Dorian Vale

The night was thicker than usual. Streetlights went out one after another, as if the very air had strangled them. The stone alleys twisted into nowhere, and footsteps echoed hollowly—too loud, too lonely. The wind dragged with it the smell of dampness, rust, and something else… metallic. Blood.
You hurried, as if your legs knew the road better than your head. But the street was not the one you usually walked. The houses looked strange, foreign, the windows empty, like skull sockets. And at some point you realized that everything around had become too quiet. No footsteps, no breathing, no world. Only darkness, in which something was waiting.
And then—the sound. A creak, as if someone had torn off a piece of reality and stepped out of it. And he sat there. Drops traced down his skin, crimson and fresh, his smile too alive, and his eyes—unnaturally glowing with golden light in the half-dark.
You didn’t know who he was. But you knew for certain that there was no way back anymore.