He tried to calm himself as he walked to his car late that night, alone save for the echoes of his footsteps across the pavement. The first convention after the finale had aired was over, though a sense of foreboding clung to his thoughts.
"Get a grip, Koneitzko," he told himself. "They had to find out eventually. You knew they'd be upset when they did. There was nothing you could do about it."
Bullshit, he contradicted himself. You're the goddamn creator, you could've done anything you wanted. But you didn't WANT that, did you? You'd rather just bait the majority of your fans into getting their hopes up...
"No! It wasn't like that! It was just the way the show HAD to end!" Silence answered him.
He took a deep breath and gave up debating the issue with himself. It was done, a moot point. He reached into his pockets for his car keys. The lights in the parking lot flickered ominously. His keys eluded him, and a bead of sweat slipped down his temple as he felt suddenly, intensely vulnerable. As he reached his car door finally his fingers located his keys, and yanked them from his pocket. Still he couldn't keep his hands from shaking as he fumbled with them, looking for the right one, finally locating it and eventually succeeding in getting it in the keyhole. As he heard the locks click, he felt a sense of elation, throwing the car door open and practically diving into the driver's seat. Slamming the door behind him, he took a moment to breathe a sigh of relief, then chuckled to himself at his irrational fears.
"What the fuck are you so happy about?"
He jumped in his skin and threw himself against the driver's side door, whipping his head around to look at the passenger seat where the voice had come from. A young woman sat there, arms folded in front of a t-shirt emblazoned with the Zutara logo, scowling. She clearly had no weapons with her, yet this somehow made the scenario even more terrifying.
He screamed.