About
The star ravaged sky was but a bled out fade under the shelf of haze that hung over the city. Lamp posts flickered about a mostly deserted parking lot and their cascading light reflected off the shiny surface of the lone, sub compact car that was waiting patiently for its owner to finish her job and return to it-- to fire it up and give it life so once again it would roll down the city streets with a purpose.
Tonight was different from other nights, the girl stayed late; far later than she normally had anytime before. Maybe it was deadlines, maybe trouble at home, or maybe just maybe she wasn't on her A game today and stayed behind to finish any missed paper pushing that she, perhaps on a good day, would have had finished hours ago.
Her car sat, cute and alone, not to different from her as she finished up her rounds of work. The parking lot was cold with night air, a gentle mist starting to settle down over it like a blanket. Along the median jutting up from the center of the parking lot sprung a whole group of trees, a mini forest, with trees nearly as old as the people who owned the building, jutting up into the air with trunks almost too thick to hug your arms around.
These trees loomed kept, but massive branches full of summer time leaves and cover that the city animals depended on. There were, at the most, probably sixteen to seventeen trees in this median, a few bushes, trimmed and alive with color. Flowers grew at the corners of the median, seasonal ones, brightly colored and as well taken care of as the trees and shrubs.
In one such tree, among the thick bows and branches, reptilian feet rested. Strange copper-golden eyes scanned out through the foliage and across the parking lot searching for something-- or perhaps waiting, but for what?
Ivory white fangs hidden under strong jaws and lips, pointed ears flicked, and strange, ethereal hair danced within the foliage like a candle flame in the wind-- but there was no wind tonight. Oh it was quiet in the city, almost disturbingly so. With everything that had been going on in the last few years, fewer and fewer people spent any time out past dark and those who did at any level of regularity were probably up to no good.
That is what he, Koji, had counted on. The creature was waiting-- on his prey, but it wasn't the young woman in the office building, she was merely the bait. Instead he was waiting on a heftier trophy. It was no secret that -something- had changed in the last few months in this city. Random vagrants had seemed to go mad almost overnight. Once friendly vagabonds had transformed into the nightmarish creatures that people had once pegged them for.
Homeless men and women would turn up and attack innocents and it wasn't an isolated occurrence, oh no. These vagrants were popping up every other weekend, sometimes twice in one week. Some had to be detained, others weren't so lucky and even a few had to be put down.
It didn't take long before word had reached Koji that one particularly violent and hard to catch vagrant was attacking and even killing young women in the alley ways and parking lots at night and finding him was nearly impossible for the city's finest. Koji had the means to track the man down and he was certain he would strike tonight.
Within his roost he rested, waiting for the girl to make the trek through the parking lot toward her car and for the mad man to make his move so Koji could take him down once and for all.
Tonight was different from other nights, the girl stayed late; far later than she normally had anytime before. Maybe it was deadlines, maybe trouble at home, or maybe just maybe she wasn't on her A game today and stayed behind to finish any missed paper pushing that she, perhaps on a good day, would have had finished hours ago.
Her car sat, cute and alone, not to different from her as she finished up her rounds of work. The parking lot was cold with night air, a gentle mist starting to settle down over it like a blanket. Along the median jutting up from the center of the parking lot sprung a whole group of trees, a mini forest, with trees nearly as old as the people who owned the building, jutting up into the air with trunks almost too thick to hug your arms around.
These trees loomed kept, but massive branches full of summer time leaves and cover that the city animals depended on. There were, at the most, probably sixteen to seventeen trees in this median, a few bushes, trimmed and alive with color. Flowers grew at the corners of the median, seasonal ones, brightly colored and as well taken care of as the trees and shrubs.
In one such tree, among the thick bows and branches, reptilian feet rested. Strange copper-golden eyes scanned out through the foliage and across the parking lot searching for something-- or perhaps waiting, but for what?
Ivory white fangs hidden under strong jaws and lips, pointed ears flicked, and strange, ethereal hair danced within the foliage like a candle flame in the wind-- but there was no wind tonight. Oh it was quiet in the city, almost disturbingly so. With everything that had been going on in the last few years, fewer and fewer people spent any time out past dark and those who did at any level of regularity were probably up to no good.
That is what he, Koji, had counted on. The creature was waiting-- on his prey, but it wasn't the young woman in the office building, she was merely the bait. Instead he was waiting on a heftier trophy. It was no secret that -something- had changed in the last few months in this city. Random vagrants had seemed to go mad almost overnight. Once friendly vagabonds had transformed into the nightmarish creatures that people had once pegged them for.
Homeless men and women would turn up and attack innocents and it wasn't an isolated occurrence, oh no. These vagrants were popping up every other weekend, sometimes twice in one week. Some had to be detained, others weren't so lucky and even a few had to be put down.
It didn't take long before word had reached Koji that one particularly violent and hard to catch vagrant was attacking and even killing young women in the alley ways and parking lots at night and finding him was nearly impossible for the city's finest. Koji had the means to track the man down and he was certain he would strike tonight.
Within his roost he rested, waiting for the girl to make the trek through the parking lot toward her car and for the mad man to make his move so Koji could take him down once and for all.
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