𝕊𝕥𝕚𝕥𝕔𝕙 𝕞𝕖 𝕌𝕡 (Atsushi x M!Reader)

Chapter #3

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I'm running.

A long sprint, I've gotten quite good at it now. Even with the lack of adrenaline pulsing through my veins, I somehow get it through to my body that if I ever stop running, I'll die. But it's true, even if I've been at it for quite a few years, the fact that death is just behind me is the truth.

It's gotten pretty good at running too, screams and limbs crackling doesn't seem to hold it down as I dash through the empty streets. Sometimes on the lucky nights, I'll run by a person, giving me just enough time to get away from the figure. After all, it has to hide away.

People can see it.

Just not hear it.

That's why it hides away, preying on the ones that can hear it, the ones that can tell it's nearby. It knows it can't hide away from me, not with its loud ragged noises and crackling with every step.

"Hey!"

My voice is loud when I bang on a familiar building, door screwed shut despite the lights inside. I don't often run into open businesses on the way back home, but I don't look a gift horse in the mouth. Sometimes shops close at later times, so I always manage to take advantage of them.

Sometimes however, they don't open the door for me.

And I'm stuck there, banging on a door when I know well enough just what is behind me. Some nights, I make the mistake of letting it catch up to me.

And I pay the consequences.

Always managing to escape it, even I myself don't understand it. Standing in front of closed store, my fists slam on glass, trying to draw attention of whoever is inside. Of course, no one comes immediately, and I hit the door at a faster rate.

Please.

I can already feel it behind me, gasps louder, wheezing putrid and at a higher pitch. Almost as if it's happy to see me, throat closing in around so that it can't breathe properly. It's sharp claw like tendrils snake to cup my cheek from behind, and I momentarily stop.

I feel the pain before I can register the situation in my head, my left cheek throbs as blood rushes up to my face. Yet it was the least of my worries as the claws drag to my shoulders, leaving a line of blood wherever it touches.

"Hello?"

I hear a voice then, just in front of me standing just inside the doorframe of the store. A woman who's wearing a plaid shirt and dress pants, the tag on her shirt tells me that she works there, but the lousy sweater draped over her shoulders tells me she was on her way out. The warm air of the store brushed past me like a breeze, and I involuntarily let out a shudder.

"Do you have any bandaids?"

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