Very Strange But Very Short Stories #7

Nearby

Nearby

I have heard tell of my reputation. Eavesdropped on many an unwary conversation from atop a bus shelter, or darkened stoop. They call me the Brixton Fiend, but my scope is much, much further. Others have dubbed me the Cryptid of the South East, but I know not what that means. Only those who have yet to lay eyes upon my body foolishly attempt to describe me. 

There are none other like me in all of London. I know, for I have searched. Do you know what it’s like, to be alone? Few truly do. Those who encounter me, though - they know. As I rise up above them in the darkness, and engulf them - I can taste the absence where their hope used to sit. If you are unlucky enough to encounter me, there is no escaping it. There is no preparation. 

They say I am not not of this world - but I was here much before all of them. I was here before the bus shelters, and the stoops, and the streetlights and the roads. 

Man invented the electric light to stave me off. All urban living is a foolish attempt at human proximity. They think they are safer in larger numbers, but all they have done is give me more choice. Gone are the days of crawling through fields of wheat and hiding in barns, all for a mere farmer, his wife and a few malnourished toddlers. 

I do not eat them all. Some, I keep close to life. I keep them, secured on the upper level of an abandoned games arcade in Leicester Square. They claim to be in agony, but I can always promise them more of it. I only want someone to speak to. Someone who doesn’t collapse into a stuporous wreck the moment they gaze upon my gaping jaws. 

I cannot help what I am, anymore than man can help what he isn’t. I am nameless. I am beyond description. I am nearby.