An Eye For A Tooth

She looked at the shadow of a man under the dim hallway light.

"I'm sorry I couldn't save you."

The man dreary and haunted, reached out to her, his skin hollow and tight, his bones weak.

The woman saw this and couldn't hold back a frustrated wail.

"Ah! Why did you have to see that? You could've lived a little longer."

A white crescent of a grin broke through the night. "But now that you know, you'll have to go."

The man wheezed faintly, his voice failing him.

"What was that Edge? You should speak louder for people to understand you, you know"

"...knew"

"What was that?"

"I... knew," his raspy voice broke through.

"Oh, are we laying down are cards now? That's right, you're dying right now, so it's now or never is that it? Then I can say that I knew that you knew?". The man's stomach dropped. The girl laughed. "Oh, the look on your face just now! I want to keep you alive just to see that face again. All this time you thought you were playing me, that you had the upper hand, but poor Edgy," a hall light short circuited, "it was you who was being played all along."

"Now nobody will live to know, and my secret will be safe!"

Not soon after, the shaky exhale of the man could be heard, and then no more.

The woman petted his hair affectionately before joining her hands in prayer. The hallway was almost dark now, the outline of the man slumped on the floor and the rim of the woman's glasses being the only things that could be seen.

"Thank you for the food."

Within the darkness, the woman's eyes turned to hollow rows of sharp teeth and so did her mouth, her legs, her face, and her skin...

The slow corkscrew of blood twisted and hammered deeper inside. The tear of flesh sounded like tearing wood. The snap of bones like.

The glasses were long discarded, the creature's body now using all of itself to devour the man...

In response to the slowly squelching noises and the copper scent of warm blood, I stepped back an inch. I had seen everything.

Her head snapped up. Even without ears, she heard everything and trained her toothy eye on to her. The teeth made way to eyeball, and the woman was back. She smiled her blood black smile.

"Now you know too."