Disclaimer: None of the characters or setting belong to me they are all the intellectual property of Masashi Kishimoto.
Long Summary:
Yuki Matarashi was only the first in a long string of unexplained murders. A mysterious killer who leaves their victims torn to shreds in their beds has plagued Konoha for months. People crowd around the crimes scenes to feed their morbid curiosity, but for others it is a way to stay alive as the nightmares are getting closer to home. Hinata Hyuuga, an under the radar high school junior, is part of the crowd in a bizarre action of trying to clear her conscience and trying to stay alive as long as she can. She was one of the last people to see Yuki a few hours before her death causing her grief for not being able to save her. But, her quest for closure is bringing her closer to what waits in the shadows.
This used to be one of those towns where you didn't have to lock your doors at night and you could trust your neighbors but the new millennia ushered in change that seemed to shake even small southern towns to their core. It's getting worse, much worse in Konoha as people begin to disappear or wake up in their beds torn to shreds from what the police can only describe as unknown and slightly resembling an animal attack- not a welcome explanation because it gives the villain no face. I want to know the face of the person that I am supposed to run from. They always taught us stranger danger but only ever gave the villain the visage of a black man in a brim hat and trench coat, which would only help if we lived in a cartoon world. Now, they tell us that the villain could likely be someone we know. I don't know what I fear more being killed by some shadowy figure or meeting my fate by the hands of someone I thought I could trust.
Chapter One
People crowd around the Mimori's house on Chiba Square as police and paramedics continually run in and out of the house answering few questions of the voyeuristic mass. Part of me thought that they no longer answered to let the false accusations and grotesque imagery grow in the inventive minds of the on-lookers who could come of with anything from the deranged wander to werewolves. The news story that would appear on the six-O-clock news would be the same as the last, though. They would tell us that there was still no suspect in the case and that it resembled a wild animal attack not offering us in form of comfort.
I make my way into the crowd, shoving and dodging until I made it to the front where my friend Sakura always seemed to find her place. When, the first story broke Sakura was the first one to dive into the story with morbid curiosity that even my own could not rival, though, we did not have much of a choice because we were forcefully dragged into this mess because we were nice to the wrong person. This caused Sakura to feel as if she needed to solve the case to truly feel safe and absolve her conscience turning her into our own little Chloe Sullivan-if that is even a relevant reference- with her wall of weird on this particular reoccurring tragedy and I'm just dragged along because I am the only seventeen year old that still has a camera that actually uses film that would actually go along with the plan.
I huffed and nodded to her before asking the formal, "What happened this time?"
She looked at me with wide green eyes radiating her excitement that I could not manage to share in such a morose setting, "Oh Hee—na-tuh, you don't even know," she sang, unhelpfully.
I pinched the bridge of my nose trying to resist the urge to hit her, "Just spit it out, dumbass," I sighed.
She smiled wider not minding the insult; "It was the whole family this time. Not just one of the kids,"
"And, this means?"
"They think that the killer has teamed up with someone else because the tear pattern on one of the victims doesn't fit the killer's usual style,"
I shrugged and replied half-jokingly, "Maybe, he's just trying to be creative,"
She glowered at me not finding it a bit funny. Apparently, excitement was ok but jokes were not in such circumstances.
"Oh, Hinata you are not taking this serious," she whined.
I stare down at my camera twisting the focus rings to preoccupy my hands as I try to formulate the proper response. Finally I uttered in remorse, "You're right. I'm not, but I am just confused. I don't see why people aren't running away, instead coming to watch the show. I was like this once, but now it makes me sick,"
Her eyes turned sad and she placed her hand on my shoulder trying to calm me, "You don't have to do this if you don't want to,"
I shake her hand off, "If I don't I just increase my chances of dying because my ignorance. I don't know about you Kura, but I'm not ready to die,"
She purses her lips and stares at me with sympathy not really knowing what to say anymore. We weren't much for talking anymore because no matter where the conversation started it would always leads us back to this, to the thought of those we once knew dying. It started with Yuki Matarashi, an old classmate from elementary school that decided to enroll in St. Mito when everyone else was heading on to Konoha Middle. Sakura and I saw her at the local 24-hour cafe the night before at three in the morning when none of us quite wanted to go home and we were too broke to afford gas.
Yuki had just had a fight with her parents for some reason or another and wanted to be rebellious, which in her definition was staying out til' the crack of dawn drinking coffee. I remember laughing at her as she recounted her adventure when she came to sit with us because we were the only slightly familiar faces in the joint. She grinned when Sakura cracked her corny jokes and blushed when I would swear so loudly the waitress would turn to give me a disapproving look. We stayed til' five and I gave her a ride home and watched her go into her house and shut the door behind her only to wake up to my mother sobbing at the end of my bed telling me that Yuki was found dead in her bed at ten-o-clock that morning. Torn to shreds, most of her organs gnawed on or missing.
I heaved up the contents of my almost empty stomach when the news hit me and again when the police showed me the pictures. Flashes of red staining my vision as I stared at ribbons of the girl that I knew only hours before as her heart beat with rhythm. But that heart, it wouldn't beat again because it no longer existed. A lot of things about her no longer existed, from what I could see and what they told me.
It was protocol to question the last people that saw the victim even if they were just teenagers because crazier shit has happened. After we were let go, Sakura and I had clung to each other whispering hollow words of comfort to one another. We knew that everything was far from over as we were taken back out into our changing world. We laid our heads on our pillows and tried to escape from our new reality, but sleep no longer offered comfort.
Sakura still dreamed of trying to save Yuki from the unseen attacker, but is never able to reach her in time. I dreamed of the night they will finally come for me and secretly prayed that they will spare Sakura. Part of me wondered what they dreamed of if they dreamed at all.
"Here they come," a voice whispered, pulling me from my thoughts as everyone watched as stretcher after stretcher was pulled from the house, body bag after body bag.
"Camera ready?" Sakura asked, eyes trained ahead as if she could not bare to look away for a mere second fearing they would disappear once she did. On days like this she would barely breath, afraid of inhaling the scent of death.
I raise the camera to my face and peer intently through the viewfinder, adjusting the dials with an eerie determination as I tried to find the perfect setting to capture such a macabre scene. But, something stops me. A shiver up my spine and a face that should not be there, but somehow found its way within my lens. Black eyes stared back as I felt myself beginning to shake from a strange sense of fear that should not have been there, not now. I could vaguely hear Sakura's panicky voice as she asked if I was all right, grabbing onto my shoulders and shaking me when I would not respond to her calling. But, I couldn't move. My mind and body were numb with fear while all the face could do was stare. Their eyes bleed into my world and next thing I knew- I was down the rabbit hole.
Chapter Two Preview
The dark haired woman with eyes the color of blood leaned down towards her companion with eyes the color of black water, yet, they were eerily still and unmoving portraying nothing of what he truly felt as he stared at her with chilling ease. She looked pleasant enough, but it the feeling she gave off that made you want to keep your distance as she sized you up with her crimson eyes as if she secretly wondered what your soul tasted like. Was it something good to eat?