text: Peering into the woods you decide that it isn't all that dark just yet and that you can definitely make it home before it's too dark for you too see. You readjust your scarf further and set off in a brisk walk through the dark, wooded park. Your footsteps are barely audible, cushioned by the slightly damp packed earth. Ignoring how darn right creepy the sound of the wind through the bare branches is you continue on through the wood, occasionally crunching through patches of dried leaves. Your nearly halfway through the park and it's now very dark, the moon your only source of light. Continuing down the path you think you hear something in the forest behind you.
  
  > quicken your pace, you're nearly home
  The sudden noise in the darkness startles you, your heart beats furiously and you begin to walk faster. The rustling in the brush continues, getting closer and closer with each and every step of yours. Your pace reaching that of a jog, your breath coming out in short puffs. You whip your head around in search of the noise and as you do your foot collides with and a large root. You hit the cold earth hard, an intense pain shooting up your leg, it's sprained. Tears spring to your eyes at the sudden shock of pain, you gingerly feel at your ankle trying your very best to hold in sobs as you touch a particularly tender spot. A loud crunch of twigs and leaves sounds directly in front of you.
  
  > look up
  Your head snaps up in the direction of the noise, your breathing short and rasping you call out "Who's there?". You wait a moment breathing erratically, eyes furiously scanning the treeline and bushes ahead of you. After a few minutes of near silence, you breath a shaky sigh of relief, turning your attention back to your throbbing foot. You let out a sniffle as you try to lift your aching limb, your attention now shifted away from the ominous noises in the forest to that of your foot. You don't realise that there is something approaching you from behind.
  
  > ...
  You were right to run away but unfortunately you tripped, and even more unfortunate for yourself you threw caution to the wind as soon as you did so. Your decision to take this short-cut through the heavily wooded park wasn't a good one. You had been followed for quite some time now. While you have been sitting on the ground fussing with your foot, your pursuer circles behind you through the woods. They step out of the woods and onto the path behind you, unfortunately you're too consumed with your sprained ankle to notice the large figure in a long coat approaching from behind. The figure pulls out a rag and a bottle, pouring the contents of the bottle onto the rag. The figure is now only an arms length away from you.
  
  > turn around
  A chill run down your spine and goose-pimples blossom on the flesh of your arms and legs, you turn around. Your eyes fall on the large figure of a man in the middle of the trail. Your blood runs cold and your heart-rate skyrockets. You cannot see the man's face as he is silhouetted in the moon-light; your scrambling in the opposite direction of the man, you try to get up and run but you stumble, your injured ankle throbbing with pain. You recover, the adrenaline pumping through your veins pushes you forward though you stumble again, this time you're unable to get back onto your feet and are forced to crawl. As you crawl through the dirt and decaying leaves as fast as you can your legs are suddenly pulled out from under you and you've fallen flat on the ground. Your aggressor has grabbed your leg and is pulling you through the dirt and grime towards them.
  
  > fight back
  You thrash about and dig your heels into the ground, one hand trying to pull your scarf away from your neck and the other searching the ground around you for some sort of weapon as you're dragged off the path and into the woods. In your furious attempt to fight back against your aggressor your hand brushes against a large stick. Your heart races as you try to grab the stick, your fingers wrapping around the stick. You glance up at your aggressor and in a vain attempt at freeing yourself you madly swing the stick at his legs and whatever else you can reach. Your stick doesn't do anything other than irritate the man, he pulls the stick out of your grasp and throws it away. He gives a particularly hard tug to your scarff, flinging you back further and gives you a swift kick to the head. The combined pain and the lack of oxygen makes your head spin and your vision go dark.
  
  > Black out
  You lie on the cold, wet forest floor, unconscious and completely vulnerable. Your aggressor stands over you.
  
  The man had been waiting in the forest that night, waiting and watching. Nothing more, nothing less. Simply lurking. He hadn't truly decided just yet whether or not he'd really kill anyone tonight. A couple joggers and an elderly couple had passed by before you, though they didn't catch his fancy like you did. Alone, quite possibly late for dinner, and careless in the dark wooded park, you were perfect. When he had made a unintentionally loud noise, a simple snap of a branch under foot, your panic and reckless abandoned excited the man, and he followed after you as you fled through the dark forest. It's too bad you so hysterical and ended up tripping in your mad dash to get away, otherwise it's quite likely that you would have gotten home, possibly even getting home before your rat of a brother Jimmy ate all the crescent rolls. The man would've been satisfied with the thrill of the chase and simply let you scurry on home. But seeing you lie there, a wounded doe, well he just couldn't help himself. He was never one to leave a wounded animal to suffer.
  
  He sighs, and gently props you up against a tree. He delicately caresses your flushed cheek, admiring the how the moon makes it look as though you're glowing. Your unconscious visage makes the mans heart tight with love and adoration. He slowly unwinds your scarf, revealing the beginnings of a large angry red bruise encompassing the entirety of your neck. His fingers ghost across the mark and move on to removing the remainder of your clothing.
  
  > The man pulls out a knife
  The man reaches into the breast pocket of his coat, producing a large hunting knife.Admiring the sheen of the moon reflecting off of the sterile metal, he places it adoringly to your side. He takes a small bottle of chloroform out from his pocket along side a rag. While he goes about unscrewing the cap off the bottle, and pouring the faintly sweet-smelling translucent liquid onto the rag you are nearing consciousness.
  
  > ...
  Although you can feel your head spin distantly, an unforgiving chill over your entire body, and the discomforting damp earth beneath you, you are unable to pull yourself awake. You lay against the tree faintly shivering as the man gently bring the rag to your face. You inadvertently inhale, and find yourself falling back into a state of unconsciousness. You don't feel it when the man slowly, lovingly carves off first your left arm, then the right, placing them gently off to the side. Blood seeps viscously from the gaping holes which had previously been your arms. He moves on to hacking off your legs. He cuts them off high on your thigh; the cut on your legs take longer than your arms, but he does this all with tender, loving care. He takes a step back to admire his handy work, his clean cuts (aside from your left leg, you got a little restless during that one so the cuts a little more jagged than he would've liked). Your eyes have fallen open during your butchering and are now staring lifelessly up towards the sky. The man let's out another sigh and gets back to work, plunging the knife in above your sternum and cutting downwards, exposing your your organs. He extracts your liver and intestines. He pulls out a couple black garbage bags from one of the expansive pockets of his over coat, gingerly placing your guts inside one, and your arms and legs in their own. He gazes back down at your dismembered corpse, your lips blue and your complexion extremely pale, he decided to take your head as well. Beheading you was both more complicated and tedious than he had thought, though he gets the job done and your head in another bag. Satisfied with his haul, he hefts his bags of miscellaneous body parts of you, setting off on the long walk home he ponders all the different dishes he will make with you.