Life's no fun without a good scare

[thalassino]

It starts some time around 3am, Tuesday morning. Thin whispers of fog start appearing all throughout Vatheon, creeping through the narrow, winding streets, up the steps, and over the park. It starts in the lower district, but as the night progresses and daylight approaches, it spreads to the other districts as well, growing thicker and thicker as it does. By the morning rolls around, the mist is thick enough that visibility has been compromised greatly, and the temperature seems to have dropped a few degrees, an odd chill filling the air.

And on the walls, there are stains.

They are infrequent at first, just a odd ruddy brown smear and a oddly bright red drop here and there, but the closer to the Plaza, the more numerous they become. There is a large smear across the steps leading up to the Plaza, as if something big was dragged up them. In one place the blood -- for it is blood, there is no deny it at this point -- pools thickly as if whoever was responsible took a casual break there, leaving the poor victim to bleed out on the steps.

On the plaza, the mist is thinner, but that is no relief. Rather, it just functions to make the gruesome scene all the more clearer.

A woman is draped upside down on the coral. Or, well, woman. It was once a woman, certainly, but now it is nothing more than something straight out of a nightmare. The flesh seems to have been torn carelessly from her limbs here and there, showing the white gleam of her bones, her nurse outfit torn as if raked apart by giant claws and her head...

well, it isn't there anymore.

The ground in front of her is smeared with blood as well. But where the previous smears had been accidental, these are deliberate, long lines curving and meeting to spell out



hel pm e


But no help had been forthcoming, clearly. No, it seems that this murder, this brutal murder, was nothing more than a game to whoever did it. The walls of the buildings surrounding the plaza are coated in bloody, spelling out a long string of mocking 'HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA's and directly in the center, behind the coral.


Who is next?


The notice board seems to have been hit too. The killer did not tear down any of the notices on the board already, but they did cover the entire board with blood-stained sheets of paper, each adorned with the same text over and over and over again.


Chop chop, sweet Charlotte
Chop chop till she's dead
Chop chop, sweet Charlotte
Chop off her hand and head.


For those brave enough to check, no, the poor girl still has both her hands. Was the killer just sloppy, or does this mean this is not Charlotte? So many unanswered questions, more born every passing moment.

Who had done this? Why? Where they going to strike again? And why had nobody heard anything?





[ooc note: Consider this your mingle log. Have fun, go forth, threadjack.

And as a further note, the fog does not seem to be clearing up as the week goes on. ]

Comments

[kingwithnocrown]

I don't know. It's difficult to tell with you. Maybe you feel regret over the loss of the woman. Maybe you feel troubled that you hadn't known sooner. Maybe you're frustrated in not knowing who it is?

Or, considering it's you, it could just be all of those things together.

[Yeah, he points out the obvious but what the hell else is he going to conclude? Jacob really did seem the type to mourn the unknown dead.]

I bet it wasn't human.

[nos_servabit]

Perhaps.

[He treats everyone with the same manner, whether they are dead, or criminals, or the most normal of the normal. He can't help it,really. It's just in his nature to do so.]

[And he turns to Izaya at that last statement, smile widening ever so slightly while his eyes stay as darkened as ever.]

Even if it wasn't, does that mean we should treat her in a different way?

[kingwithnocrown]

[Of all people, Izaya probably knows this the best. Or at least he likes to think that he does. After his last interaction with Jacob after a rather...criminal act of his own, his opinion on the man had gravitated quite a lot.

He stares back at Jacob and his smile seems to mimic the man's.]

What? The victim? No. It's still a death. The killer, however, I suppose people will want to punish the killer regardless of his species. Perhaps more cruelly if human, perhaps more cruelly if not. Who knows?

[nos_servabit]

We shall see. People are unpredictable sometimes, Izaya. Sometimes the nicest of them can be the most vicious, and vice versa.

[A small sigh.]

Either way, an act like this can't go unpunished. But what punishment will be given, I do not know.

It is up to the populace to decide.

[kingwithnocrown]

Are they, Jacob? I never knew that.

[He is. Astounded. Blown away. Absolutely perturbed by this. What a twist!]

Mmm. We'll see. I've never seen anyone really punished here. After all, no one really had any personal connection to this woman, did they? They don't feel the same emotional content that they would have had they known her.

And whether people want to admit that it's true, that does change the game a bit.

[nos_servabit]

I wasn't stating it because you didn't know it, Izaya.

[He can't help but frown slightly.]

Still, a person is a person. Just because no one knew her doesn't mean she should go without some form of justice for what happened to her.

She didn't deserve this.

[kingwithnocrown]

Are you sure about that, Jacob? That she didn't deserve it?

[He looks more completely now at Jacob, his face calm and entirely unreadable.]

How do you know that?

[He slants his eyes to look at the body.]

Hey, did you ever read that story Charlotte's Web?