Madness is contagious. One scream is all it takes to make people panic. One person gets frightened and panics and starts to babble or cries or screams and it gets attention. Other people begin to get frighten and they panic and babble and cry and scream. Asylums are places of waywardness and insanity. A person could go in sane and easily come out mad. Those who are mad when they go in, well, they only end up madder.
His madness was classic, a true and shining psychotic with no inhibitions. No morals, no worries, no codes to break. He’d shoot you just as soon as see you, simply because he could and he wanted to. He’d giggle inanely to himself as he watched you die, whether you were bleeding to death or your flesh was raining from the sky from a potent explosion. They found amusement in violence and gore and pain and sorrow and fear.
It was invigorating and lovely.
She adored it.
It didn’t matter that the paint was smeared down her lips or over her cheeks. That the dark sheets were stained with white make-up and there was red all over. Hairline traces of red stung and there were noises from all around: Pained gasps and surprised squeaks; stifled whimpers and bated begging.
It was all madness. They would kill together and laugh. They would watch their prey bleed and reach for one another in a rush. They ran through the violently bleak streets and chaos followed them like a kicked mutt. Panic flowed like water from their sheer presence. When they went home they reeked of gunpowder, dynamite, and blood, and glowed like kerosene fires. It was absolutely magical.
Even when he stabbed her, even when he cut her to shreds and burned her and beat her, she was too madly in love with him not to go back. She was too mad. She had caught his disease and relished the fact.
Madness is contagious. One scream is all it takes to make people panic.