06 November 1888

The Pink Lotus

"I'm surprised that Jack didn't rip anyone this weekend," Mary peered at me pensively.

"He would have been spied upon by the urchins running rampant in Whitechapel, burning Guy Fawkes effigies," I studied her face for any signs that would give away her state of mind.

"You think he would have spared the little tykes?" she frowned in concentration, contemplating her next move.

"Well, when a company reports one of their child labourers missing, you can be sure that the police will leave no rock unturned," I tried to keep my face neutral as I found a weakness of hers to manipulate. "Plus, they would have had fireworks and matches so I wouldn't want to face said imps in a dark alley."

My lover had begun with the King's Gambit: sacrificing an ivory pawn in exchange for establishing control of the board. It would be bad etiquette to refuse a gambit so I lulled her into believing that I had fallen for it. The games of this era were marked with fast-paced, fearless, and bold moves. Chess masters had developed clocks with tumbling mechanisms to measure the speed of moves.

The next ivory pawn moved two squares from its original position en passant (in passing), my ebony pawn only progressing one block. I moved the pawn forward and captured her pawn. Grasping that opportunity, she captured my aggressive piece with the one that had remained stationary. I would have done the same if I were on her side of the counter.

I surrendered my queen, both rooks, and a bishop. Mary had most of my pieces next to her half of the board and looked prepared to conquer. However, my insane gambit and three weaker pieces had forced her into a corner, unable to defend. She sighed as I declared "checkmate" with a poker face.

"We've spent enough time indoors," I looked at the slowly descending sun. I didn't want her out and about when it was dark. Evergreen willows waved as the wind whispered, the water wending its way through the park, peacefully. The gas lamps would soon be alight, lighting up the streets with a golden glow.

Salt Stew Manor was nestled in a valley, the charred remains of Sweet Stew Manor perched at the top of the hill. Each time we met, I watched her walk home from this vantage point, and left only when I saw the door close behind her. I had made her promise not to accept any invitations to enter from anyone on the outside, myself included.

At night, the waves of the Thames splashed out like ink from a bottle. The water was the colour of just-boiled tar. Clouds paled the moon and frost nipped at my fingertips like hellhounds. I wasn't alone for much longer, having been joined by Ye Xing, a carpet bag in her hand. Her hair was knotted in a bun and hidden in a top hat and she wore a black suit, looking like my twin.

"Do you have everything we need?" I approved of her attire.

"Yes," her voice dropped several octaves, and this is what she would sound like if she were to be possessed by Caishen. "How do you know who the target is?"

"I attended the autopsies and in each case, the victim had anaemia. Jack would target these ladies since their low iron count makes them liable to fainting and general weakness. Who has access to this information? Their doctors and pharmacists. Once I located the chemist who held all of their records, I did a background check on the employees."

"And how will the contents of this bag stop him?" I admired her strength, hauling the heavy baggage around.

"1000 years ago, the god of wealth advised me to read Dracula by Abraham Stoker. But that book will only be published in 1897. It was easy to find his records, as he is Irish. Having contacted Sir Henry Irving at the Lyceum, I paid him to lend me our future penman for a day. Having wracked his brains for ideas and giving him a deposit to publish the book, I began our adventure."

"How do you know that Mary Jane Kelly will be his next victim?" Ye Xing followed me into the empty streets of Spitalfields.

"She is due for her monthly prescription of iron salts next week," I sighed, aware of impending death. "Miss Kelly is the only Irish immigrant from the list of such chronic patients."

"What an unlucky number," the acolyte whispered as we stopped under a tree. I scrambled up the branches and assumed my form of the nocturnal beast while she stood at the gate of 13 Miller's Court. A second later, I had carefully swooped up her and the carpet bag over the wrought metal. I set her on the ground as gently as I could before crouching beside her.

"Not bad for a first try," my smirk was replaced by a wince, "let's go".

Unhindered by skirts, Susan bounded up the stairs in my wake as I kicked down the door. Lifting up my hand as a signal, she stuffed her ears with balls of cotton wool that had been soaked with olive oil, rendering her deaf. I emitted a frequency that caused Jack to experience nausea and become dizzy. His ears bled as he dropped to the floor, remaining motionless.

My partner in vigilantism followed as I grabbed a foot of the serial killer and dragged him to the front lawn. She opened the carpet bag when I whispered "stake". In a detached voice, I informed the both of them that this sharpened piece of wood was the sole surviving remnant from the crucifix of Jesus, the rest of it having been used to kill estries (Israeli vampires).

Firmly grabbing the stake as if I were at the pottery wheel, I drove it into the chest of the ripper with such force that the hard soil around him cracked. Without a cue, the acolyte handed me a bottle of high-quality sperm oil, the blubber of the whale having cost a premium. I doused the English vampire with it, before covering him with newspaper, held in place by bricks.

"Light the match," I stepped away and let her begin the cremation. Soon, the air smelled of something sweet as well as burned paper. I transformed into a bat again and picked up Ye Xing. The pain did not tear away at me as it usually did, that's how shell-shocked I was at my method of disposing of a fellow monster.

"Miss Kelly's face had been hacked beyond all recognition with her throat severed down to the spine, and her abdomen emptied of her organs. Her uterus, kidneys, and one breast had been arranged as a pillow beneath her head. Viscera from her abdomen had been placed beside her foot, about the bed, and sections of her abdomen and thighs were on the bedside table-"

I gently lowered the newspaper of Friday evening, revealing my bride's face. "We have a wedding to get to: no ghastly talk will be entertained in this nuptial carriage."

"It doesn't say anything about the perpetrator being arrested so I wonder why you deemed now to be a safe time," Mary frowned.

"There will be copycat crimes but the true monster has been apprehended," I tried to iron out the creases in her forehead.

"Father would have told me something, you know how high up he is with the police," she looked outside the little square window, mindful of the way the world worked.

"I saw him being taken away at the scene of the crime," the lie convinced her. "Maybe the officers wanted to- deliver justice prematurely."

"That's a sensible conclusion," the clopping of hooves slowed down as we approached the kirk. I alighted and reached for Mary's hand but all that ever crossed my palm was air. Looking into the carriage, I saw the green eyes of my beloved had dilated in a way that no person alive would have. Her head lolled onto her shoulder at an impossible angle.

Panicking, I turned around and bumped into a giant. My brown eyes contracted with horror at the sight of this being. "I have no pity for a wench who betrayed her motherland."

"She did not deserve this punishment," my fangs drew blood from inside my cheek.

"My jurisdiction doesn't extend over yellow men so Mary had to die," his voice boomed in my ears.

"For what crime?" I felt my blood boil.

"The immigrants were supposed to die at Jack the Ripper's hands and you got in my way, you pesky little fly!"

I dodged a hand that was the size of a cartwheel and was about to leap at him when I felt myself being launched into the celestial kingdom of Caishen.

"LET ME AT HIM!" I was about to jump back onto Earth when He grabbed me by my collar.

"You will start a war between gods if you do something so reckless," I was pulled away from the window.

"That thing was a god?" I deflated, backing into Him willingly.

"I'm not surprised that you don't know but that's how I would look like if I were to assume my natural form on Earth," He led me to a chair. "Except for my being more handsome, that is."

"I crave revenge," I prickled at the idea that I was merciless before the British deity.

"And you will get it," Caishen promised, "at the expense of His descendant, the American deity."

"How long?" I calmed down and became more contemplative.

"A century or less," He led me to the training room. With the speed at which humanity was progressing, I would need a cutting edge to win. Memories of Mary and I surfaced so I shot them down with a harpoon until the waters of my mind ran red with fury. Whoever my next target was, wouldn't be able to pay the price that was on their head.