My eyes flicker as bodies swarm through the streets, many figures hustling through the chaos in a hearty attempt to make their way anywhere else. This was not a popular place to lurk, it seemed - well, not popular for most. Me? I liked it here. As I kept myself expertly hidden in the shadows and watched the many people rush by, I felt happy. I was satisfied with my place in this world.
Yet, these people were of little interest to me. They were all but a minimal amusement, something that was fun to watch for a short while, but elongated observation was hardly my style. I needed action; I needed some fun. There had to be someone worth giving the time of day. The question was, who?
I preferred not too old. Elderly people were little challenge. It was like trying to capture a rock - hardly any effort whatsoever. Adults were dull and they were a dime a dozen. Adults were too alert and you didn't get that same flashing terror or foolish brazen bravery you did with the younger generation. Yet, it was also dull to go too young. The really little ones were too curious and it took them a fleeting moment longer to realize there was a threat, and they responded poorly. I needed perhaps a teen, someone who would be interested, but wary, aloof, but attentive.
There were plenty interesting bodies piecing through the crowds, but choosing a target was a matter not to be taken in small matters and I wanted a thrill. I would find someone who would shudder in my visage. I felt a certain dullness begin to grip me, and I disliked such feelings.
I lowered my gaze, shifted my figure a trifle. I still kept myself hidden. These people, in their quest for existence, misunderstood much and overlooked the same amount. To eyes such as mine, my place of concealment was poor, uncreative. Had I been in their paths, lulling through the crowd - although what crowd would I pass through without cutting a few of them up - I would have spotted a figure hidden in this location instantly. I was, to my eyes, highly conspicuous. These people were so driven down by the droll and repetitive actions of their life that they overlooked clear details, saw no flaw in the strange. All they saw were objects, things they saw all their life, and thus they searched no further.
Then, there was a pause in the crowd. A female, easily teenage years, and shorter then the rest, she hesitated. I deviated a bit from my position, drawing my hand forward and curling my fingers around the edge of the garbage crate which I hid behind. My eyes flashed as the female stared directly at me. Her strong green eyes lingered on my figure for no more then three seconds, but there was no denying it, she had noticed me. While people of an unsurpassable quantity blissfully ignored my existence, she noted it. I saw the flash before she turned her eyes away. She was worried, suspicious, perhaps. She noted me and she wondered what I was doing.
Happiness formed within as she picked up the pace. Interesting one, that girl. What did she fully make of me? I wanted to know. I knew what I made of her.
As I knew the general public would not be kindly taken to a person such as myself for long, and I wanted to keep to the girl without being pestered, I made myself vanish deeper into the shadows of a narrow and foul alleyway. It smelled of death, although not the kind I preferred to inflict.
Quickly as I could, I dodged through the alleys, my feet tapping rapidly on the pavement below as I made haste to catch the girl once again. My hand fell to my waste as I peered around a corner, fingers curving over my weapon. I felt a certain joy to touch such a useful tool, to think about and consider its imminent use, the blood it would soon taste.
There she was. She turned the corner not more then a few seconds after I made to look. I shied back a little, yet thrill was the only feeling that gripped me with its elongated fingers as she hustled past. She failed to see me, but I saw her.
It was quieter, and got more so as she continued on. I kept within the series of alleys as she moved into the more reserved parts of the city. I saw a reticent look in her eyes as she turned on to another road, loneliest road she had taken thus far.
Quickly did I hasten out of the alleyway, moving with purpose in the female's direction. I kept mt pace steady, slow enough to where I would keep well behind her, but not so much to where I would not exist should she turn around. I wanted to see how long I could play this game with her, how long she would allow me to hold this position before checking, before realizing she was not quite as alone as she would have liked to be. I could hear my own footsteps echo on the pavement below, and hers were just a little off-key with mine. It was only a matter of time before he ears caught this information, realized the steps did not quite match. Then, she would check. She would search for the unwanted guest, and she would find him. I slowed a trifle, but the excitement, the nagging curiosity of when she would look, it only increased its pace.
Then, she came to a stop. There was a nervous twitch in her system as it registered something was amiss. Her head turned and immediately fear flickered into her eyes as they met my figure.
She staggered back uncertainly, stricken by a mixture of fear and worry as she tried to calculate what to do about my presence. "W-Who are you?" she asked nervously. Rookie mistake.
I flashed her an expert grin. "I don't know, hun. Who do you want me to be?" I responded.
She was taken aback by my answer. I could see it in her eyes among the fear. "I shouldn't be talking to you." she muttered nervously, her gaze flickering downwards a little, as if she were appalled to look at me for a moment longer.
"Hold on." I said, not calling it with a yell, but being firm nonetheless. She was halfway in a turn when abruptly she stopped, glancing at me for half a second before looking away. "Who told you that you shouldn't talk to me? Where I come from, I'm the life of the party. Ok, well, actually Jack is technically the life of the party, but when he's away on business, its me who takes over. People will kill to get a chance to talk to me... literally! Or was it the other way around? I tend to get that part mixed up."
"L-Look, I'm sure you're a lovely guy - who hangs out in dark alleys - but I have th-things I need to do. I can't be late for my appointment and all, so I should go." she mumbled nervously.
An appointment. That was a very weak cover, a facade that would only fool the most clueless of minds. I may have been a tad on the psychotic side, but sometimes the ones with a crack in the side of the head were the greatest artists, the minds the world lusted to be like. They simply failed to understand the roots of our creativity, what forces drive us to such a spark. Nonetheless, I had a retaliation for such a poor excuse. "I could take you there. I know these back paths better then anyone else. Bet I could find you a much quicker path then you had in mind."
"No thanks. I'll be fine." she replied doggedly.
She diverted her gaze once more and it was at this point I could no longer ignore it. I had been slowly building anger with each time she refused to look at me and every occasion where she refused to meet my eyes was another drop of wine in the fire. She had given it one too many chances, and a blaze rose into the night sky with a flash.
I reached down, quickly drawing my blade as my eyes flashed with fury. She had little time to react, for I pounced her like a fierce panther, the prowess of the hunter in my step and the fury in my motions. I dominated her easily, snatching her in my grasp and thrusting her against a nearby house. With equal speed I brought my blade to her neck, gently touching the blade to her fragile skin. I could hear my fragile heat pounding rapidly in her chest, and her hand twitched violently as she attempted to get a grasp on the threat at hand. I could feel her tremble, and it made my heart glow. "Why won't you look at me!?" I howled fiercely, the cool exterior I earlier exhibited vanishing without a known trace. "Is there something wrong with my face? Am I not good enough for you?"
"N-No... there's nothing wrong with you..." she muttered nervously, but I knew. I knew better. She still wouldn't look at me. She was afraid, but perhaps of the wrong thing.
"Really?" I asked with a sadistic purr, drawing my blade slowly over her skin. "Then tell me, why will you still not look at me!?" I jerked my blade quickly, not quite cutting her, but convincing her for half a second I was going to. "Look at me, girl! Look at me or I will cut you open - carve you like the cattle you are!"
She wouldn't look. No matter how often I howled at her, no matter what threats I threw her way, she would not look. She was terrified, oh yes - she just wasn't terrified correctly, that's all. She wanted to look away, but I wanted her to look. I was lying, of course. I would cut her either way. But I wanted her to be looking at me when my blade claimed her. It would be all the more sweet to see that burning light in her eyes fade.
"Look at me! Look!" I ordered aggressively. I drew back my blade and thrust the point into her shoulder-blade, twisting it on its side to cut deeper. Blood trickled at first, but as I twisted the blade, it began to flow far more vigorously. Excitement welled in me; I yearned for more. "Do you like this?"
I could feel her attempting to struggle in my grasp, but all she was truly doing was helping my cause, tearing herself apart more, and as she tried to achieve freedom, she bled more fiercely, and I loved it. "N-No! Of course not!"
I screeched, "Then look at me!" But she would not look.
So I thrust my blade from her body and lunged into her once again. I struck with precision a number of time, my knife penetrating her painfully, drawing forth plentiful amounts of that thick crimson liquid I had come to fancy so much, but I did not strike to kill. I released each lash with the intent to draw forth suffering she had never felt before, and as she flailed and bled and cried and plead, I felt only a rising thrill, and satisfaction. She tried to grab my arm, to hold me back, but a single jerk of the arm was enough to release her weak grasp. As I drew my knife back to strike again, this time in the chest - I would not hit the heart, of course; I didn't want to kill her yet - she managed to grab my wrist with both her hands and I hesitated as I saw the pleading look in her eyes and she looked into mine, sobbing, "Please... stop."
I relented now. She looked at me. Her eyes gazed into mine and I felt satisfaction. I shoved her forcefully and backed away from her, and she collapsed to the ground, blood sticking to her hands as it had fled from her body. She panted weakly. She would live... assuming nothing else attacked her. Shame, that one.
I stepped closer to her, hovering over her body, my figure positively terrifying. She shivered, then it intensified as she saw me above her, a fierce glow in my eyes.
"Wh-What?" she sobbed weakly, looking once more straight at me. There was much hesitation, but still she looked. Her heart escalated once more as I moved towards her, blood dripping off my knife as I moved it purposefully towards her. "I looked at you! You said to look at you and I did!"
I placed a hand on her chest, willingly her to the ground once more with the minimum pressure required. I tilted my head, a psychotic bliss highlighted in my every facial feature. "Yes, you did. And I thank you for that. It will be far more satisfying to watch you die if I have seen the hope your eyes held before they forever lose them."
As soon as the threat was released, she struggled wildly in my grasp. She was weak, though, not that it would've taken much effort to keep her struggles at bay even before I drew much of her strength away. A single hand was more then enough to ignore her attempt to escape me. She wasn't going to escape. I knew it... and somewhere within, she knew it. My knife loomed over her menacingly, poised to claim yet another victim, to add to its count. She stilled as I held a hand to her lips and grinned at her. My eyes burrowed into hers and nestled in for the night, and I then purred to her, "Go to sleep."
