He had followed the rusty old van into the middle of a farm road, just south of the casino. A man got out and walked out in front of the car, following the road in the beam of the headlights until they clicked off, blanketing him in darkness.

It was Halloween night, and laughter spread through the air of the small town. Only out here, Halloween was but a faint glimmer of orange, just visible at the edge of town. 

Jerry followed the man, trying to quietly step through the rows of corn, although each step brought forth a loud crunch. The man he followed never turned around.

Jerry knew what was at the end of the farm road. A graveyard. Not just any, but one that had been long abandoned and left to the earth. Some of the stones were as old as 1790, but most weren’t. Most were from the 1830’s, and more alarming yet, a large majority of the stones held less than a year’s gap between the two dates chiseled into them.

Jerry had looked up the history of the people buried there, because apparently, like the man he was following, he liked to spend time there. 

Some sort of outbreak had occurred in the small town, and children had apparently been the most susceptible to the disease. Although there were other theories. Perhaps a witch. Jerry liked the idea.

Perhaps a werewolf. Jerry thought that was stupid. 

But maybe Jerry liked stupid things, because he was following this strange man into a corn field and then further into a cemetery. And for what? 

Well, Jerry had trouble even thinking about why he was following the man. He did feel guilty, but not conflicted. He definitely wanted to kill the man, he just didn’t really know why. 

The man ahead of him suddenly ducked into cover.

Jerry didn’t know how he could do that, because the man was walking in the middle of the road. There was no cover.

Jerry stopped where he was, crouched halfway down in between rows of corn stalks. He could see his breath in the crisp night air. The moon was full above him, and the nearby highway had ceased to produce any sounds of traffic.

He glanced again at the moon. He laughed a bit, thinking about the theory that crazy people seem to come out and do their wacky crimes, preferably in the light of the full moon. He laughed again at the stupid theory, because he was proving it true.

He resumed his stalk.

The prey had yet to reappear. Jerry approached where the man had turned to darkness, and instead of a pentagram in the dirt, summoned to trick the man’s killer, Jerry found a black Prius. 

It was almost invisible in the shadow of the corn, and as Jerry stood looking at the tinted headlights and dark window glass, he heard a series of shallow breaths.

Jerry ducked, tiptoeing around to the other side of the car.

There, crouched silently and shaking violently, squatted the man he was following. He stared at the graves that were now nearby, nibbling ferociously at his fingernails and clutching a large, rusty, dirt-caked dagger.

Jerry followed his gaze to the cemetery.

A flashlight beam bounced over the nearest graves, and an echo of laughter erupted from the group of high school kids. 

The man shuttered, laughing quietly and shaking even more. 

The group of kids consisted of a few guys and a few girls. A good mix, Jerry thought. Makes for a fun evening. 

They were appropriately flirty, pushing lightly on each other and groups of two would skip into the dark shade of the old oak tree and reappear moments later, holding hands and laughing.

It was a fun scene, and Jerry wished that he had experienced more cemeteries in high school. Maybe things would have gone differently. He shook the thought from his head.

Then, the young lad with the only flashlight took a nearby girl by the hand, setting the light down on a nearby headstone and rushed into the dark of the woods, the girl’s laughter following behind them. 

This is when the man made his move.

He snuck, low to the ground, yet quickly, towards the group, grabbing the light from the headstone and stashing it under his coat. 

He rolled, out of sight from the kids, closer and closer, from headstone to headstone.

When he reached the first kid, a young fella, he sliced his throat and grabbed his body, laying him gently beside him as his last words gurgled from his throat. 

Jerry nodded, impressed with the militant efficiency displayed by the surprise killer.

The young man’s girlfriend called for him, and the man made his next move, standing in the moonlight and looking less like the dead kid and more like an outline of Beetlejuice. 

The man waved his arm through the air, and the girl ran to him, like a fly to a carnivorous plant. 

The man then turned and ran, dashing to an ivy covered mausoleum. 

Jerry didn’t hear her die, but he knew she did when the man reappeared, now wearing the girl’s jacket and fluttery hair, no doubt still attached to her scalp.

He now walked towards the group.

Jerry was in awe. The man, who had previously been crouched in the dirt, shaking and laughing at the very sight of the kids, now strutted in front of them, mimicking the young girl’s walk so perfectly that the other high school kids flocked to him, shocked that he had been gone so long. 

The man flicked his head back and laughed, spinning in a circle, arms extended out in front of him.

“Overdoing it,” Jerry thought. 

One of the kids asked him a question, and the man stuck the dagger into his jugular. 

“Overdoing it,” echoed back to Jerry.

The kid fell to his knees, and the man stuck his boot on his face and pulled back, slamming the dying kid into the dirt.

There were three of the high schoolers left, now running for their Prius.

Jerry stood up, still crouching out of sight behind the car. He dove into the car, wriggling quickly to get over the back seat and into the trunk.

He peeked over the seat just as the killer slammed a young girl into the hood of the Prius, entrails slapping the windshield.

The other girl grabbed at the man, but he wrapped an intestine around her throat, choking her. The remaining boy grabbed the man’s shoulders, throwing him to the side. The man groaned as the gagging girl climbed into the car.

The young man grabbed at the passenger side handle as the girl started the car. He screamed something about the broken handle, so she stopped as he climbed into the backseat. She then punched the gas, and as she did, the killer came flying through the sunroof, landing in the passenger seat of the car. 

It was without dignity that the killer died: face down on the floorboard, legs still jutting out of the sunroof, as the young man slammed his fists into his crotch, so much so that the man found the handle to the door and opened it, crawling out.

At this point, the Prius was moving at a very fast pace, over fifty miles per hour, and it felt as if the car was going to somersault as it drove over the man. 

The young girl slammed on the brakes of the car, skittering to a halt on the dirt road.

Jerry didn’t hear any words spoken.

But he did hear laughter.

Jerry peaked over the back seat at the young man who was laughing deliriously. He had picked up the dagger from the front seat where the killer had dropped it in his crotch defense.

The young man hesitated for a moment, staring at the dagger as blood ran down the serrated edge.

Then, he slit her throat. 

“Been waiting for that for a long time,” he said. “Just have someone to blame now.” He wiped the handle of the dagger, throwing it out of the window. Jerry heard it land in the rocks behind the car. 

Jerry sat up and looked out of the back window at the skid mark that used to be the killer. Jerry was supposed to kill him.

Jerry looked at the girl, slouched over the steering wheel, then at the last person alive, other than him.

Jerry had a lot of respect for the kid. He persevered. He saw both sides of murder and walked away. Besides, he couldn’t kill the kid. He just couldn’t.

Three killers for one night is more than coincidence. Jerry felt he was treading in dangerous waters. Fate was on the line and the kid needed to live.

“I hear you back there,” the kid said. “I know you saw that.”

Jerry raised his eyebrows, then pulled his hammer out from his jacket. 

“Gonna have to skin you, old man,” the kid said, opening the door and running for the dagger.

Jerry shrugged and opened the hatch to the Prius.

The kid stood in the middle of the farm road, his breath fogging in front of him and the full moon still raining light down upon the corn field. 

Jerry stood, shaking his head.

Killing ain’t what it used to be.