"No! Leave me alone!"

You know you need to do this.

"I don't want to kill tonight, please!"

How else are you going to
have a good night's rest?

"Please no, just … just let me sleep without a kill, I beg you, please!"

No, no, no,
you will kill tonight!
And you will fall asleep
with blood on your hands!
That is final!
Now go!

That's when I realized where I was: back in my car, sitting there with the lights off. Walking past in front of me was a man wearing a blue sweatsuit with white stripes running up the outside of each leg. I noted that he'd combed his hair to one side of his head, a tiny, insignificant detail that stuck with me anyway.

There's always some stupid little detail. Every time.

He was too busy carrying grocery bags to his house to notice me as I slid up behind him. To do what I had to do, I brought my usual tools: a hand-held sledge and a knife. The hammer was short, but massy, its head hefting at just over two kilos; the knife was slim, with a stubby handle but a long blade, the metal reaching from my wrist to the tip of my index finger. Long practice made it simple to keep them out of sight.

I paused suddenly just a few meters away, experience lending me its wisdom. I obviously didn't want to carry him up the stairs, only to find the door locked. I'd caused myself that sort of trouble before. No I would wait for him to open that door and then knock him out; simple, quick, and easy. Once I saw him get his key and put it into the lock, I attacked. With my sledge I bludgeoned him on the back of his head, and with that he fell, barely aware and dropping his things onto the porch. Anyone who happened to be in a position to look could have seen fruits and veggies falling down the stairs. Fortunately, I'd made sure no one was.

With him too weak to fight back, I started my reign of terror. Tucking my hammer away, I pushed him over onto his back, took my knife and stabbed him, low in the gut, in that soft spot just below the stomach. It always goes in easy … so easy. He makes a small sound, a sort of wet *HUCK* noise as the hilt pounds into his skin.

Then, just like every other time, I stabbed him again and again and again, almost mechanically.

Just the way she wanted me to.

After a while, I lost track of how many times my knife found a sheath in his body. That's when I heard her return.

The metallic clink and hiss of her bracelets announced her. Always with the bracelets. Behind me I heard her laugh and jingle them. I heard music begin, and even more jingling of her bracelets, faster now, a mad kind of rhythm. Then I knew she was dancing and laughing as over and over I stabbed his unresisting body.

I kept stabbing him even after losing count, even after I knew beyond doubt that he was already dead, I just didn't stop. I couldn't stop.

As I kept going into the night, and as the blood splashed everywhere with each blow, and as I stabbed and gouged and tore and ripped … I felt the tug, the pull of fatigue, dragging me off into the night. I knew the moment I stopped and closed my eyes, I would fall, fall into a world of nothing until I woke again. In this world of nothing though, there was peace, away from her.

The only thing I knew of what happened after was when I woke up. There next to me was the very man I killed last night, my blanket his blood, my pillow his blood … but even with this kill, she wasn't satisfied.

Even as this one ended another one started. And I know this cycle of killing will be repeated, over and over, without an end, only ceasing with my death. I know this … and I despair.

Each night's respite is a little shorter in length, a little less restful. And she comes a little sooner. Before long, I fear, she will not leave me at all. I turn my mind away from that thought.

I can do nothing to stop it. I will kill again, and again, and with every kill I will sleep. And with every new day, she will come back.

END

A/N: well that's all folks thanks for reading!

-Katsuki