Sasha waved goodbye to her friends and headed for home.

Two and a half blocks, almost there. If she cut through the back alleys she'd save time. But they were dangerous.

"There are bad men out there waiting for young girls like you to make a mistake," an image of her mom appeared before her, telling her what to do as usual.

"I can defend myself, you know I can!" Sasha argued back, but her mother scoffed and vanished. Debate over before it began.

A slow moving car rolled past Sasha as she crossed the second block. Had the car stopped or been aggressive in any way she'd run. Kidnapped off the street, another warning from dear mom.

Suddenly someone shrieked, Sasha jumped in surprise.

THUD

Sasha jumped again, something landed behind her.

She spun and her eyes landed on a man lying on the ground. A vibrant red colour oozed out of his mouth, more of the same red spread out around him, and slowly crept towards her.

She had never seen so much, the dark red puddle grew larger turning into a lake.

She bent down and placed her hand on the ground, letting the warm thick red liquid run through her fingers. She watched it spread past her feet, as it broke off and formed paths down the curb.

A heavy aroma filled her nose, choking her breath.

A groan escaped the man. His eyes wide open, his cheek against the pavement, staring in Sasha's general direction. His legs bent wrong ways, one of his arms too. One of his fingers hardly attached at all.

Sasha knew she should have been scared, knew most would run away, but she wasn't, and running away from something that can't do any harm didn't make sense.

So still the man was. Lifeless, unimaginably destroyed from a simple fall. His entire body was bleeding, and the heavy metallic smell of blood was strong enough to taste.

Sasha absorbed the scene, fell in love.

It's... beautiful.