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People surrounded the dead shade, laid in the snow, form drifting between reality and not. Murmurs of “It is alive?” “It might be a trick.” wafted through the crowd until the man at the front spoke up.
“Yup, they're dead alright.” He mused, tucking his hair behind him as he sat, crouching in front of the shadow of a figure.
One man approached. Younger. “Did you kill it?”
“No. The cold probably got ‘em. Might've been ill.” The older mused in that same monotone voice, tinted with Scandinavian roots and deeply set in the bottom of his chest, giving it a rumble.
“Well… Good either way.” The younger grinned to his pals.
“...Good?” The man in the front replied, his voice now dripping with concealed anger.
“W-well, yeah. Whether you got it or the cold did don't really matter none.” He replied hesitantly before continuing. “Either way, it's one less devil to worry about snapping us off the streets.”
“Vicious monster, I hope it suffered…” One woman spoke up.
“Just what it deserves.” Another mused in agreement.
“...’Vicious Monster’, eh?.. for… wanting to live?” The man murmured again, unmoving.
“...Ah… what?” The boy behind him turned to face him again.
“If they don't hunt… they don't eat. And if they don't eat, they die. So… are they vicious for wanting to live?” He slowly stood up, long black hair running down his back and curling to conceal his face.
“I-I guess they can't help but be vicious, then! Cruelty is in their nature! So it's only fitting for them to die a cruel death, eh? Haha!” The confidence that was in the boy’s voice before dwindled into a pulp.
“...I am… Kin to a shade, you know? It isn't much different than me.” His voice dropped slightly.
“Don't be ridiculous! You're nothing like it! Not at all!”
“No?.. far as I can tell, the only real difference between they and I is that I don't gotta hunt for my food… if I wasn't fed, I'd have to kill to keep livin’, too.” He slowly turned around, hair falling in front of his scarred face and letting his orange eye glow in the dim light of the moon, a stark reminder of what he was in this world.
“Then… maybe I’d be the one snapping you off the streets.” He leaned in closer to the young man, who was cowering in fear at this point.
He then slowly stood back up to full height, turning his attention to the whole crowd. “If seein’ this poor thing lying dead in the snow gives any of you some sick sense of pleasure… do me a favor…
And keep it to yourself.” He spat, before turning around and sitting in the snow again. The crowd, now thoroughly sure it was a bad idea to bring Damien Harvennson of all people or things to a shade’s death, all wandered off or ran their separate ways.
He was left in the cold again, watching the figure in front of him dissipate.
He felt so much less than human in that very moment.
He felt like a monster.
One of them.