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This went on for weeks, every night I would be led to another murder. I watched death over and over again and the creature slowly drew me closer to the victims. It liked me to watch the interactions before death arrived.
My mind had slowly compartmentalised what I was seeing. I’d managed to slot these memories into the same place I put my illusions about strangers. Soon what little sleep I’d had before was taken from me, replaced with flashes of gore, broken glass, blood, I could smell death everywhere I went. My life became even more of a shell than it had been as every night I made the same mechanical movement towards my front door.
I was so tired but I longed to see the creature more, to get closer and as time went on my thoughts began to change. I wondered what it would be like to be the monster, to participate in serving justice, I had a compulsion to follow it and I gave in to that every single night.
Then one-night things changed, the same routine I had followed every night for 3 weeks led me to a small house just outside of town. For a while I’d been taken to desolate places, dumps and dank rooms in small buildings the nastiest parts of town, but tonight I’d been guided to a clean street in a nice neighbourhood.
The house itself could have been taken from the front of a magazine, a perfect lawn with rows of flowers and a small white fence that bordered it all. Two expensive cars were parked on the driveway and there was an air of freshness about the place, it was well looked after no-one could deny that.
I crept up the driveway avoiding the security light and the creature tucked its gaunt body as low to the ground as it could get and slithered its way towards the front door. I watched the creature slip its fingernail between the door frame and handle and a small click meant we were granted entry.
The creature paused and tension filled the air. It slowly looked back at me, its gaping sockets aimed more towards the floor, but there was a message behind its gaze. My insides bubbled, I became nervous. I had no idea what was coming next but the creature obviously did.
We entered the house quietly; overtime I’d been allowed closer to the being and at this point I was within touching distance. I felt in tune with the creature like we had formed a bond.
It’s hard to describe but I heard it speak to me several times, never with words, it was like I just knew what was being said, its emotions in tune with my own. I felt the euphoria before it took a victim, I also felt the hurt, rage and disgust at humans. I wondered if I fell into that category. It did nothing in those moments to tell me I did not, it left those thoughts to hang in the air. Yet I craved its attention, I felt privileged that it had picked me to witness its acts.
The house was dark with the occupants having already gone to bed and I wondered yet again why this night was so different to the previous. Slowly we crept up the stairs, the monster’s movements drawing impossible shadows as its limbs entangled themselves. Then we stopped. I sat on the top step, in a shadow drawn by the ornate staircase and I watched as the creature made its way towards the light coming from one of the rooms on the second floor.
The glow of a computer screen leaked out into the corridor and I could hear the sound of typing: but there was no argument, no violence, just silence and the satisfying clicks of someone writing. The creatures head loomed round the door frame and it slipped its way inside, unheard and unseen. I moved from my position and crept slowly towards the door to the office, the typing became even more frequent and a small giggle rang out into the hallway, this made me pause for a second before continuing.
I was almost at the door. I was so close. I stepped on a floorboard and the creak rang out over the house, in the silence it was deafening. The typing paused. I drew in a sharp breath and heard someone move from across the hall. The typing became more urgent, almost as if a paragraph was being written and I saw the door to another room crack open slightly.
I had no choice, I darted from the doorway and back towards the stairs just as the door slowly opened and a heavy-set man crept out into the hall. He peeked through the crack in the office door, left open by the monster and with force pushed the door open. It smashed into the wall. I heard a gasp come from inside the room. A woman pleading with her husband, “it’s not what it looks like, you have to believe me, I told you, you’ve got it wrong” and I moved towards the now open door.
I approached the scene and saw the man’s fists were balled. I could feel the rage from where I was. She looked oddly calm, not terrified but also not accepting. She became silent as he smashed things around her. He was in her face screaming and still she kept the same look. He pushed her up against a wall and she stayed limp, no tears from her eyes, just a distant look, like she wasn’t truly present.
He let her go and she dropped to the floor. He kicked her and her body moved slightly. I was sure at that point she had broken ribs at least. He picked her up and hit her. She was unconscious but still breathing when he crouched down on the floor beside her. I did not hear what he said but I could see what he was about to do.
I’m not sure what made me do it. I watched her slowly open her eyes and she was suddenly well aware of what was about to happen to her. I had watched so much death and destruction shown to me by the hands of this monster, I refused to watch what I felt an innocent woman was about to endure.
I calmly scanned the scene and my eyes lay upon a vase that had been knocked over during the man’s violence. His back was turned to me and he was still berating his wife. He struggled with her to move her into the position he wanted her in. She was a dead weight in his arms. He turned her and as she moved her eyes locked onto mine, I knew in that moment I had the opportunity to be like the creature, to see through its eyes finally, to exact my own form of justice.
I moved forwards and brought the vase down as hard as I could on the man’s head. His skull cracked slightly and blood gushed out as he fell to the floor: but I did not stop, I kept hitting him until the solid vase in my hands broke and fragments of bone and tissue littered the floor. Then I looked at the woman curled in a ball and walked away.
That night I remember walking home. I remember the emotion flowing through me and then I remember the numbness. I had taken a life: was it mine to take? I did not fear the police or punishment, for some reason I knew no one would find me. It was like I wasn’t a person any more. The entire world just forgot me and because of that, I could do what I had just done.
The feeling didn’t go away, in fact as I lay there I felt the walls close in on me. This is what I’d wanted, this is the thing I’d craved so much, to be like it, to kill. Night turned to day and I still lay where I’d fallen, not bothering to shower or change. I lay in my bed as I was, a nasty reminder of what I’d just done.
Hours passed and the numbness returned and then as night fell comforting thoughts came in the form of near insanity. I had done the right thing. How good it felt as I saw his chest cease to rise, how I wanted more, to do it again, to feel the power that came with taking a life. I felt lost inside my own head, conflicting thoughts barrelling past like trains on opposing tracks, never stopping for me to formulate an opinion, which side I was on.
Suddenly my senses told me it was time to leave and I felt a sensation of crawling making its way up my legs. This time I fought it with all my might tucking my legs up so I was curled into a ball, my jaw was clenched tight, I refused to give in.
The crawling feeling dispersed and I gulped air in, my body finally being given chance to breathe. Then I heard the click of a lock and the slow creak of my front door. I stared at the thin gap from a not quite closed door, the street lights illuminating the hallway from the living room but casting awkward shadows as it did.
I waited, my eyes scanning up and down, trying to see any shadow that moved, and there it was. I saw its skeletal fingers curl around the door as it pulled its body through the small crack. I did not look away, I faced the creature. Even if it could hurt me, I was a willing victim of its punishment. I had come to terms with that in those hours I lay on the bed, that I would not escape, that in admiring the creature I had allowed myself to have the same fate as the others. I closed my eyes and let hot tears spill down my face. I did not want to look at the creature, so broken, yet so beautiful, I did not want to feel the shame I felt in this moment, and so I lay, once again, curling into a ball ready to accept my fate as tears soaked the blanket.
I heard the monster move from the corner of the room. I opened my eyes briefly to see shadows creep around the dark edges, the bed gently depressed and I closed my eyes taking in the moment I would finally be free. The creature moved its slender arms around me and gripped. I felt its breath on my neck, I could feel a drop of congealing blood hit my shoulder and I realised the deep wound that made its mouth must have curled into a smile.
I lay there in that moment, the feeling being unusual, knowing I was so close to something that could kill me. Yet I felt comforted, protected. We went out again that night and the night after that, the creature sometimes giving me opportunities to fulfil my desire of justified revenge.
It didn’t leave my side after that night, soon I began to be able to feel out death for myself. I had a nose for it. A bar fight here, a stalker there. Until last night.
Last night we found two women. They were young, just teenagers having a good time. There’s a bridge just outside of town. It crosses over the river. They’d been drinking, feet dangling over the edge, giggling. The creature urged me to obey, my brain on fire with the command it had ushered, push one of them, drown her, kill the other. But in that moment, I felt a rush of nostalgia. I remembered my high school days, me and my friends daring each other to do stupid things. I heard the laughter from my friends echo in my mind and for the first time since this entire thing started, the itch I’d felt in my brain began to ease.
I calmly walked away and I left those two girls where they sat. I knew this was the end now, and as I walked home, I began to snap pictures of the streets bathed in light, reflections in puddles casting pleasing angles of buildings. I wouldn’t have made it home, so I came here.”
The two police officers cast astonished looks at each other. I leaned back in my chair and took the camera that had been round my neck and placed it on the table in front of them.
“I didn’t realise at the time, but every night I’ve been taking pictures. I needed someone else to see what I see, to know I’m not going insane.”
The one officer picked the camera up and turned it on. They both leaned in slightly and flicked through 3 or 4 pictures until a sharp intake of breath made me look up. The kind looking officer was shaking, his hands barely able to hold onto the camera he was gripping so tightly. He stared at the photo as his colleague asked him over and over what he could see. He abruptly stood up and faced me, a look of pure terror plastered across his face. He stuttered over a few words until he realised he could not speak then dashed for the door, my camera still in hand. His colleague, confused by what he’d just seen, looked me up and down and walked over to the door, muttering about how he’d only be a few minutes, I smiled back.
The second the door was closed a shadow crept from the corner of the room. I watched for the last time as the creature moved its limbs so fluidly but pausing so jerkily. I took in the deep scars and new wounds inflicted upon it. It approached me unlike any other time I had seen, the act playing out differently. It’s gaunt frame slowly starting to loom in front of me, I looked up and into its eyes. Its fingers reached out to touch my face. I instinctively did the same, my fingers tracing the deep lines in its face. I ran around the edges of the eternal abyss of despair that was its eyes. I felt its fingers hook into my mouth and waited for the moment my body would cease to be, zero hour. I closed my eyes and let it move my jaw, unhinging it to an angle I would never feel again. I felt it press it’s body up against mine and then it reached into my mouth with its bony hand.
I gagged as the creature slowly dislocated its joints, and crawled inside.