The Roof Dwellers

I first saw them quite by accident, a casual glance skyward that would change my world forever. There were three of them, crouched along a narrow ledge three stories above street level. They blended into the grey skyline almost effortlessly, there drab clothing and pale complexions making a perfect camouflage against the urban decay of the city.

Once I had spotted them the first time it became obvious that they were everywhere and I began to wonder how I had not seen them up until this point. Always huddled in small groups of three or four they gave the unsettling appearance of homeless people who had been infused with the mentality and agility of birds. It was very disturbing to watch them wander about the highest roof and narrowest ledge with uncanny sureness of foot and absolute fearlessness in regard to altitude and the shattering drop to the busy streets below. How had I missed such an obvious display and how had everyone else for that matter?

After convincing myself that these roof dwellers were neither optical illusions nor the product of an over active imagination, I took it upon myself to attempt a closer investigation. This was not to be as easy a task as I had hoped, my fear of heights being part of the problem and the other part being there preternatural ability to be wherever I was not. Many times I would race up the stairs to the roof of a building and emerge into the cold air only to find myself alone, where moments before I had seen a group of them sitting in silent contemplation of the street below.

My first actual contact with these creatures came in fact by there doing, not my own.

I was rushing towards my car attempting to head off a parking warden about to place a ticket on my windshield when a strong hand fell roughly onto my shoulder. Before I could release the shriek that was building in my chest I felt myself hurtling upwards at a sickening speed and was not able to unclench my eyes until I felt myself being dumped onto a hard surface.

I was on a roof top in the cold evening air and standing before me one of them, the roof dwellers.

He looked at me blankly, not a trace of emotion or expression crossing his face. I rose to my feet slowly, my hand stretched out before me in a futile gesture of warding. As soon as I had fully gained my feet he began to circle me and a rasping, choking sound emerged from his throat. It took a moment to realize that he was attempting to speak to me.

“Steady” I said in a low voice as I backed away from the thing.

At closer range the differences between there species and ours were quite pronounced. There skin had a leathery toughness to it and the face seemed to be re-enforced with ridges of cartilage and bone. There skin was a sickly grey and coal black rings encircled there eyes, making them look cavernous and hollow.

“We will be watching.” it’s sandpaper voice rasped. “You will be watching us and we will be watching you.”

It held a long finger to it’s blackened lips and winked grotesquely. With blinding speed it leapt into the night air and away from my sight.

In the days that followed I began to see them even more frequently, this tribe that lived amongst the city’s aeries and perch’s, and more frequently did I notice one of there numbers watching me from high above as I went about my routine. I told no one, and no one else seemed to notice the creatures that moved along the city skyline, leaping from roof to roof and climbing along ledges with far more than human agility and speed.

I may have been capable of convincing myself I was having an episode of some sort, or even perhaps of blocking them out entirely in a single concentrated effort of denial, had I not witnessed the events which were to follow.

Upon leaving work late one evening I glanced around to see how many of my roof top shadows were in attendance, and caught a glimpse of slender white legs disappearing around a third story ledge, carried along by one of the roof denizens.

I began to fumble with my car keys, trying to force them into the lock, and trying desperately to ignore the faint muffled screams that were fluttering down on the cold night air.

I managed to open the car door as the voice gave a final pathetic yelp and was silent. I stood motionless for a moment, cursing myself for my cowardice and then cursing myself even more venomously for getting involved in what was obviously a dangerous situation.

I slammed the car door shut and made my way to the building on which the woman had been abducted. Upon gaining the roof I emerged to see a group of four roof dwellers standing in a circle around the unconscious figure of a young woman. She was bloodied and battered, her dress torn and blood seeping from a deep gash in her forehead. The four fixed there stares on me in unison, then back to the figure on the ground as one in disregard for my presence.

With quick jerking motions they drew long knives from there coats and fell upon the unconscious woman, there voices raised in a furious cawing as they plunged there knives repeatedly into the prone figure. They sat hunched around the corpse, tearing at the flesh and cutting it into smaller pieces which they stuffed into the pockets of there voluminous coats and popped into there mouths with obvious relish.

I stood frozen in horror, trying to scream but managing only desperate, croaking sounds. With a fluid motion one of the roof creatures stood and turned, moving towards me with long determined strides.

I stood immobilized with fear.

He pushed the tip of his knife firmly against my stomach and leaned in to whisper in my ear, his stench overpowering and his voice making my skin crawl.

“You watch us, we watch you.” he breathed into my ear and with a sharp tug of his teeth removed most of my earlobe, swallowing and making an exaggerated gesture of licking my blood from his lips as I screamed and ran back to street level.

Now I find myself trying desperately not to see. Trying not to notice there coming and going above street level, and trying not to hear the shrieks of horror, the desperate wails that only I seem to be cognizant of. They seem to be amused by there game of stalking and watching, both they and I knowing that at any moment they may end it with a leap from the night sky and the flash of a knife. How can I spend my remaining days knowing that we are food for an evil that dwells just above us in the cold night air?

End.

M. Stafford 2006