My veins crack and pop with euphoria, watching the way his muscles seize his body to stone.
He gurgles, trying to say something that’s drowned in the blood sputtering from his lips.
“Holy fuck!” one of them yells.
The one that called me a whore but couldn’t remember my name is running in my periphery. I’d care… But the crimson pooling from the wound and dripping down this guy’s neck is interesting. It’s poetic.
The thing that kept him alive is now killing him.
He becomes too heavy for my forearm, so I let the stake slip from my grip. His deadweight crashes to the ground, launching a jet of scarlet that splatters loudly on my glossy stage.
Don’t let him get away. He deserves it, too.
My eyes trail to the side, finding the tall guy in the center aisle. He must’ve tripped. He’s clutching the red velvet seats on either side of him and frantically trying to get back on his feet from his knees.
I feel pretty calm, honestly. I’m not consciously sliding over to the axe hidden behind the sandbags. There’s a need for victory moving me on autopilot, my wet hand curling around the stained wood and my feet swiftly carrying me back to the edge of my stage.
He’s almost out. With a few feet to spare before he’s able to run free, I’m double gripping the handle of the axe and rearing it back over my head, using all my might to propel the axe through the air in his direction. “It’s Bunny!”
Thinking he’s about to escape, a twinge of panic shoots my blood pressure up, my toes curling and my teeth gnashing, eyeing my axe oscillating in the air toward him.
He almost gets his hands on the curtain. He reaches for it. But the sharp edge hacks him in the back to the head, stopping him from making it out.
He’ll never leave.
Satisfaction rips up my chest, catching him plummet to the ground before spinning around to the other guy unconscious under the spotlight.
He participated. He’s just as disgusting.
Flowing, I get the stake dislodged from the first guy’s neck and crowd over the one that fainted before I could say my name. It takes him a moment. I think it’s my shadow that stirs him awake.
His eyes pop open and a whimper bobs his throat, shuffling his shoulders to try and slither away from me.
“Is this prude to you?” I ask.
He shakes his head, pleading in gibberish and slobbering, letting out little snot bubbles.
Raising the stake over him, my reflection in his pupil catches my eye. The light is an aura around my malicious hand, triggering a steep drop in my gut. But my brain isn’t getting the memo. As hard as my stomach falls—my hand does, too.
Puncturing through the pressure stabilizing his chest, a loud sear tightens my throat, the wafting stench of hot iron burning the whites of my eyes.
He coughs, projecting a rainfall of blood with the lurch of his body. Unable to blink or react to the wet warmth smattering my face, I flick down to my hand curled around the last few inches of the metal stake, the outside of my palm pressed firm against his wet chest, and a lethal dose of repulsion sinks me into my grave.
Becoming so heavy I feel weightless, my head spins and my vision jumps, slinking out of a crouch and onto my knees. “Oh, no-no-no-no-no.”
Everything tilts, crawling away from my last victim, blinded by the influx of blood reflecting the glaring spotlight overhead. It’s pooling.
Pooling.
Pooling.
Pooling.
So much is spreading out of the first guy I… I-“Oh, my God. Ohh, my fucking God.”
My stomach knots and I sway to a stop, slipping sideways onto my butt, straight into the sticky liquid draining from a shanked neck.
Dreadful shakes abate the high I was woven into, disassociating on the pungent pool that’s quickly surrounding me.
