Crime And Punishment.vk -

The argument started over a repost. Katya had shared an article about a local shelter for stray dogs — “Please donate, even 50 rubles helps.” Alexey, feeling cynical and unseen, commented: “Funny how you care more about stray dogs than about the people in your own life you’ve ghosted.”

In the interrogation room, the detective slid a printout across the table. It was his deleted draft post — timestamped, IP-matched, and recovered from VK’s servers.

On the seventh night, he opened a new post. Private. Only visible to himself.

He refreshed. New comment from her mother: “Has anyone seen my daughter? I’m going to the police.” crime and punishment.vk

As Dmitry, he commented under her last photo: “She mentioned going to visit relatives in Tver. Maybe her phone died.”

For two days, he didn’t sleep. He scrubbed the apartment, wore gloves, wiped down the doorframe, took her phone, deleted their chat, and posted a final status from her account : “Taking a break from social media. Need to think. Don’t write.”

The lie felt electric. He was controlling the narrative. He was inside the crime scene, walking around unseen. The argument started over a repost

Then to “Friends.”

“You know,” the detective said, leaning back, “we wouldn’t have had enough to arrest you without this. The physical evidence was messy. But a written confession, saved on a Russian social network’s cloud? That’s iron , my friend. That’s punishment.”

Alexey’s hands went cold. He closed the browser. Then opened it again. Then closed it. Then opened it — this time as a different user . He had a fake account he’d made years ago for trolling forums: Dmitry_V_77 . On the seventh night, he opened a new post

And then came the suggested friends : Katya’s mother. Katya’s best friend. The detective who had just made a VK page under a fake name (Alexey noticed — the account was two days old and had only three profile photos, all generic). The algorithm didn't know it was building a cage around him. It just kept recommending connections.

“Yes?”

That was the last public message. The private chat that followed was worse. She called him pathetic. He called her a liar. She said he was never good enough. He said he’d prove her wrong.

He felt… nothing. Then everything. Then nothing again.