A Blur of Black. A Splash of Red.

I got home pretty late last night and tried to get this done last night, but kept falling asleep after a few paragraphs. Sorry for the tardy update...

The clouds parted, and the ghostly white eye of the night sky blazed ominously across the rain-soaked pavement. Sounds of dogs barking and howling could be heard.

A young couple walked along the sidewalk, alone in the perceived safety of the late night suburb. They chatted quietly and flirted carelessly as they splashed through puddles and hopped over concrete streams.

As they walked alongside a row of tall bushes, they heard a noise. A low, rumbling growl undulated from the other side of the shrubbery. Chalking up the noise to a large dog, they kept walking, but the noise moved with them. They reached the end of the bushes and the noise snorted. The couple jumped, now a bit shaken, and quickened their pace away from the bushes.

They finally made their way down the street to the woman's home. They skipped up the steps, now having forgotten about the noise completely. The woman unlocked the door, turned around and kissed the man. They bid each other a goodnight, and the woman entered and shut and locked the door behind her. The man began to walk casually back the way he had come, whistling to himself in the brisk midnight air. He was about two blocks away when he heard a terrifying scream from the direction of the woman's house.

He turned around and sprinted back to the house. He pounded on the door urgently and called for her, but she did not answer. He tried to open the door, but it was locked. He yelled once more but she did not respond. He heard a violent crash of breaking glass from behind the house. He sprinted around too the back and saw the glass back door shattered. He carefully stepped through the translucent maw and into the house and began searching frantically about the house for her. Finally, on the floor of the living room next to the couch, he found what he was looking for.

The body was bent an angle that suggested broken back. Most of the throat and neck was gone, the head barely holding on to the body with a string of mangled flesh. Entrails and blood were steaming out of the opening where two legs used to be attached.

The man teared up and held back vomit.

He ran back out the back door and looked around for the culprit. He could feel bloodthirsty eyes watching him from the shadows as he stood on the back porch, scanning the surrounding houses. It began to rain again, slowly. The man stood and felt the drops fall on his matted hair.

drip

drip

drip

drip

Using the back of his hand, he wiped some of the rain from his forehead. He looked at his hand and froze. It was red.

He slowly looked up and saw the silhouette of something hairy and monstrous on the rooftop, its crimson eyes shining hungrily down at him, its gleaming white teeth clamped around a freshly decapitated human leg.

A low, rumbling growl undulated from the rooftop.

A cry of agony.

A roar of hunger.

A blur of black.

A splash of red.