The Hunt

It always hurts to eat.

I can barely remember what it’s like to enjoy the act of eating. Savouring the reward was always my favourite part of a hunt; sinking my teeth into soft, supple flesh, warm blood trickling down my chin and leaving my hands slick and red, taking my time to relish every last bite. It’s all gone now. Killing has become nothing more than a chore, knowing that in the end, I won’t enjoy the feast. Never again.

***

The winter air was harsh and biting that night. The seasonal chill always made it harder to get a good meal—the further I walked the fewer prey there was. But it’s important to only hunt at night. Under the comfort of darkness, it’s not so easy for prey to tell I’m not one of them. Pay no attention to the lonely man passing you by. There’s nothing to see here.

Sure, the street wasn’t completely barren of prospective targets, but I didn’t want just anything to be my meal.

The young giggling couple wrapped in each other’s arms? Pairs were always a pain to deal with.

The moody teenager milling on the street corner? The acrid tang of their cigarette smoke would spoil their taste.

The elderly man pretending he wasn’t drunk as he stumbled down the sidewalk? Older flesh was always so tough and sinewy.

I’d rather go hungry than to settle for something of subpar quality. I needed my prey to speak to me. A nice voice, a nice smile, a nice smell. Something enticing that would send a tingle through my fingers and up my spine. Only then would they be worthy of being my meal.

That night, it was the eyes.

A girl in her early-twenties. She strolled towards me, boots crunching along the sidewalk, her hands shoved deep into a bulky black jumper. The lower half of her face was obscured by a simple black facemask and a woollen scarf wrapped tightly against the chill. As she stepped around me, her gaze met mine for only a split second before I looked away—before she could notice how wide my pupils were. But even that tiny space of time told me everything. Such a beautiful shade of green, steady and focused, without a hint of uncertainty. Such fascinating strength of character from someone so young.

My fingertips were already tingling.

I stopped walking, but made sure to wait a few seconds before turning around. It was easy to keep pace with her, a small figure dead in my sights. The lovebirds and drunks and dumb teens no longer deserved even a sliver of my attention. There was a bounce in her step that made her hair swish side-to-side like a metronome. I tried to mimic it as I followed. Her scent carried on the wind and my tongue darted out to catch its taste. Layers upon layers of burning energy fizzled up through my arms and surged across my entire body until I pulsated as though I were on fire. What had she been up to this time of night? I tasted more deeply this time. Sweet and fragrant, with no hint of sweat. So she couldn’t have been walking for long. We were heading away from the direction of the train station, so she probably lived nearby. Not that it mattered. She would never make it.

Perhaps tonight would be even more fun than yesterday’s hunt at the park. My target had spotted me at the last second and ran for the treeline. It made for a great opportunity to stretch out my legs. His flesh felt divine on my tongue.

As for the girl, my chance for us to finally be alone came soon enough, when she stepped away into a back alley that led towards the residential neighbourhoods. A dumb decision on her part but an exceptionally suitable spot to make my move. I quickened my pace, drool already coating my mouth and even sliding down my chin. I didn’t bother to wipe it away. All pretences of playing the unsuspecting man were slipping away. I was a monster on a hunt and I was hungry.

When I turned the corner she wasn’t there.

The alley was completely silent.

This wasn’t right. There was no way she could’ve made it out the other side already. Had she made a run for it? Had I been too obvious? Foolish, careless, over-excited. No, I needed to calm down. I would have heard her heavier footfalls if she had started to run. I could still catch up before it was too late. My eyes scanned side-to-side and surveyed every nook and cranny. Searching for a movement, a silhouette, a face. The light from the main road was gone. Here, the dim streetlamps cast the way ahead in shadows that danced against the walls with every hurried step. I was halfway down the alley when I heard the crunch of a boot. A figure stepped out from the darkness of a doorway.

And a hammer swung down and smashed into my forehead. 

I stumbled backwards. White-hot pain spiking through my skull. Fire spreading across my face. She closed the distance in an instant. The hammer in her right hand crunched into my cheek. The sickening cacophony of my own bones shattering beneath cold metal. I tried to regain my balance. The pocketknife in her left hand cut into my throat. I fumbled for the blade. Black blood trickled, then gushed from the wound. Some of it sprayed onto her. She didn’t flinch. I struggled to breathe. To stand. The girl pressed her hammer into my chest. Pushing me to the ground. My head slammed into the concrete.

Over my rasping gasps and throbbing face I heard her weapons clang to the ground. Then her slow, melodic footsteps against the gravel as she circled me, taking her time to inspect her handiwork. She loomed over my body, staring down at me. Those beautiful green eyes, steady, focused, meant only for me. Studying my face slowly and deliberately. I couldn’t move, couldn’t speak. She was in no rush to finish me off. The scarf hung loose now, her face splattered with blood, my blood, oily and black against her pale skin. She didn’t seem to notice nor care that it wasn’t human. She knew what I was. She’d known the whole goddamn time. She pulled the facemask down with one finger. Finally I could see her whole face. Her mouth didn’t sit quite right. It bulged like it was being pushed out at odd angles from the inside. She didn’t smile.

She stretched her hands out towards my face. I braced myself, expecting her to start digging into my wounds. But instead she calmly prised my mouth open—which was still excruciating as my facial muscles raked across my broken cheekbone. She traced a slender fingertip along my teeth, yellowed fangs set into blackened gums, and felt each point one by one, like she was… inspecting them. Testing the sharpness of every single tooth. Pushing and prodding, up and down each row again and again and again. Taking her time. Analysing. Deciding.

Her finger stopped to rest on one near the front. I wanted to bite down and sever it clean off. But the pain in my head was too great and my body was limp. I couldn’t even turn my head away when she pulled a pair of pliers from her jumper and shoved them into my mouth. The jagged metal clamped down on her tooth of choice and she pulled. I felt it strain, start to budge, then give way as she tore it out. I would have screamed, but what came out was nothing more than a pathetic, wet gurgle.

Even as she inspected the thing she’d ripped from my body, still her expression didn’t change—a stony exterior plastered on a pretty, blood-smeared face. She opened her mouth.

The top row of teeth were normal and untouched, but the bottom row were almost completely inhuman. Each one was different from the next—some ragged and squat, others smooth and pristine—jutting out of a mouth far too small to contain them. She turned the pliers on the few human teeth left in her line-up of mismatched monstrosities. She chose the one nestled next to a razor-sharp fang that glistened like diamonds and must surely dig into the roof of her mouth. She pulled it out with ease, root and all, blood pooling in the crevice left behind. She didn’t even make a sound.

She placed the tiny white tooth into my open palm, tenderly closing my fingers around it for me, like it was a gift. She raised my own tooth up between thumb and forefinger and shoved it into the empty crevice. It was far too big to fit, and her gums split and tore to make room. The neighbouring human tooth cracked and shattered as they pushed against each-other. More and more blood gushed out of the ever-worsening wound, spilling over her bottom lip and down her chin and onto my face. Red mixing with black in a disgusting mess. With her latest addition in place, she moved her bottom jaw around, making sure it fit nicely. It shouldn’t have stayed in place like that, it was too easy. But what did I know about what was going on? Clearly nothing.

Only then did she finally smile, her eyes boring directly into mine as her bloodied face split into an uneven, satisfied grin—like she was showing off her triumph, her prize, her collection, all of it. It was gone an instant later, her flash of malicious victory dropping back beneath the cold surface. Once again replaced by her stony, steady focus as she picked up the pliers, the knife, the hammer, and put them back into her pockets. She wiped away the blood with her sleeve and spat what was still left in her mouth into my face. I didn’t shut my eyes in time. Through a stinging blur I watched her adjust the facemask back into position, get to her feet and walk away, a bounce in her step. Leaving me to bleed out and die.

***

I didn’t die. Of course I didn’t. A slashed throat and smashed-in face aren’t nearly enough to keep me down. Instead I had to lie there in agony, drenched in blood and shame for hours, beaten and broken and humiliated by my prey. No-one else came through the alley in the hours it took for my skull to knit itself back together. She may not have finished the job, but she’d picked her spot well. Maybe she was unaware that nothing short of a decapition would do the trick. Maybe she just didn’t care if I survived or not. I don’t know which thought scares me more.

The tooth never came back. Unlike my other wounds, the hole stubbornly refuses to heal over. I can’t help constantly running my tongue over the raw and empty space left behind. It is no longer mine, but hers. Does she plan to replace them all? I don’t want to think of what it will look like when the set is complete. I never want to see that smile again.

I still have the tooth she left with me. It sits in my coat pocket as an insulting reminder. I’ve thought about throwing it away so many times. But I can never bring myself to do it. What’s hers is hers, and what’s mine is mine. A tooth for a tooth. What a vile thought. Besides, things won’t go back to the way they were even if I did dispose of it.

           The joy of the hunt is gone.

           It always hurts to eat.