feel his breath on your breast as he keeps asking you to forgive him for being so disappointing. You don't feel his breath, though, and neither do you feel the scalpel until it has gone very deep in your breast, severing your heart from its home. As he takes your heart and walks away, over the great glops and wheezes of your sucking veins you hear him cry a small cry - of shame? when his own heart falls out and, as if that cry summoned it, the moon floods your room.
By the molten moonlight, before the final blackness comes you see the thief is very small, and a bit broken.
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