Michael Myers: Final Girl

Dust In The Wind

He was afraid to move from the shadows. For the first time he felt truly weakened as if movement would cause him to unravel piece by piece. His hands touched the bullet wounds, which had already lost their sting. Physically, he no longer felt his wounds. His pain was not external, it was something he had never experienced. His insides twisted and churned in a brutal way. A heaviness weighed hard in his chest and spread to his stomach. It was as though each part of him was decaying rapidly the longer he stared at the empty street. It was a hunger he didn't know if he would ever be able to satiate without her. He longed for the physical pain. That would have been easier to mend. His fingers pulled on the still open wound and his blood turned the blue cloth around it black. Still, nothing. It didn't compare to nor distract him from the permanent wound she had left behind.

The light was returning to the skies above him and he knew he would have to force his limbs to move. Each step was an exerted effort, his heart was fighting him each time his footfall strayed farther away from his place in the shadows. He did his best to ignore its obnoxious pleas to wait for her. He knew she wasn't coming back. Perhaps she was physically alive, but she no longer lived as she was. Death wasn't even something he knew how to mourn, so how would he know how to grieve this? His body was no longer running on predator instinct. He began to think she had caused him to devolve. His mind had been a blank canvas before, occasionally painted with the blood of his victims. Black and white in a sense. He needed nothing and he wanted for nothing. It was easy to satisfy bloodlust, but now she had taken that canvas for herself. She had tattooed herself inside the deepest part of him. She was permanently in him and permanently unobtainable at the same time. He wanted to hate her for it and hated that he couldn't. Though her betrayal had cut him deeper, burned him worse than he ever had been before, the idea of hating her proved to be more hurtful.

The farmhouse, their home slowly came into view. He had hoped maybe it would bring him comfort to be where she had loved him to the fullest but his fists clenched tightly at the memories. Still, he walked closer. He was determined to fight this agony, kill it. Standing where she stood was a daunting feat but he followed her memory as if her ghost was guiding him. His breathing became labored as he neared the porch and the aching intensified. He could almost see her, but he couldn't quite reach her. This trick his mind was playing on him was quickly igniting a rage even he hadn't felt before. He moved past the mist like images of where they had stood and went through the open doorframe. The leaves she had cleared out had returned to the floor of the front room. Ashes littered the area by the fireplace where they had once sat. Ghosts lingered there too, he could see her head resting on his shoulder, but when the wind rushed in, her form joined the ashes on the ground. That heaviness within him was spreading throughout the empty house, as if it was aching for her presence as well. He turned towards the hallway where he tried to remember what those photographs his mind had created of them looked like. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't see them. They refused to appear to him. Leaves went before him as he walked to the room he dreaded the most. He forced himself in. He saw it as it had been in his dream. He saw himself holding her, her body draped in that dress he wanted so badly to give to her. Her face was as it should have been. She was at peace and she was with him. His hands held her face gently as if she would crumble in his grasp and he carefully let his forehead rest on hers. His senses became filled with her essence, he could see it engulfing him, intertwining with what little of himself he had left. She lifted her lips to his and he watched as she took everything. With one kiss, she had taken all of him. She spread like fire through him, turning him to ash with her. He could feel his palms bleeding and begging his fists to unclench, but he pressed deeper. He was decaying with her now. The fire was dying and their images were fading fast. She was killing him all over again, but in a way she hadn't understood she was. He had died in so many different ways because of her. He no longer knew who he was or what he was. She had given life to a part of him he wasn't aware existed and then taken it from him. Or maybe it was still there and that's why he hurt in such an unknown way. He couldn't take it anymore. He wanted it to stop. He did the only thing he knew how to do. His hands swiped away at the phantom only to land on the bed frame. Pain shot through his fists and he responded by ripping the wooden knob off the nails that had held it in place. It crashed through the window and the sound of glass breaking filled the house. Nothing was left untouched. He had thought forgetting her would kill him, but remembering every moment, every touch and to know it was all for nothing was worse. It was a punishment he didn't deserve.

He left the house in a worse state than before. It was destroyed. The curtains that had covered her were ripped to shreds, the bed destroyed. Any evidence that it was their home for a time was gone. He strode through the door into the fog that was settling around the area. It clung to him as he put distance between the property and himself. His work was done there, but he wasn't satisfied. Breaking walls or mirrors wasn't enough. He needed to find himself again. He needed to kill.

Nearby lay an unfortunate soul unaware of the trauma Michael was about to inflict on him. He was homeless, a drifter, exactly what the Shape needed. He wanted to remind himself what real pain looked like and that he was the one who dealt it. His footsteps weren't nearly as quiet as they usually were and the man began to stir as he approached. His eyes widened with fear as Michael descended upon him with his bare hands. The man scratched at the massive hand that gripped his throat mercilessly, but to no avail. He was lifted off his feet and as he looked down at his attacker he tried to scream. Michael's hand began to squeeze tighter and tighter. He wanted to break him as he had been broken. The man's life began to fade from his eyes and what should have been satisfaction washing over Michael was instead guilt. He saw what she had done, what he had tried to stop. He saw those eyes again. Lifeless, tainted. He saw her. He wanted to scream.

Just before the man slipped away, Michael released him. He fell to the ground with a thud, gasping as air filled his lungs again. The Shape stood there for a moment and watched as the man regained his strength and scrambled to his feet. His eyes were frightened and confused as Michael stood deadly still before him. Once he realized he would indeed survive this, he ran. The Shape didn't move. He watched him disappear into the forest. He had no desire left in him to hunt. He knew it wouldn't do anything to fix this. He accepted his defeat. Now she had really killed him, this was his death. He waited until night had fallen to return to the only place he knew to go. It welcomed him as it always did, but this time he knew he wasn't going to leave. His home was once again filled with his masked breathing, it had once been a comforting sound to him. This time, he had no desire to go to the window. He went to Judith's room to join her. He had died so many times he wasn't quite sure how to make it permanent. But he was patient, he could wait. Perhaps starving himself of other's lives would return him to his mortal state and death would seek him out once and for all. He wasn't going to be haunted by her for eternity. He would starve here if he had to. He rested his body on the dilapidated bed and gazed up at the ceiling. He might as well have closed his eyes, the darkness that hung about the room was all consuming. He let it surround him. Perhaps the Myers' house could finally claim it's last victim.