The mists roamed the city knowing that they owned the night as they gave a thin veil of moisture to everything they caressed. The bluish flame of that lamppost flickered with the sound and with the same grace with which the mists swirled. The closed night invited the honest inhabitants of that emblematic city to take refuge under its roofs, next to the fire in the chimneys, as much or more comforted by the security of the rudimentary lock just installed on the door, as by the warmth of the house.
The religious silence was barely interrupted by a distant echoing of horse's hooves dragging a car for, in a matter of fleeting seconds, return the protagonism to the silence again. Rodents sneaked through the nooks and crannies of the walls after quickly crossing the exposed cobblestone floor.
And there where the dim light of the streetlamp could not illuminate the darkness that this alley housed, it was a monument to cruelty and sadism, with human form and wrapped in a black cloak, which gave as the only symptom of life a repetitive blink. His prey, who would have the honor of playing a leading role in his ode to violence, would soon appear.
The excitement accelerated the heart of that creature when a few steps began to approach that location to finally stop just a few meters from his fateful destination. The woman, dressed in a dirty dress, lit a thin cigarette that, together with the adoption of a relaxed pose against the wall, would help her to exercise the wait of some man in search of her comforting and wet heat at the price of pennies.
The shadow soon approached silently and hit, by surprise, a blow to the belly of the victim that made it difficult to scream because of the lack of air and made it easier for him to position his hands around her neck without screams of terrifying surprise at first instance.
He threw her to the ground and, strangulating her with the proper strength not to sink her windpipe, he was compensated by seeing that glint of pure panic in the victim's eyes. He slightly lowered the pressure of his hands on her neck as the best was yet to come and he wanted her fully conscious.
As he pulled out the instruments from her cloak, the woman tried to emit a scream that resulted in a grimace drowned by another accurate kick to the abdomen. Contemplating his black eyes reflected in the sheet of cold metal was part of his ritual. On his knees and with one hand pressing her windpipe again, he raised the metal with a smile and plunged it into the side of the victim's abdomen and began, with a biased movement, to leave the viscera visible.
He felt the warm blood flowing and soaking his wrists and only a scream of pain and agonizing suffering ever experienced, got away from the joy that flooded him.
Angrily for the distraction, and with a cut that reached the victim's cervical as evidence of it, also sliced the neck of the woman, who began to emit rattles that seemed music to him.
With urgency, before the victim lost all knowledge, he reached inside and began to remove the gelatinous intestines, spreading them along her legs.
The music finally stopped and, licking one of his fingers, he stood up proudly, while proceeding to keep, with meticulous gestures, the instruments in his coat.
After dedicating one last look of longing for his work, he moved away, disappearing into the mists.
Image credits: The Thames below Westminster by Monet, 1871