From Athan's Papers and Leonard's Notebooks137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡcp5rlbEtMX
✦ [Undated scrapbook - in unclear handwriting, signed: A.]137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡc5KxFQokJ4
“Every time they rejected what I wrote, they said, 'This doesn't sound like us.'137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡrvZqdpP9wF
But they never said, 'This doesn't sound like the truth.'137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0odpY84OyL
So I gave them the truth, and asked only that it be said in an anonymous voice.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡFQJzU7k2Kh
And I became that voice.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRQn36Ne319
And in time, they came to rely on me whenever they wanted to lie in the name of truth.”
✦ [From Leonard's Diary - Second Year of Joining the Circle of Five]137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡWU6q9v8yQu
“Sometimes I feel like I'm not writing anything. I'm just covering up the sentences others write with my own voice.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡPxJqVAjctq
Athan wasn't a name... he was a gap.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡBjGXlTdwb2
And we all inhabited it.”
✦ [Letter not sent – folded inside a worn book]137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2eWGjnif6N
“Thomas,137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡizhJbxrGhV
I know you read my last text.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡsuuMSxi70d
I know you were afraid.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡuuPavf8BK4
But not of me… but of yourself, because you know I said what you couldn’t.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ7gIFh2svvs
If I die, don’t publish anything else under Athan’s name.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ8brYeZCV6j
Let him die in me… or let him live if someone finds him worthy.”
✦ [Note in Ella’s handwriting – in the margin of the investigation paper]137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyC8xn8FXbR
“Athan wasn’t a murderer.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡqSttAZRigy
He wasn’t even a person.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡFsY6jlRAaC
He was a chokehold in the voice of everyone who wrote, and he was afraid to be attributed with what he believed.”
✦ [Last page of Leonard’s notebook – the day before the incident]137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡUBSKsKbh27
“The lake doesn’t forget.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRD3YkaCnpb
Water doesn’t drown those who tell the truth, but those who have no one to listen.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡvdKjep7nvL
I’m going to go to him tonight.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡgw9EdUCjUK
And if I come back, I’ll write under Athan’s name… not to hide behind me, but to apologize to him.”
✦ [Epilogue – Unknown handwriting, found inside Leonard's coat fold]137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡENnDxPvGCe
"No one kills a shadow.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡjvEfRZcZe5
But a shadow can decide to follow no one anymore."
Letters from the Circle137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTwNBhnB98W
✦ [Letter from Laura Quinn – in ornate handwriting, dated months before the incident]137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ6pn3k9IK4N
"I thought we were sheltering behind Athan.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ0Z2FlJ7YwA
But the truth is, we were hiding behind him, the less we felt.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhkddjIEbP4
I didn't like Leonard much, but he was the only one who wanted to give the Shadow a face.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡhs4eH6wmfT
I was afraid that face would be seen."
✦ [Letter from Thomas Reilly – typed, appended to an unpublished article]137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡGPECPTgrL6
"If there is a killer, it's time.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡNTGTJ82mP3
Athan was an experiment… an abstract idea.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡCUqccWrzfT
But Leonard, with his stupid idealism, wanted it to become a tangible reality.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡMl5vOgb2xO
And because we don't have the power to give life, we did what cowards do:137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡHvnYC90HW9
We silenced him, made his death seem like a personal decision."
✦ [Short note from James Holloway – in pencil, just a few words]137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡU7VTMge7Xn
"There were five of us…137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ2RXyT5KPa3
Then there were four…137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaZp7W3NFKY
Then there were even fewer."
✦ Investigator Ella Moore's Final Report137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡbwk7Ajof7v
File: Death of Leonard Wilkes – Cascade Lake, New York137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡO8Ed8YpiHQ
Date: March 17137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡIXaLgnuoqH
Reporter: Department of Special Literary Investigations
🕯️ Narrative Analysis:137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡskOvXf7099
The "Five" literary circle created a fictional literary persona named Athan, which served as a disguise for writing highly daring or identity-blurring texts, published under their real names.
Over the years, Leonard Wilkes, the youngest member, began to give Athan a personal life. He wanted to transform from a shadow into a real author.
This approach was strongly opposed by the members, who feared it would expose the true identities of all those who contributed under that name.
He was subjected to indirect threats and gradually removed from the group.
On the day of his death, a gun was found in his hand, a gunshot wound to his mouth, and his ear was severed, as in some of Athan's self-written stories.
🔍 Conclusion:137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡTcZHM48Amg
It was not a pure suicide. Leonard went out to perform a symbolic ritual similar to what was written, hoping to find someone to stop him, to bring him back from his pre-existing madness.
It wasn't a direct murder.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡg0rQycTuqV
There's no physical evidence of another person at the scene, but the psychological pressure, the symbolic threat, and the literary betrayal were all an invisible bullet.
🧩 The killer?137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡeEH9rQeQfO
Everyone, and no one.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡv5YROElYsq
The circle killed Leonard with its silence, with its cowardice, by making the writing a wall, not a mirror.
📝 Final word:137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJwr8Bfihe8
Ella wrote:
"Athan may have been just a name... but Leonard was a human being.137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡJ3pCvtZv8r
And in the world of literature, when a human being is killed so that the name remains,137Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡKzyk5Hz0ML
we no longer write... we bury."
✦ End of the novel✦
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