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1• Threatening setting

‿︵‿︵ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ・❉・ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ‿︵‿︵

25/11/21

Homework : Describe a threatening setting

‿︵‿︵ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ・❉・ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ‿︵‿︵

The young vigilante sat in a rickety balcony, rocking on the balls of his feet, one palm rippling with pain as he grabbed onto one of the damp iron railings, the other resting against the brick wall behind him, as he glanced at his pursuers below him. From his vantage point, he melted deeper into the shadows casted by the apartment block and stared down into the graffitied alleyway below him.

The moonlight wasn’t bright, but it illuminated all the wrong places, and one false placement could light the twenty-two-year-old up to the people he was trying his hardest to avoid, to the point that he might as well be wearing a bright neon sign flashing, “I’m right here”. Not that he was convinced they’d see him, these were the dumbest police officers he’d seen yet. They were currently preoccupied rummaging through the garbage cans and bags, trying to find him. If anything, he found it insulting- did they really think that he was that stupid? Still, they’d figure it out soon enough. It wasn’t exactly a hard thing to jump from a dumpster, grab on to a balcony, and pull yourself up, even for him- and he had a broken hand.

He slowly stood up, pressing his back onto the wall, making sure to stay on the balls of his feet, despite their aching. There was no way he could jump down from here without being caught, so quickly decided that his best bet was committing a tiny bit of breaking and entry. He was already on the run from the police, what would committing a simple offence do?

Sure, it was going against every vigilante rule in the book, but that was just a minor inconvenience.

Pulling a hairpin from his pocket, he set to work at picking the lock on the balcony’s door. After a minute, the lock opened with a satisfying ‘pop’ that felt like a gunshot in the silence of the night. He slipped into the apartment before his pursuers could flash their torches up to the balcony.

As he closed the door behind him, his senses were overwhelmed by the freezing temperature. He involuntarily shivered in spite of his cloak, which usually kept him warm, even throughout winter. It was cold, unnaturally so, and his instincts told him that his goosebumps weren’t only raised due to hibernal room. Something was off. The vigilante understood that people liked to turn on the air-con during heatwaves, but the last heatwave ended nearly a month ago, and he wasn’t certain that aircon could even go this cold.

Through a slither of moonlight that flooded the room with candle-like light, he could tell that the apartment itself was seemingly normal- if you ignored the fact that the occupant went overkill on bookshelves. They covered every wall from ceiling to floor, and each one was filled to the brim with hardback books. The books bared familiar titles such as Dracula, Rebecca, Emma, Anna Karenina, Matilda. It was almost unsettling how all the titles began with names.

He moved to the closest bookshelf and picked up one of the books. Hamlet. It was warm to the touch, a stark contrast to the rest of the room. The young adult wondered if the shelves were heated, to protect the books, maybe, but they were just as cold as the rest of the room.  He ran his fingers up the spine. Leather covering, he presumed, but the texture felt slightly off. The vigilante blamed his anxiety. It wasn’t usual that he got nervous, but nothing about this situation was quite usual.

He slowly turned the cover open, as if doing so would end in some perilous and torturous death (though, at this point, he wouldn’t completely be surprised). It was obvious from opening the book, that this was, in fact, not Hamlet. It seemed to be some sort of diary, journal type thing, but instead of recording events, it was recording dreams, and rather concerning ones at that.

The one that caught his eye the most, however, was one that detailed a rather gruesome drowning of a teenage girl, one committed by the dreamer themself. Attached to the page was a photo of the girl described in the passage- who looked strikingly similar to another girl who went missing a few months prior, about a week after the date at the top of the page. A choking sensation rose in his throat. Whatever this was, whyever the dreamer had done what they did, it was undoubtedly sick and sadistic.

He dropped the book on the floor as he reached for another book, titled Esther. It was bound in the same material, but didn’t hold the same warmth, instead it was scorching hot, burning his hands as he touched it. He ignored the pain as he flipped through the pages.

Another entry, another photograph. This time of an older man- a lumberjack it seemed. The description had him dead with his own axe stuck in his head. The vigilante didn’t even need to look at the photograph, the news stories after his death last year had been scarred into his brain and had stuck with him ever since.

He tore two more books off a shelf, Lolita, and Peter Pan. These books, backed in the same material that was slowly becoming more disgusting to touch, were the hottest yet. He dropped them onto the floor, the skin on his hands angry red and blistering where they had touched the books.

Nevertheless, he rummaged through the journals, seeing more photos, more passages, more murders. All these deaths, who the police had assumed be irrelated, who he had assumed to be irrelated, all committed by one singular, sadistic individual.

He stopped at one passage, at the end of Peter Pan. The last entry in the book. He didn’t read the writing. He didn’t dare to. Instead, he stared directly into his own eyes in the photo, and today’s date on the top of the page.

‿︵‿︵ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ・❉・ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ‿︵‿︵

In my defense, there's nothing more threatening than being about to be killed.

Grade : 9 (A**)

(Turns out I did the wrong thing but my teacher really liked it and gave me a 9 anyway 😃👍)

‿︵‿︵ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ・❉・ʚ˚̣̣̣͙ɞ‿︵‿︵