Frank kept his ear close to the door. The sound of nothing but silence graced the eardrum of his poor suspicions. 

“Fuck… Woody, you better still be kicking, mate.”

“Mama says cursing is bad.”

The only sound Frank heard was that of a child calling him out for his sailor words. It was one of his many bad habits that he could never think to kick.

Turning to the young one, Frank apologized before noting the extravagant, well-refined room they were both in. It looked like a private study by some wealthy individual. 

“You alone here? Are there others?”

The child shrugged. 

“You gotta think, kid. There’s gotta be more of ya, right?”

“I don’t know.”

“Alright, alright. Well, tell me this then, is this your home?”

“I don’t know.”

Such answers from a child weren’t insightful in the slightest. Frank could only scratch his head in frustration.

“Just tell me about your mother. Any father?” Frank questioned, trying to soften his approach. “Anyone who can explain this damn place?”

The child’s only response was to cover their mouth. Frank winced, catching his mistake—another swear had slipped through. He muttered an apology, having thought he’d been more careful with his words.

Seeing his effort, the child nodded.

Her jaw unhinged—slowly, impossibly. Skin stretched beyond human limits, tearing like wet paper. Bones cracked with a sound like breaking kindling. Her eyes rolled back, revealing only white.

Two hands emerged from her throat. Not a child’s hands in the slightest.

Such a grotesque sight caused Frank to stumble backward, his service weapon half-drawn—muscle memory fighting against what his eyes were seeing. The firearm trembled in his grip—aim wavering between disbelief and pure, primal terror.

A young woman emerged from the child’s husk like a sleeping bag, her grin stretching across her face from ear to ear. 

“Me, oh my, so many, many, many, many, many, many naughty boys and girls. Not Noel here. She was such a good one. That’s why she tasted the sweetest.”

The young woman’s words were like the icing on the cake as a sense of dread overcame Frank. He knew just from her presence what she was. Fearful, he pulled the trigger to fire a shot, only for the individual to flick her finger to correct its direction somewhere else.

Taking several more shots, Frank cursed a slew of words like a battled cry as he fired off the clip. The last bullet, missing entirely as the individual disappeared, reemerging from behind his side. It had come from one finger at a time, pulling him close until she was face to face with him.

“Me, oh my, a naughty boy indeed,” she said, twirling his hand as if they were dancing in a ballroom. The momentum spun him around and around until his rump found the softest cushion in a chair. “Tell me, why are so many naughty children finding their way here today? Tsk tsk tsk. And you are most naughty of them all.”

Her words spurned sweat to pour down Frank’s temple. His heart drummed with fury within its confided cage with such intensity that it felt like it was about to beat out of his chest.

“A-are you truly a…” Frank stammered. His words were barely coherent from his trembling lips.

“Say it,” the woman coaxed, her smile too bright, too perfect—almost mocking him. Her touch was soft, deceptively gentle, but it carried a sickening sensation. It crept under his skin like a swarm of unseen insects, burrowing and writhing, their stings burning and claws scraping as if trying to dig their way out. “Saaaaaaaaaaaaay it.”

“A, a witch.”

The words sparked something deep inside her—a slow, visceral hunger that unfurled like tendrils of smoke. She inhaled, drawing in the essence of his fear. It hung in the air, thick and metallic, a flavor more intoxicating than any perfume. Each trembling breath he took painted the space between them with raw, primal terror.

“Me, oh my,” the woman’s smile twisted as her head snapped at an unnatural angle, causing Frank to sink deeper into his chair. “There might be something in there…”

She raised her finger to touch Frank’s forehead. The nail sank slowly into his skin. It caused a searing pain to radiate throughout his body. 

“Shhhhh, shhhhhhhh, shhh. Me, oh my, don’t struggle. It will only be for a…”

Her words trailed to a silence as her eyes rolled to meet the pair in front of her.

“Don’t tell me… Do you know my name?”

“What?!”

“My name! You know it! You’ve dreamed of me. Oh, how exquisite today is. Say it, oh please, let me hear you say it~.”

“What are you on about?! I don’t know—ARGHHHH!”

Her finger pressed deeper into his skull, a precise incision that felt like a surgical blade without the anesthesia to quell the pain. 

Frank thrashed, muscles convulsing, desperate to wrench away. But his body betrayed him—each violent twist only drove her touch harder, more merciless. His memories began to leak out, raw and liquid, spreading between them like an open wound. Not shared. Consumed. 

Despite his frantic struggles, he could feel himself unraveling, becoming transparent under her grip.

“It, it, it, it…”

“Yes, right there. Say it for me, darling. Let’s do this together, and we can... What’s this? Impossible. You’re—”

Pulling her finger out, she turned only to meet the sharp end of an axe plunging deep into her neck. The swing came with such force it carved past the bone, snapping it like a twig. 

Without remorse, it came down several more times. 

Seated, clutching his chest, Frank took many breaths before he could collect himself to see the new horror before him.

“I think you missed a spot—”

One more hack and cleave for good measure interrupted his words. Several more for pleasure and then an encore performance just for the hell of it. The one wielding the weapon did not stop until the one beneath their toes was a pile of unrecognizable destruction from their carnage. 

“You good kid?” Frank asked.

“Clean this up for me. I need to return to Woods and get him to a hospital.”

“Woody? Is he alright?”

“Just…look for the flute. I’ll be right back.”

Sirius

After brutally severing that monster’s head and giving it a good thrashing to pay her back, I returned to the pale man lying unconscious. Silence crashed down like a physical weight.

Checking his pulse. Nothing short of a reflex. If he died, I’d find a way to bring him back—to make him understand what he’d done.

My body had ached from how I had awoken earlier. Grass stretched around me, endless and indifferent. How did I get here? The question drifted, disconnected from any certain reality. But the taste of cinnamon and copper had lingered on my lips. When I touched my face, my fingers came away stained. Blood. Always blood. Lieutenant Woods was lying there, barely breathing, a gash, deep, running along his arm. As I had nothing else on, I had torn off a piece of his coat to bandage the wound.

My hands moved mechanically as if on autopilot. Suppose it was out of survival.

“Unbelievable, you are,” I whispered to him, to myself, to the darkness that had brought us here.

Police moved around me like shadows as children were found in droves. But ‘children’ seemed a loose term now. The survivors represented different states of childhood. Those from now, and those from before. The batch I had found with Delilah slumbered nearby, their breathing a soft counterpoint to Woods’ shallow, labored gasps.

“Is he going to make it?” I asked the paramedics as they loaded him into the ambulance. They appeared more concerned with my blood-stained appearance than my question—a familiar dismissal. Frank stood by a police cruiser, his presence somehow quelling my swirling anxieties.

“Don’t worry about him. He’s a strong one. Stronger than me. You should’ve seen him in there. Not a bead of sweat on the bloke.” 

“Yeah…?”

“Yeah…”

His face was a map of fatigue and something else—relief, maybe, or the numbing aftermath of violence.

“Are you alright?”

Such a simple question. Loaded with everything and nothing.

“Yeah, yeah,” he stuttered, finishing his flask in one practiced gulp. For the nerves? A medication? Whatever kept the darkness at bay. “I am sure I will be. Got the flute. It’s secured,” he said, tapping the trunk. “Everything’s contained.”

I knew what “everything” meant. The remnants of a horror older than either of us.

“And don’t worry. I’ll handle the rest.”

“Tampering with evidence,” I said, more out of habit than accusation.

“Pffft. Who’d believe me anyway?”

A somber expression fell over his face. “It’s going to take some time to back-catalog and match up who is who, but...”

The scene was a mess. And that was putting it lightly. The workers at Smitten Kittens knew only that life—nothing else. Who knew what sort of future they will face now? A part of me felt sorry for them, but I couldn’t invest in each of their stories. My hands were already full with my own problems, my own case.

As I scoured the scenery of flashing red and blue lights, I noticed a woman standing by a car. Her face I recognized immediately.

“What’s with the Winters being here?” I asked.

“They want justice,” Frank answered. “A child of theirs was a victim.”

I stared back at her, an unspoken understanding passing between us. “You going to be alright?”

“Not sure yet. You? Need a ride?”

“I am not getting in a car with that thing,” I replied, a hint of disdain in my voice.

“Afraid to do your job?”

“I did. Now do yours,” I said, turning away. "Delilah, you ready?"

Delilah grabbed my hand—not as dirty as before since I’d already wiped most of the grime onto my coat. “Alright, let’s bring you home.”