murder aesthetic

Milo was blinded for a moment, then his arm was being twisted, and alarm filled his body. He scrubbed at his face quickly and reached out to catch Vincenzo around the waist again- for some reason, despite everything, not wanting him to fall. This response gave him all sorts of bad, bad feelings and implied information about Vincenzo. He didn't like it.

"I'm not trying to, it's-" Milo snapped, but in a tone clearly very different than his previous anger. He sucked in a shaky breath. "I don't want to, okay? You clearly can't consent like this, any of it would be mixed with a need to distract me or convince me to not hurt you. There's no fucking pedestal. I think you're attractive, yes, it doesn't automatically mean forcing myself on you sounds good to me. I'm not holding myself back from that, I'm just flustered, and that's literally as far as it goes."

"You don't like or understand morals, or anyone being high and mighty. I get it. It isn't just that, though. I'm not better, sure, I don't care about you thinking or not thinking that. I'm doing my shitty fucking thing, yeah. This isn't part of it. I might be awful, sick, but at least I've been honest about where this is all going, haven't I?"

Milo slowly collected his thoughts, reordered things to deal with the way this was going. He was fine with being a monster, he'd gotten over that as a child, there was just something desperate in him that wanted, needed, it to be a straightforward, self aware version. He couldn't cope with anything else.

He was quiet in response to Vincenzo's harsh words at first, just respectfully allowing him get it out, but didn't let go of him. His fae energy perked up a bit at the strong magic flowing out, and he bit his lip.

"Okay, we can do that," Milo agreed, nodding. It was far too late for any saving now, wasn't it? Everything felt wrong, and Vincenzo was painfully complicated. Very, very bad things must have happened to this person. Milo recognized it because he was the same, it was too familiar, grated on him terribly and made him cringe.

It didn't make what Vincenzo did okay. There had been stalking, and what he'd taken in couldn't be mistaken for anywhere near good or justifiable, sad backstory or not. But then… then there was this.

Milo wasn't someone with black and white morality. Not in the slightest. He just tried to get rid of his awful, be selfish, with those who seemed to refuse to stop. Vincenzo was one of those people, and yet, everything about him was still… aw, fuck.

He was beautiful, and Milo wanted to hurt him, but he also wanted to hold him close and speak in gentle tones. This felt like the creeping signs of an unhealthy addiction, one that he shouldn't be trusted with. He swallowed, and released Vincenzo carefully, making sure his sliding to the ground wasn't rough. Milo took a step back.

He went and fetched a different knife, sharper and more precise. He tried not to let anything show on his face, for once glad a stony look was his natural state. He'd planned to draw this out. He still wanted to. Milo wasn't kind, quick, or merciful. He enjoyed what he did.

Even so. He was going to kill Vincenzo, and treat it in a way he'd never treated this before. This was too much. It needed to end before they really couldn't go back.

Milo didn't have even a little pride in him. No true regret for his actions, but there weren't any bursting feelings of satisfaction or anticipation, either. He just wanted to be done, even when his fingers twitched at his sides, trying to scratch an itch that was long out of his reach.

He met Vincenzo's gaze once again. He was going to look him in the eye while finishing this. All of this hadn't meant nothing, Milo wouldn't forget about it, and he was going to be as forgiving as possible while still not condoning all the awful. This was the only way he knew how to do that.

He couched down, level with Vincenzo. Spent another quiet few minutes in his presence, taking it in, trying not to feel the disappointment he'd known would sink in. Making it last now wouldn't be any better, unfortunately.

He wanted to say a number of ridiculous things. It was nice meeting you, I enjoyed our time together, I'll remember… and as well as being weird and cheesy, it would be pretty fucking garbage behavior from him, so he resisted the urge. Nobody wanted to hear that shit from their murderer, or anyone in general who just put them through a great deal of physical and emotional pain.

He sighed, instead, expression fully soft.

"Goodbye, Vincenzo."

Without any further bravado, he brought up his knife, then buried it in his victim's heart.

Soon, the sound of faint breathing was only coming from him. He was alone. He didn't move after that, not for a good while. Eventually, he had to get on with it, break the atmosphere of grieving. Him wallowing in such a thing was already tasteless enough.

After doing his usual check for any dangerous traces of himself he could've left, Milo fixed himself up a bit, then got together all of his things. He looked out the window. It was still dark, he had plenty of time. He settled into routine, a bit of spark coming back to him, looking forward to giving Vincenzo a proper setup.

The police would have a field day with this, as it was clearly his work, but different. The body nowhere near as mutilated as it could've been, and the death was deliberately fast. Hopefully this wasn't what would finally fuck him over- that'd probably make the man whose blood he had on his hands happy, though, wouldn't it? He smiled at that.

He wasn't going to fucking prison. It would be hell, and he'd never get out, no matter how progressive and focused on rehabilitation Manta Carlos claimed to be. There was nothing like that in his future, they'd have to pry the knife from his cold, dead hands first. Just like he did with other monsters. It was nothing if not poetic- in a very snarky manner.

He set up the display of Vincenzo's corpse up around the entrance of the Underground, since any deeper and it'd have a chance of being missed or outright ignored. None of the regulars of that part of the city wanted his activities given any more attention and encouragement, and he knew that. This place was relevant for Vincenzo, though, and therefore it was a necessary setting. It was Milo's way of things, being artistic while also making sure to offer a nice, mocking, 'fuck you' gesture to the police.

He found a nice, clean, recently empty small building space that claimed to be for rent, so he obliged. It had big, clear windows, where nothing could be unnoticed even from a distance. He pinned up pictures, documents, and little notes on all the empty wall space. It was a lot, and seeing it all spread out and forcing it to be looked at felt fulfilling. Vincenzo made for a lovely masterpiece of horrors.

Milo brought in a chair and posed Vincenzo in it, making sure he seemed all too comfortable with this and his own crimes, just like in life. As an afterthought, Milo cleaned him up a bit too, while making no effort to hide the fatal stab wound.

Vincenzo looked angelic in the worst of ways.

He was perfect.