A wisp of black and grey appeared in his view, the scythe-like appendage slicing down. With a scream, Peter stumbled to the cold, rough, hard concrete, his face stricken with despair as the monster made its return. His scratched and bruising arms rose in a feudal attempt to block the cleaving strike, and eyes clenching closed.
Flashing on the back of his eyelids like the memories of an antique projector, death and carnage from that night seven years ago played on repeat. The screams, the blood, the snapping of bones, and the tearing of flesh. Everything began to rush back, a nightmare bursting forth with terrifying force.
Seconds passed, his heaving lungs burning from hyperventilating as a panic attack bit away at his soul. More seconds fled and he didn't feel the pain expected from the creature. The creature almost always toyed with its victims before they died.
"Hahahaha!" a boy cackled, two or three years older than Peter.
Flinching away from the noise, his blemished arms still covering his face defensively, realization washed over him.
He wasn't going to die.
Peeking an eye open, Peter trembled as he looked up at those his tormentors once again.
Looming over him were three figures, each veiled in dark and unoriginal costumes.
Holding a large plastic scythe, the individual in the middle leaned down towards Peter. Features disguised by a crude dollar store skull mask, with many impractical, shallow cracks, and a disproportionate jaw decorating the cheap plastic, the skeletal face met Peter's.
"What's wrong, Little Peter? Thought I was your little Vexedge?" Questioned the shoddy Reaper arrogantly. Exhaling shakily, Peter wiped away the tears that were building up in his eyes, anger building up inside him.
This- This is why he hated Halloween: all these kids dressed up as ghouls, freaks, and cryptids. Mercilessly trying to scare him, forcibly digging up old and cruel memories of that night.
An arm shot up, shoving the taller kid off him quickly. "Fuck you," Peter barked, slowly rising to his feet.
Though all masked with cheap plastic and rubber, Peter could nearly feel the trio's fury.
They hated it when he fought back, when he tried to stand up for himself. He didn't have the right to, always lying about that night.
Moving in from the right side, obviously a female from the costume and body type, the girl let her foot scuff along the concrete only long enough to draw Peter's attention before arcing upwards into his ribs.
Wheezing in pain, Peter was slammed back into the concrete. His shirt scraped against the coarse rocky material, bruising Peter further through fabric as his uncovered elbow was left bloody upon the contact.
The last instigator, the oldest of the teens that stood left of the skull-masked boy, lifted his rubbery mask slightly to reveal his chafed lips. Puckering, his lips opened, and his signature chipped tooth revealed itself as the teen spat a glob of saliva onto Peter's face.
Far too many times, even on that night when he witnessed that boy get impaled before his eyes, Peter had been spat upon.
Lowering a shitty imitation of a Micheal Myers mask back down, the teen with the chipped tooth let out a callous chuckle as he used his foot to lay Peter onto his back, firmly digging his boot into the boy's chest. The teen's boot then raised from Peter's chest before lowering itself back down on his face, twisting back and forth, smearing the glob of saliva he had gifted with the sole of his boot.
Peter let out a strained whine, writhing in pain as his face and the rough rubber on the underside of the boot ground the slobber together.
Each twist of the boot pushed Peter's head into the concrete, entrapping black specks and pebbles of rubble into his usually curly hair.
The boot's rough actions ceased after a while. Peter remained, head aching as the lead bully switched in, lowering his face to Peter's.
"I bet your sister died to that stupid Vexedge monster on that little camping trip of hers." He sneered, his dark blue eyes managing to glint off the shine of the crescent moon above despite his mask, making them glow with a dangerous and cruel intensity.
The Reaper stood back up, tall. Like a beast in the moonlight looking down upon such worthless prey that it didn't ingnite any care to hunt.
Reeling back his foot, the reaper drove it into the side of Peter's stomach.
Laughing amongst themselves, the trio allowed their feet to pitter-patter along the dark grey road below.
They didn't look back, and didn't care to so much as look down as a pool of mist began to gradually flow into the streets like a slow, steadily rising flood.
***
None of the other trick-or-treaters or their parents seemed to care, and the houses lit with bright yellow and orange jack-o-lanterns bore no will to assist the boy with his problems. Ignoring the last remaining survivor of the incident was simpler than interacting with him, helping him, believing him.
It would only lead to the boy's 'ego' being fed, allowing him to believe he was permitted to spread his gruesome fable.
No parent wanted their child to be subject to his story, to give acknowledgement to Peter or the creature he spoke of. Even if some of the police force backed the boy and his late sister, they refused to believe.
Ignorance, be it intentional or secondhand like cigarette smoke, was dangerous. It was the instigator of almost every cause of death, and the fog that fills one's head will finally escape the world and cloud their view like all those following suit.
Lambs following each other in line to the slaughter house, to the demise for their transgressions of neglect and ignorance.
The fog rose in the streets, the bright and flashy houses illuminating the heavy mist with mirages of shapes and colors that shifted in the wafting low clouds like wraiths.
Wandering mindless children in costumes filling their greedy little hands with clumps of packaged and wrapped candies, their parents and their delusions believing the dense rising fog would make this a more exciting night for their small, masked, energized gremlins to enjoy.
None had ever headed the warnings of the fog, and none ever would.
They all believed the stories to be nothing but the ramblings of a child with an imagination far too cruel after a so-called massacre.
Even the parents who lost their children that night refused to believe him, stuck in their denial and insanity. Opting to change their mentality to believe they never had children to feed their ignorance and quell their everlasting misery.
To remain like all the others.
Ignorant, mindless puppets dancing under the same line. Mimicking each other like ants, reporting to their imaginary puppeteer that composed their lives of indifference.
And without knowing, a child was taken.
***
She wandered too far away, too caught up in her excitement. Never realizing her mistakes until a long, razor-sharp blade impaled her chest. Another pierced her lower abdomen, keeping the young child in place. Her lungs and heart were already in ruin, and her brain dosing her on unfathomable amounts of adrenaline didn't register as the limb of the creature tore its scythe-like appendage upwards.
Ripping through skin, bone, and organs, the scythe split the girl up the middle.
Her eyes spun wildly as blood poured out of every orifice, cascading out of her split frame like a waterfall.
The last sound was of her split tongue clicking against her teeth, the creature residing to silence as it left the little pink witch to her misery, turning the ground below her sticky and crimson.
The creature, silent like the death it inflicted, glided through the fog, ever so excited about its hunt. The ignorant masses inflamed its ego, offering it a shining silver spoon that it would greedily take for itself.
***
Feeling the blood dry on his person, Peter put his feet under him.
The fog was closing in, and pure, unadulterated terror overloaded his senses. His body began to move on its own, stumbling over his feet and crashing into the crowds that never cared.
The creature always followed the fog, the shadow of a ghost. Unseen until it has decide you may glance upon its visage as you expire.
The creature was coming, and Peter woud be alone this time. He had no need to care for the people who didn't heed his fortellings of the Vexedge; they never cared for him. Hell, they mocked him, abused him, refused to believe him at every turn.
He would let the creature hunt, tear and claw its way through the masses with ferocity. Poach those who neglected him, be judged by the creature that they refused to acknowedge.
This wasn't survival of the fittest- No, survival of the luckiest. It wasn't survival of those aware of the danger or the survival of the determined and willing to live.
Those ignorant would die, and those who thought they would be safe were be next.
Anticipate the threat, and you might have a chance to live. That's what all he could believe. A simple chance, the roll of a dice.
Even that fabrication would not save him, though; it wouldn't- didn't save anyone.
He knew that best because Sarah was taken from him last year. The body turned to rags of flesh and bone, her face the last recognizable detail that allowed the disturbed detective to present evidence to Peter.
Forced to accept that the creature that once spared them, by it's own mercy or possibly pure coincidence, has taken his beloved sister from him.
Hacked skin that transformed his late sister into a human chuck roast, inducing horrifying night terrors that lasted for months. Sarah's red-painted body flickered in his subconscious like an everlasting flame that betrayed the snuffing gales of the raging typhoon of time.
The thing that turned his sister into a corpse, murdering her in cold blood, and returning like an indominable fear. The invincible concept that never ceases its onslaught, a force of nature that couldn't be predicted, stopped, or controlled.
***
Jason was laughing with his trio, gaze attempting to scan through fog opaque as steel. They wanted to find the next house, to fill their buckets and bags with more sweets.
Their costumes slowly becoming wet from the dense condensation, slowing their movements as if wading through an ever-thickening sludge.
They didn't see the bodies littering the ground, didn't hear the squelching of boots and sneakers against red-hot blood that turned the asphalt into an ocean of blood.
Far too engrossed in their jabs at each other and exaggerations of their beating of the city manic. Delving into details that never met day, though they all implicitly believed every word like it was law.
The group, lost to their own musings, far too entertained by themselves, overlooked the screams approaching from the mist. Sprays of blood caught by the thick and wet clothing of their costumes as their masks prevented the blood from splashing on their faces.
Once, three, now reduced to two by a howl of pain. Trio turned Duo spun on their feet as horrifying realization struck.
The Family-Dollar Micheal Myers was absent from their group.
Another screech parted the fog like a knife, filling their ears like the snow in a storming tundra.
The girl stepped back, her body shaking in fear as the wails grew desperate. The muddled words vaguely resemblant of their names, apologies thrown to Peter lost to the boy's sobs as pain took over like the most vicious of dictators.
***
Stabs riddled his body like a pin cushion as the last laceration throw him forward to his knees. Blood flowed out of his wounds, streaming down his torn garments. Dark red painted over black, impossible to perceive the change in color with the eye.
Landon's mask, once white, was the only indicator of the torturous hell he had been admitted to.
Spit and tears melded with the liquid of life, turning the inside of the rubber veil that covered his face just as red as the outer layer. Words unable to escape his maw as pain and blood loss gradually turned his skin stark white.
Eyes pleading, unseen through his mask, begged at the ghost of his friends. His silent pleas were answered only by the terrifying and lonely release of death.
***
Jason felt heat rise in his throat as the body of his friend heaved towards him. His friend, now cold and unmoving, was swallowed up by the fog as he dropped the corpse in fear.
He couldn't see past his knees, let alone the bodies that laid in hiding below them.
Fright turned his body around, moved his feet, and made his lungs and throat bleed as they overtaxed his diaphragm.
Shoving the fear-stricken Alexis, Jason, too self-absorbed to pay attention, let alone care, for his female friend, ignored the confused and fearful shriek from the poorly dressed demonic nun.
He needed to survive, and sacrificing his friends to aid his escape was not beyond his own twisted morals. Focused only on the continuation of his being.
His feet stomped hard against concrete and blood, the slick yet sticky liquid throwing him off his feet. Jason barely felt the smack of his jaw upon a patch of grass, tears beginning to pour down his face regardless. Too distracted by his fear and adrenaline that also masked the pain of his knee shattering against the concrete edge that separated the yards of houses from the streets as he fell.
His body lurched forward still, standing itself up and pushing him forward, an unnoticeable limp in his step as he stumbled towards the orange, purple, and red lights. His 'run' was quickly impeded by the object that emitted the light. A tall blow-up decoration, which his skull mask and the heavy fog made difficult in determining the exact shape or design.
His arms flailed against the synthetic plastic-like textile in a desperate, futile attempt to escape the hold of the giant inflatable lawn ornament.
While pitifully losing a wrestling match against an inanimate object, a searing pain stabbed his lower side.
The tool, weapon, whatever impaled him, popped his inflated enemy like a balloon. Jason took a step forward, only to not move. Looking down, the sight of the blade impaling him became known.
He wanted to scream as one hand grabbed the item currently lodged in his abdomen and shoved down. Pain didn't register as his hand was nearly torn down the middle, separating into two halves between the knuckles of his pointer and middle finger.
Crazed and successful, Jason felt a smile of success wash over his features as his body rushed forward again. The cold didn't affect him as he nearly tripped up a set of stone stairs, his ruby-dyed hands pulling on the guardrails of the elevated walkway.
A foot crashed down, again and again until there was no longer contact with another upward step.
He laughed manically, his hand grasping at the door handle and tearing the door wide open as his shoddy mask met the faces of a family of three. The two adults stood, shouting, but all Jason could hear was the ringing in his ears as he laughed louder.
Delirious and utterly detached from reality, the multiple shots from a firearm that tore through his body like spears didn't hinder his lumbering March toward the family. Shot after shot met his chest, and he still kept moving on willpower alone. He would sur—
***
Fred trembled, his outstretched arms with his pistol in the grasp of both hands. The tip of his handgun smoked after the barrage of an entire mag.
The intruder didn't go down after eleven chest shots, so the final went to the head. Internally, he questioned if the apocalypse had begun.
Was he going to be the new lead role in some fucked zombie outbreak scenario? He didn't like the sound of that; he didn't want to follow such a path.
Slowly, his head turned back to his wife and adorable little three-year-old girl, who were his whole life. He gave them a sad, shaky smile as he grabbed his receiver and cell phone from his pocket.
Unlocking his phone and rummaging through his horribly mismanaged apps, he located the 'phone' icon. "Honey, take Ellie to the-."
Fred's words died in his mouth as he saw his wife's face, horror written over her features in spades.
Expecting to see the intruder back on his feet due to some whacky Halloween bullshit, he spun on the ball of his foot. Without looking, he flipped the emptied magazine out of his gun, snatched another from his thigh pocket, reloaded, chambered a round, and fired.
Pang
His bullet rang out as if he shot metal, and his gaze met a towering figure.
Its body was dark grey, nearing black. Its frame was thin, with meter-long arms that nearly covered the entire three meter length of it's body, three long scythe-like blades that emerged from each wrist. Its legs, bending in an anthropic manner, were meant for pure power and speed. And a thin triangular head that lacked eyes, a mouth, a nose and ears did nothing to hide the the way it seemed to smile.
And apex predator that only seeks to kill with no regard for it's prey. Each death just another trophy to add to its glory as a hunter.
Fred thought of the siblings he saved seven years ago, and a single word came to his mind: 'Vexedge.'
An attempt to whirl around to tell his wife to run was prevented by the three slicing claws burrowing into him. Blood sprayed like a fountain, covering everything within range.
His body fell, sliding off the oblong appendages as he put the last of his strength into looking at his family.
He wanted to scream, to order them to run, but those slashes had cut through his lungs, upper intestines, and his hip.
He was left alive, barely, though he was without a doubt he would die within a minute or two. Lesions like these were fatal, painful, and numbing.
His mouth cracked open as a mix of liquids drained from his tear ducts, his eyes worrying for the love of his life and the child he wanted to watch grow up.
A silent 'live' escaped his lips, and in return, the creature raged.
His wife got up, tried to grab her daughter in an attempt to flee-
A single claw ripped through his wife's head, throwing brain matter, blood, and fragments of bone across the room. There wasn't a sound as the creature had closed the distance between them, killing her in a single swipe.
Fred's mouth opened, his throat vibrating without noise as he was forced to watch as his wife fell backward.
Dead.
His eyes were glued open as the creature moved to his bawling daughter next.
More empty screams made no difference as weapons of death rose like the istrument of a reaper. And then, they came down.
Slashing into his precious little girl, his body shook in anguish and rage. Unable to move as the creature's head turned towards him with a featureless smile. A constant attention was focused on Fred as it continued to mutilate his daughter, already dead and bleeding like a drained swine.
The creature made a sound, a distorted and scratchy sound mimicking a laugh, as its claws expanded outwards on either of its limbs before they crashed down over and over again.
Each swipe tearing his beautiful little angel into shreds of indistinguishable burgundy strips and carmine matter.
Wracked, mute sobs left the officer to only view the carnage.
There was nothing left of his daughter but the liquid that painted the floor and walls red, dripping down the blades of the monstrosity that was enjoying its work as it poked gashes into the hardwood floor of where Ellie had… where Ellie had laid at one point.
Enjoying a night with family, a smile on her face as they played board and games on the floor. Said games now turned into scraps, painted in the liquid of life that once belonged to his daughter.
With a final glance and another invisible, mocking smile, the creature fled out the door, back into the mist.
Fred could do nothing, not even allowed to curse the creature out for leaving him to despair for the rest of his short and dwindling life as his gaze was incapable of shifting from his dead wife and the pulverized remnants of his daughter.
He wasn't allowed to die quickly to meet his family in the afterlife, as the seconds passed like hours. He was left here to wallow in his regrets as the scenes flooded his conscious thoughts like a plague.
***
Alexis curled in on herself against the ground, her lips mumbling out several prayers as the gunshots from the house rang off, ending Jason's deranged madness. The laughing halted, and her body shivered in despair.
The screams from Landon still echoed in her head, leaving her a quiet, sobbing mess on the road. Each sound around her made her flinch, seizing up.
She didn't know what was happening, she didn't want to go through this hell anymore.
She wanted to be back in her room, lounging on her unusually rough mattress, watching some fantasy movies. Anything to keep her mind away from the horrors of tonight. She wouldn't mind hanging around Peter at this point. Everything was following the events of his stories anyway.
The fog, the confusion, the fear, the death.
Peter would know what to do; hopefully, she could plead that he would put aside her actions she made with those two assholes' bullying. She had been dragged into it every time anyway; all their parents were friends, and Alexis' parents expected her to get along with them.
They were a bad influence, and thanks to their terrible personalities, they were fucking dead.
Dead.
Never to breathe again.
She sucked in a breath, and with fluctuating resolve, brought herself to her hands and knees. She didn't want to draw attention to herself and possibly alert that thing that left Landon dead at her feet.
Alexis blurred everything around her out as she crawled, ignoring the sensations as her uncovered hands splashed through hot, sticky liquid heavy with the stench of iron. She kept her eyes forward, holding in the bile that threatened to rise from her throat when her fingers squished into the entrails of the soft and wet corpses having been pried open like pumpkins.
Minutes of trekking through a sea of guts and skin passed like hours, digits squeezing warm clumps of deteriorating organ tissue, limbs moving across exposed calcium structures that protruded from the cavities of the dead. Enough to drive any mortal mad, slowly infecting their mind with hysteria.
Disturbed, with eyes dull like a dying rose, Alexis brought her gaze up towards the two incoming bright lights. The growl of an engine clawed itself through the muddled cadavers like a beast, giant rotating claws that crushed skeletal remains into shards and dust.
With unblinking glowing eyes locked onto its next prey, the metal creature bounded towards Alexis.
A scream erupted from her throat as the vehicle was moments from crashing into her obscured shape. Ducking her head down, a sweeping wind flew centimeters over her lowered frame.
A screeching sound reminiscient of metal against metal ripped through her ears, pain rearings its fangs on her eardrums. The involuntary screech of tires shocked Alexis into falling back.
Illuminated by flickering headlights, a lengthy and grim figure with scythes for hands had stopped the stampeding mechanical beast. Another screech of metal followed as the hood was torn off, wires and car parts discarded like the innards of a pumpkin, thrown to the ground and clattering on the shallow bleeding ocean.
Alexis jumped, splashing in the ocean of blood as the creature's head shifted. Freezing like a statue, the beast gradually turned its head towards her.
Breath held like the dead; she did not so much as blink. If the flap of a butterfly in South America could become a hurricane in North America, she didn't want to see what a single blink could create in the face of a creature capable of turning a car into a disfigured piece of metallic art.
The movement of an arm, the fear that made her body again begin to tremble, and the shriek of panic made her jump. Her head smashed into the previous location of the monster's head, having already left to claim its next victim.
***
The scream registered in her ears, but she didn't see the driver stop. He kept driving, uncaring, as they had already driven over droves of dead bodies.
The addition of another screaming survivor wouldn't damage her consciousness any more after her driver had flattened the first dozen. She was already out of tears for the damned, her body shaking with terror born of her inaction and the holocaust enforced by whichever demented deity that thing was.
Her head came crashing against the back of the driver's seat as the car cane to an abrupt stop. She felt her head grow fuzzy, her vision hazy as the world spun.
Holding her head in hand, the other stabilized herself on the cheap leather of the driver's seat, she began taking in a long, deep breath. Lungs thrummed against her ribcage like an old guitar, aching as they pressed against bone.
Releasing her breath, she shook her head to clear her dizziness. The effect was enhanced first before fading.
Slowly, her hand reached forward, tapping the shoulder of the driver, her deceased friend's older brother.
Her finger met a hot liquid, and her eyes widened in realization. Slowly, her hand rose from the shoulder, trembling as it glided into her view. Dripping from her fingertips was liquid ruby, a lump got caught in her throat.
A cold chill, the sensation of freezing water, crashed through her system as a scream erupted.
She was too horrified, her mind far too enraptured by the revelation that the last person she knew was dead, to see or hear the car door being ripped off its hinges.
Her hypocritical thoughts only paused by the the knives that sunk their way into the metal, foam, and leather. Head swiveling towards the thing as it's claws released their hold of the door, dropping it as watery eyes looked upon the black demon in the fog.
Her voice died out, mouth gaping for words like a dying fish. With the hands of death, its grasp shot forward. No sound escaped as the three spears of it's 'hand' became an arrowhead that carved furrows into her chest.
Blood spilled from her mouth as her eyes fell down to her torso.
Slowly, her vision returned to the visage of death. Its head drawing nearer, its blank triangular face twisting into a cruel lip-less smile. The joint where the arrow met rotated half a turn, carving a hole into the woman's chest with the snapping of bone.
***
Alexis' body moved on its own, a survival instinct driving her running body forward. She was half-conscious, her legs and eyes working separately from her near-inactive mind.
The screams had already dropped like a coin into a well, gone forever to the darkness of the depths. When she thought it was over, they only began again; another group of children wailing as their tiny bodies were pierced, gashed, and torn.
All this flew over the girl's head in her rush, vision partially impaired negatively complimented by the fog to render her nearly blind. She didn't see the brick structure, the bulky and sturdy square mailbox making contact with her ribs and right arm.
Thrown to the ground, winced, looking down at her now lacerated sleeve, revealing her bleeding and gashed arm with gravely particles of brick and cement embedded in her wounds.
Alexis closed her eyes as she grasped at her injured right arm with a vice grip. The pressure gave little relief, but it was enough to allow her to retake full consciousness through the pain.
Reopening her eyes, Alexis turned around, still holding her bleeding arm. She laid her back against the brick mailbox, sliding down slowly as the coarse material hung onto the back of her costume.
A long exhale allowed her to catch her breath, tears building up again beneath her mask. Taking the initiative to better her situation, her scarlet-dipped hand slowly reached for the hood over her head, letting it down as she removed the rubbery plastic mask from her face.
Alexis' hair was dyed crimson through the cloak, her once beautiful face now poorly decorated with wet and drying tear lines.
Forearms raising, they rubbed against her eyes as she cried silently. Liquid rust smeared over the tanned caramel skin of her face, staining her like a tattoo. She shuddered in heaving sobs, shoulders trembling like a fault line as her lungs pushed and pulled against her bruising chest.
Each breath spiked with agony, and the likelihood of a cracked or broken rib was highly probable. The best option for her now was to wait this out. Sit still, remain quiet, and hope she could survive.
Alexis no longer had the delusion that someone would save her; she knew an encounter in this thick fog with another living person was faint, especially with her partially hidden off to the side.
Crawling through enough death rendered her resembling the very corpses she had drug herself through. Chunks of muscle, fragments of bone, and scraps of flesh clutched to the thin fabric of her robes.
Alexis' realization of the exsistence of the material quickly led to her good arm releasing the latter. Tearing a shred of the black fabric, her effort rewarded her with a long, thin, ragged strip of wet, red-dripping cloth.
Laying the tattered ribbon of clothing over her bleeding arm, she slowly began to wrap it around. This was far from ideal, but even a temporary solution like this would have to suffice.
***
Six friends, between the ages of seven and nine, thought the horrified screams were from haunted houses and terrifying costumes. They paid little mind to their surroundings, and the fog didn't hinder their stumbling legs or detached care for everything else around them.
To them, they were the kings of the world, standing on Cloud Nine as they marched messily in their arrogant, young pride.
Nothing could stop them on their trek from house to house to obtain new pieces of jaw-rotting hardened corn syrup and fake sugars. Candies flavored like fruit and a variety of chocolates kept the little shits addicted like crack house junkies. A multi-hour-long sugar high keeping their small bodies focused and energized.
Their mouths smack obnoxiously with chewing candies, big-name candy bars, and oversized lollipops. Their small legs kicked over the jack-o-lanterns with both simple and exaggerated designs. The voices in their heads, slowly molded by the excessive dopamine from glucose, brainwashing them into performing their impulsive actions.
The young posse didn't notice their numbers dropping to five. A child dressed in blue with a plastic shield completely helpless despite believing his shield to be the real thing, indestructible.
Like his arm, the shield was ripped through with ease.
World rocked; confusion and disbelief left him in turmoil. The pain never registered; too self-absorbed to recognize the missing arm as he stared down at the ravaged plastic.
It was supposed to be invincible, and yet he watched it get torn like paper.
A large, dark grey, anthropic leg raised above the boy's head, the massive foot hovering before the stunned child's face had claws like a vulture's. Grasping the child's head with the two foremost talons, the bottom-most dug up through the open jaw and out through the back of his skull, piercing through like the stinger of a titanous hornet.
Letting go, the skull remained mounted to the bottom claw, the body dangling limply in the air as the creature tried to shake its dead prey off.
Growing irritated, it kept attempting to remove the small child's mouth from its hook-like toe. Still with no leeway, the creature furiously slammed the body of the dead child against the ground. Bones snapped, and blood exploded from their chest as it exploded open from the sheer force.
Still, the head was not removed from the talon, so it did it again and again and again, slamming the small, broken, and lifeless figure against the concrete of the unlit and foggy walkway.
One last strike to the ground released the small carcass from its unwilling grasp, now ragged with skin broken and bone protruding out unnaturally. The body resembling what one expect being thrown into the turning gears of an industrial motor would entail.
***
The six, now five children pattered their uncaring feet along the blood-soaked paths, eyes excitedly washing over the bright lights and noises breaking through the fog near the end of the street.
Standing above the rest, a massive house caught their attention. The outside was spray-painted with rinse-off black and resembled a haunted mansion. Trees were covered in toilet paper and fake blood marred the windows with hand prints and horribly drawn messages.
Cars littered the driveways and brightly lit cul-de-sac, monstrous and ghoulish guests entering and leaving through the open garage of the massive Halloween party.
The quintuplet all began to cheer excitedly, their short legs springing them forward. The fun-sized party crashers burst through the crowd of teens and adults, running past a duo of quarreling dogs.
The drunken attendees couldn't give any care to their small intruders. The party would go on regardless of their appearance, all throughout the night and early into the following Wednesday morning. Five little gremlins couldn't bring much to the table.
So the party went on, five small children in the mix of alcohol, partying, drugs, and sex. Ignorance wafting off the manor like a spotlight, drawing in the creature on its hunt.
Apples bobbed in wooden barrels of alcohol; detailed orange bowls were brimming with various candy and chips, and a figure stared at the excited house.
Taller than the ten-foot skelleton statue that stood upon the green and purple-lit deck facing the street, the creature took a step forward.
The first few guests who noticed it gawked in amazement. Their awe was quickly snuffed out as one of the limbs came crashing down, Slicing through flesh with ease.
A single slash felled four, corpses slashed through cleanly as their blood turned the emerald grass vermillion. A wave of intestines flooding the lawn as onlookers viewed the carnage. Their stunned silence only momentary before they erupted into drunken screams and cheers.
The feet of at least twenty of the semi-rational guests began to scatter, fear driving them away as others were heaving vomit onto the ground after the display of unbridled violence. The creature left the ones too dumb to run as it began its hunt.
Speed like a sound, the blood-lusting beast darted off towards the running mass. Two sets of three scythes diced fleeing prey. One, two, three, four, five, chopped into chunks of bleeding chunks.
The sixth had her torso blown open wide with a claw, the remnants of her chest cavity caking one of the many green box transformers outside the mansion.
Emitting a disgruntled, horrifying, mouthless screech that defied nature in all of its forms, the creature roared. The sound chilling to the bone, shaking the entire frame of those in its direct vicinity.
And then, howling like a savage pack of wolves, similar roars echoed across the city. Hundreds receiving the call.
Falling into a crouch, the creature lunged towards the next target, its arms clawing at the ground, digging at the grass and dirt as it barreled forward.
It's seventh victim was a woman dawned in a witch's costume, blades digging into her as they delivered deep lacerations. She was tossed aside, her body now carved like the pumpkin she was thrown upon.
Moving onto the eighth, its claws grasped one of the two gargoyles that sit at the end of the driveway, hurling the mass of concrete. The drunken Dracula in it's path exploded into red mist as the stone demon ripped through the right side of his body.
The once man turned shredded and brutalized human flesh was sent cascading across the lawn as the gargoyle continued it's path, crashing into a neighboring house. The walls crumbled, dust and splinters of wood sprinkling down from the wreckage.
The spectators quickly began to understand the grim severity of their situation, and more began to flee.
The only way out was through the fog. Some ran, others dashed to their cars, haphazardly pulling out and slamming into others in their attempt to flee. Many were trapped, surrounded by other vehicles, struggling to escape.
The first few cars finally permitted to leave veered off into the fog, followed by on foot escapees. The sounds of screeching tires and screams were lost to the fog.
Only a few moments had passed as an explosion shook the ground. Flames danced upon cars, barely visible through the mist.
Illuminated by the flickering yellow, orange, and red, another creature stood atop a car that had turned into an aluminum bon-fire. The terrified crowd still outside watched as two bodies, bisected and missing limbs, were ejected from the fog.
The dead crashed into the ground, tearing up the earth as blood and bone burst from their remains like carrion left under the hot desert sun. Creeping from the dense vapor, seven more creatures of similar sizes emerged.
Following the new group of atrocious beings, the shadow of a titan appeared in the deadly haze. Remaining hidden in the miasma, the creature watched. An eldritch being witnessing the rage of it's spawn with indifference.
As the survivors of the massacre outside fell to their asses and their knees, gazes locked onto the god of death, a single heart-wrenching scream ignited the onslaught. Eight fiends crashed into the mass of repenting sinners like a wave.
Shots from a couple firearm-carrying attendants were as helpful as trying to empty an ocean with a cup.
Shrapnel flew off the armor of the demons, even the joints undamaged.
Flying and deflected bullets killed men and women alike, riddling mortals with holes.
After a long and grueling two minutes of ferocious butchery, the creatures having turned the riches to rags, moved further into the mansion. The real party was finally going to begin.
Sport-hunted corpses litter the grounds the creatures decimated. Bone, entrails, and blood replacing the water that supplied nutrients to the grass.
***
Inside the mansion, the five kids enjoyed themselves. One, a bit too intrigued, watched a drunk couple go at it like animals on the soft couch. Immersed in the adult world as new thoughts and ideas ruined his young mind.
Two of them were digging their hands through the bowls of sugary goodness, feeding the cavities that have begun invading their teeth.
The fourth was being paraded around, a mascot to the wasted mob that carried him above their heads, rushing wherever the power-consumed boy pointed and shouted, 'Charge.' The entourage of mind-controlled giant drunk toddlers often being led to chase the two poor hounds around the house.
The last was on the ground, convulsing. His seven-year-old body wholly unprepared for the poison invading his system. A party of drunks holding an alcohol-chugging contest that were far too excited to watch the small child attempt to take the champ, wholly uninterested about his safety. The boy's body tossed aside like trash after failing to meet the intoxicated horde's demands.
All the party-goers were far too ignorant of the blood-bath outside that had poured into the open garage. The music loud, small child-led army screaming, couch rocking, and chugging contest chanting. Hearing anything outside was almost impossible.
The creaming, the pleas for help, the banging on the doors, and screeches of the blades that belonged to the monsters rendering people and inanimate objects alike into a hotpot of human body parts, drywall, and metal canisters with alcohol in them.
When the walls and doors came crashing down, allowing the creatures access to their newly packed and prepared victims, the extermination of life outside had already ceased. The masses inside far too plastered, massive collateral damage just another minor hindrance to them.
***
Death loomed over each and every living soul in that house, the reapers gnashing their scythes against everything. The first to sense the danger were the two dogs, their senses tripping like landmines.
The mutts rushed toward the danger in an attempt to protect their respective owners. The apex predators they came to face were creatures far too vicious for even them to overcome.
A single blade lobbed the head off the first pitiful creature, and the second pissed in its place as it stared and whimpered at the beasts.
With its head lowered, the dog shook in submission. It did its best to remain still. Any hostile movement might be seen as hostile, and the dog's instincts were to survive.
Sadly, instincts didn't win out against these creatures. The dog was killed merilessly, crushed beneath the heavy step of one of the monsters.
The mob with the young monarch atop that followed the canines all froze, looking on in fear as they came to look upon the dead animals. Fallen angels of death being burned into their minds with the intensity of a branding iron.
With a fearful scream, the clan spun around and tried to haul off their young master to safety.
Pouring in like ants, the atrocious entities began their subsequent genocide. The slower members trailing behind were the first to die, cut down like swine. The clan quickly thinning out.
Crimson flooded the marble-tiled floor, the bandwagon falling apart as they began to slip on the blood of their brothers. Like a falx, the sweeping edge cut down the mass of bodies.
The roar of the creatures echoed inside the house, spreading fear through each occupant.
The boy atop his steeds cried, watching as his people were dying like moths to the flame. Beasts closed on him, tearing through his defenses till there was none left. With one last horrified scream, the fiends lurched forward.
Hooks and blades tore apart the small leader, ripping open his chest and turning his organs into a buffet.
Along with his mass of followers, the energetic and arrogant child lost his life.
***
The two little bastards chowing down were startled by the screams. Immediately, the stuffed duo began to move. Their tired bodies couldn't take them far, the food making their stomachs ache as they looked for their friends.
The older of the two looked back, stumbling, pointing ahead toward their friend, occupied watching the busy people on the couch. "Right there, we can-" Cut off, the older boy's body was forcibly removed from his lower half at the knees. The younger began to scream, a claw wrapping around his body like a constrictor.
The child, previously enraptured by the couple fucking like rabbits, looked back. His eyes landed upon the body of his friend, slowly being crushed. Eyes beginning to bleed, bones snapping like twigs, and piercing flesh. Bile and half-digested food rose in his throat, spewing out along with half a gallon of blood.
The last living member of the six-friend group cried in sadness and fear, watching as the ribs finally exploded out of his friend's chest like a blossoming flower.
Turning on his feet, his eyes washed over the bleeding and ruined bodies of the nude man and woman on the couch. Eyes slowly rose, meeting the eye-less gaze of the creature that gave him a mouthless grin.
He wasn't even given the moment to scream, his eyes flaring wildly as the death raged on around him. Not even sparing the group of chanting drunkards having their contest that killed and tossed one of his other friends.
***
Peter looked up at the sky, tears running down his face. The creature was right above him, the halo of a street lamp illuminating him enough to see the Vexedge.
It wasn't the same as the one in the forest. The creature in the forest had claws that more resembled the pincers of a praying mantis. Were there different variants? Mutations?
The creature shifted it's weight, moving to look at him, ready to finally take him like the one that took his sister.
The creature watching him in featureless excitement paused as an unsettling roar ran throughout the night. No longer worth the creature's time, it raised its featureless triangular head and let out a similar, bone vibrating roar.
Unable to move, he watched as the creature screeched. His mind took too long to realize he needed to flee. He rose, shaking as he took the chance that was likely, quickly shortening, and ran.
The monster was too engrossed in its roar, unwilling to care as Peter fled. He didn't stop, going until his feet started to tire as they trudged through the blood and death turning the road into an ocean of rust.
When Peter felt like he could no longer run, he hid behind the first large object he came across.
A startled scream met his action, and he fell back in surprise, his heart racing in his chest. The fog made it nearly impossible to see, but he could make out a figure laid against the structure.
"Who's there?" He whispered, hesitantly.
Rather than a verbal answer he expected, the figure pounced on him.
"Peter! Peter! I'm sorry! I'm so sorry!" Cried out a female's voice, tears splashing against his clothes.
"I- I'm sorry! I- I shouldn't have bullied you. Y-You were right!"
The girl shook in his arms, and he knew who it was. Alexis. One of the girls who has been bullying him for years.
"They- They were there. They killed them-" Sobs racked from the girl, her hands clenching onto his shirt.
"Both of them are dead! Peter! They- Both of them are-"
Confusion and anger rose, but the overlaying emotions of fear and the overwhelming need for any companionship overpowered them. His confusion and anger fell, he was too tired to be angered and any human interaction was more than welcomed now.
He had his sister last time, he had someone to find, someone to be with. He didn't expect that being alone in this event would shake his core so violently. Even if it was with a bully- maybe a former bully, be damned, he needed someone to have by his side.
Peter couldn't, wouldn't survive this alone.
Allowing the girl to settle herself, he took a few deep breaths to calm himself from his most recent escape. She knew the horrors of these creatures now, the least he could do was help out a fellow survivor.
Raising an arm slowly, he set it on her head. He had a rough night, too.
Narrowly escaping three different monsters thanks to some stupid bastard's screams and now fleeing the last howling Vexedge was taxing, mentally and physically.
He was lucky, but he didn't know how much longer his luck would go on. He kneeled down, taking deep breaths.
"Let's stay here for a while. I hope we will be safe for a while. Many of them seem distracted with something " he explained, petting the girl's wet and matted hair. Leaning against the brick structure, his body slumped down.
As Peter hit the ground, Alexis huddled against him, crying. Crying for her late friends, surviving the encounter with the car and finally for being found.
The sobs racking Alexis began to settle down as exhaustion began to overtake her. Too tired to stay awake, she closed her eyes. Peter, equally fatigued, fell to the sweet embrace of sleep too.
As they slept, neither saw the figure that stood there.
Quietly standing there, eyes wide and focused on them.
Watching.