AN: Alternating POV up ahead. And, I would like to extend my appreciation to the readers who have thus far followed/faved and commented on this story. Thank you for showing interest — it truly fuels my desire to write. With that said continue to R&R!

Chapter Eleven: Rabbit Heart, Fox Maw

Upon his entry into Smith's Grove, he'd told his doctor that he wanted to kill his younger sister with a box of crayons and scratch paper. After that admission, Michael earned his plea for insanity incredibly young. For what child could be capable of murder lest he was psychologically unhinged to begin with?

He wondered what Laurie would think of him.

Would she be proud of him, of her brother who is now so notoriously despised by Haddonfield that its residents ignorantly discount his existence? He certainly was humbled by it.

Oh Laurie….

The thought of his sister…

oh, sweet, little Laurie

His ageless obsession

His undoing.

… consumed him entirely, purely as though morphine had entrapped his thoughts as he crossed the street, entering the edge of the forest and lured by the harsh breaths of a nobody girl.

Not often did he think of Laurie, but the way this girl's legs were pumping, the way she threw frantic glances over her shoulder, was so eerily familiar to when — almost a year from today — his Laurie fled from him shrieking through the neighborhood that had answered her hysterical cries none.

His gait was constant but his chase was gaining distance. She was fast — the image of her profile grew smaller with each passing moment. Several yards in front of him, she tripped over a protruding root and he knew instantly clumsiness befit her.

When Michael heard her distressed scream blare achingly into his ears, he hoped she had injured something.

He hoped it was the ankle.

But, from the distance illuminated poorly by the fall moon — he saw the girl stumble to her feet and continue her escape. He followed her all the same with the knife gripped in his hand. As the forest thickened, he swiped at dangling branches and bushes to clear his path. For a few moments, he could no longer hear the dry leaves crunch under the girl's feet besides his own.

At some point, when he'd reached a hundred paces since entering the dark woods, Michael came to a halt. There were no sounds above his controlled breathing. The absence of noise from nocturnal creatures on the prowl made for a rather suspenseful ambience. It seemed the entire forest had waited in bated breath since his arrival. As Michael scanned the foliage surrounding him, the wind whispered over fallen oak leaves, blowing them towards his bare feet.

For all the times he was kept in solitary confinement, it would not be hard to believe that he'd mastered patience. But, the cold air breathing upon his cheeks bothered him immensely. He had never felt so exposed, so insecure. The need to conceal himself was becoming gravely irritating. It didn't make better the situation that he hardly had half the motivation to continue traipsing through the woods for a silly teenager whose brother seemed perfectly capable of capturing her himself. Michael contemplated changing his current direction but if she were half as foolish — like so many before her — then she would've fled in a straight line through the forest.

He paced forward then, passing through the towering shadow of a willow, when, from the corner of his eye, he registered the blur of ivory wood swing in a low arc behind the tree.

The thick branch snapped upon collision with his abdomen. His teeth sank into the wall of his mouth as he dropped his knife, staggering backwards.

A frightened gasp, short and soft, spilled from quivering lips when the other half of the log fell to the ground. He'd seen her face, pinched with regret as though she'd never hurt anyone before. Then, the girl spun on her heel.

Not so fast.

Michael's hand flew and caught her wrist, yanking— hard— which forced the girl to her knees.

Sprawled flat on her stomach, Carmen scrambled, clawing at the ground. Her feet had positioned themselves to propel her forward into a crouching sprint when a violent tug on her ankle pulled her back and she was eating dirt again.

"No!" she cried, "No! No please, st—!"

Carmen grunted in surprise when his wiry mass crawled onto the small of her back, pinning her to the forest floor. Thick fingers tangled into her black mane and jerked her face upwards. Her spine popped, but her fear effectively blocked out any realization that there could have been pain.

A face came into view above her— masculine, dangerous, terrifying — and black eyes drilled into her with clinical disinterest. Carmen couldn't blink, even with tears casting a watery film over her eyes, blurring her vision.

She released a sob from full lips as a hand forced her face into the earth. His body lifted off of her briefly and briefly did she draw in a haggard breath, cold air spilling into her ribcage. Suddenly, fingers dug into either side of her hip with rough demand and her vision whipped around as she was flipped onto her back.

Carmen cut off her sob for a scream as soon as their pelvises met, the heated contact seeped through the cotton fabric of her skirt. Then, Michael established a grip on her throat, bolstering her panic to reach an extremely frightening degree. As something within her snapped, Carmen relentlessly kicked beneath him for all the strength stored in her. He could have easily been eighty pounds heavier than her, yet she thrashed and screamed because there was nothing more critical to her than her life and her breath.

Until, Michael pressed down onto her trachea, repressing the air from exiting her quivering lungs.

He could break her neck. He wouldn't even have to try. How vulnerable she was now than she ever would be in her short existence. She was at his mercy. He could commit unto her a great deal of atrocities, even here, in the woods, where if one did hear her scream would mistaken the sound for that of a dying animal or convince themselves that it was. The thought was fleeting. But, he refrained.

Though her round eyes did make for an enticing offer. If he squeezed a little harder, dug the pads of his fingers deeper into the artery where he could feel her fluttering pulse, maybe he could coax her pale eyes to widen a tad further as she clawed at his wrist, blunt nails biting into his skin.

Then, as though he had actually done what his mind suggested, she went limp.

It occurred to him that he should've released her sooner. Slightly perplexed, he realized he didn't even need to try — not that he would ever have to, not that anyone has, but, this was effortless and her resilience was truly pathetic. Weak. His surprise dwindled quickly, however, and whatever exhilaration had come as a result of this chase dissipated as if it had never been.

Slowly, his hands slipped from the smooth column of her neck.

Eager to return indoors, he kneeled and grasped the curve of her waist. He ignored how her flesh molded in his palm as he tossed her over his shoulder...

And thought in the second that he felt her body tense and a sharp object pierce below his shoulder blades that maybe the girl wasn't so incompetent.

Rolling off of his shoulder, she flopped onto the forest floor and broke off in a sprint.

Michael spared three seconds to swallow the slime of something thick and iron between the roof of his mouth and tongue, then rose to his feet with anger set ablaze in his chest. His hand reached around his waist and eased the knife from his flesh.

The sight of blood never unnerved him, but finding his on a blade he intended to use on others frayed his nerves to the very last thread.

Ahead of him, he stared at the trees coated in shadow.

Carmen…

She wasn't his sister.

But, for Michael, she would have to do.