The night was alive with light and sound, costumed new yorkers running around and avoiding the cake vodka vomit on the streets. Helena stuck to the sides of buildings, avoiding the commotion of the Halloween parade. The girls must have been freezing, unused to wearing so little so late in the year; she could join if she wanted. She didn?t. She had no time to waste on them, she had to ?nd Christine and fast.

It had started about a month ago, a girl hadn?t shown up on her night, or the next night, or any night. Most of the others had no illusions as to what had happened to her, though Christine had offered the idea that she won the lottery or ran off to elope with a lover and had simply neglected to tell anyone. Helena didn?t tell her when the body was found, no one should have to see a gruesome sight like that. She had retched when she saw it: the body broken and mangled, dried blood staining her naked ?esh and the ground surrounding it, eyes no longer in their place, completely vanished from the scene. The corpse could have almost been bearable if not for the smell, a rancid stink from when the corpse had released its bowels and all the ?ies that had come to s*** and lay their eggs inside of her. She turned away, unable to stay in this place any longer.

Her name was Victoria, or it had been before. She had always been warm to everyone she met, not just the customers, her smile was always so beautiful men would fall instantly in love.

It did not stop there, much as Helena prayed for it. W**** houses and corners all over had been losing women as the killer, and many imitators, ceaselessly continued to slaughter the girls. No one did a damn thing, the justice system seemed not to apply in light of the circumstances; even as every night daughters, mothers, and sisters were stolen.

“Well at least they aren?t killing just anyone.” Helena heard a man say as the police pushed onlookers away from a new body. It seemed to be the only thing the brave men in blue were willing to do.

“Yeah, good thing.” His friend agreed, “We don't have to be afraid, only them.” She scoffed and kept walking, it was too hard to look at the bodies, there were too many piling up.

She couldn?t sleep anymore, every dream ended in her death and every creak in the room was an intruder. Work was no better; every client, even her regulars, were the culprit, or they could have been. There didn?t seem to be anyone to turn to, who even cared? Eventually she couldn?t take the fear and she begged Christine to stay with her for a night or two.

A week they spent at each other?s houses, staying up with each other if one couldn?t sleep and assuring each other they were simply hearing things. In that week no body had shown up, no blood draining down the streets. Another week rolled by and Helena could feel her coworkers relax and life go back to normal. That was until a few days later when Christine failed to show up on one of her nights and the fear was instantly back. She just switched a night with one of the other women, she was just under the weather. Helena went to visit Christine, afraid to ?nd what she knew must have been true. She felt tears build behind her eyes as she stood in the empty apartment.

It was dif?cult for anyone to talk about the young woman?s disappearance, but one of her coworkers admitted to seeing her go off with a customer the other night, it seemed to be the last time anyone saw her. She ?nished up quickly that night, not taking anyone else so she could go looking for her. It was just one person in the whole Village, how could she ever ?nd her? On top of it all she had forgotten it was Halloween, everyone in New York City had conspired to confuse her with the noise and movement. She ignored that nagging voice inside her telling her she might as well give up and go home to grieve. If only she were more like Christine, she wouldn?t ever give up.

Throughout the night she searched every abandoned area she could think of, hoping he hadn?t taken her anywhere residential. She saw the body when she found herself near a line up of trash behind a convenience store, limbs splayed in unnatural directions and Christine?s beautiful brown hair covered her face. Helena ran to it and held the cold body in her arms, body glitter from the corpse rubbed off onto her as she wept. Brushing the hair away from her face she realized it wasn?t Christine, even with a cut up face and one of the eye holes bloodied and missing she could tell. It was some other girl. She set the body down as respectfully as she could, suddenly disgusted in lieu of sorrowful. She wondered why he would kill some other girl if he had already stolen Christine, could he have mistaken one of the parade goers as his target? She had to keep looking for her friend, she felt a bit guilty not doing anything about the victim, but what could she have done?

She searched the rest of the night, but by morning she ?nally had to give up, almost too tired to stand. She had been able to keep herself from crying on the way back home. When she ?nally walked into her apartment she had almost lost that control, but was surprised to ?nd Christine curled onto the couch; bruised and bloody but alive.

“Christine.” She walked slowly to her, not quite believing she was here. Christine pulled her into a hug and they stayed that way for a long while, wordlessly holding each other and feeling safe once again. “How did you escape?” Making no attempt at letting her go, despite the fact that she had disturbed the comfortable silence. She simply shook her head.

“I unchained myself and ran off when he wasn?t in the room.” Helena had wanted to hear more, but she didn?t press for it, not wanting to traumatize her.

“It?s over now.”

Not really, since he was still on the streets, but she was trying to comfort her and she needed to believe it as much as Christine.

Every news station for the next few weeks was about the investigation of a young college student murdered during the Halloween parade. NYPD was able to apprehend the disgusting criminal straightaway. Though the police never commented on it, it was clear he was the man killing all the w****s. It was too bad the girl dressed like one of them, what else could she have expected to happen?