Empires SMP Halloween prompt oneshots

Day 10 - "What... are you?"

           Being an empress was hard, False reflected. Even an empire as tiny and as uninhabited as Cogsmeade. The grand architect of said empire yawned widely, feeling tired. Despite how often she napped and how late she got up she never seemed to be wide awake; False was seemingly in a state of perpetual drowsiness. It did not help when she was overworked to exhaustion.

           Yawning, False stumbled to her house and fell into bed without even considering eating dinner. She was too tired to cook something anyway. Or to kill a random animal for its edible flesh.

           As her eyelids fluttered shut and she fell into dreamland, False suddenly sat up in bed. Stealthily she grabbed several knives hidden all over her house from under her bed to behind the bathroom mirror to even squirreled inside a frame of a painting. Slipping those knives under her clothes and tucked into her belt, False stole out of her house in the dead of night, with not a single soul stirring.

           False stood on a hill, surveying the quaint little town that was so far still fast asleep and oblivious to her presence. It was so funny to her. She tilted her head back and laughed manically, her silhouette cast against the light of the full moon behind her. Any superstitious soul still awake at this hour would've thought she was some kind of monster if they ever saw her like that.

           Eventually False stopped laughing and felt it prudent to sharpen her knives. And what better way to do that then to use them. She made her way down to the Cogsmeade lark and started throwing knives at the trees. One by one the knives came back down to earth, having stabbed straight throight several sleeping squirrels and birds and other woodland creatures. False found strange satisfaction in noting that they would not wake up again the next morning.

           But sleeping targets were too easy. And not nearly as much fun since they weren't awake enough to scream as they felt False's many blades sink into their flesh and draw out spurts of blood. False found herself craving an awake target. One that was quite well aware of what was happening to them.

           Laughing and humming a tune, False twirled her knives as she skipped gaily down the paved Cogsmeade streets. She didn't even bother to keep her voice down. The sound of her singing would wake up some light sleeper and coax them out of the house, False reasoned. Then she would have a playmate tonight. If it didn't work, well, she could always have the playdate at their house. With False inviting herself over since she was the empress of this town and could do as she wanted. It wasn't like anyone could really stop her, no matter how much they wanted to.

           Sure enough, False's logic proved sound as a light flickered on in a stranger's house. Within a few minutes the door swung open and a man staggered out with bags under his eyes and a pair of flannel pajamas on. He stared, blinking grumpily at False who continued to laugh and hum as she skipped along like she didn't even notice him.

           "Oi," The man said, but False paid him no heed. She started to laugh much louder and bounced along with an extra spring in her step. Soon her skipping turned into a little dance. "I said, what are you doing? And at this hour?" The man asked False, looking irked that he had been woken up for apparently no sane reason. "Who are you? Are you crazy?"

           False's first thought as she stopped dancing and slowly turned to look at the man in his eyes was that his question was most likely a rhetorical one. But she answered him anyway. "Yes. I am crazy." False said proudly. The man looked at her in surprise.

           "Wait, grand architect False?" The man asked once he recognized her. He rubbed his eyes and looked her up and down again as if to make sure that it was really her. "What are you doing up at this hour?" "Crazy desensitized murderer stuff." False replied easily.

           The man's eyes shot wide open and he stumbled back in shock. "What?" He gasped as False suddenly approached him with four knives in hand. With quick precision she had him pinned to the opposite wall with half of her knives in his shoulders. Blood started to leak out in torrents as the man shrieked in pain and fear. Ah, it was even better than False had imagined.

           He stared at False with shellshocked eyes. "What... are you?" He screamed at her. "Your worst nightmare." False replied pleasantly as she slit his throat. With a gurgle he fell limply into dreamless, unending sleep.