Jane of Jericho.
One day out of the year you’re just blipped into what appears to be an empty city. That’s Jericho. The city that doesn’t exist. You and a handful of others around the world. The sky feels wrong, like the mix of an evening after a storm that orange pink sunset against storm clouds. You see signs and logos on buildings from the distance but they’re just gibberish. You think you see people staring out high rise windows and shops along the sidewalks but they’re never really there.
That’s when you see her. Sometimes she wears various outfits, rare occasions she’s naked. When she talks it’s like a bad connection on a phone line or video call. Her hairs never the same color. You never can see her face. Only her mouth, red lipstick and a dark infinite void.
She’s fast. Even at different sizes, almost inhuman. Her steps reverberate in the city if she’s small enough to walk down the street. Only once did a survivor recall seeing her approach from far away only to block out the sky. The last one to be sucked up into her breathing in so close as she laid down. Next thing he knew he was back on his lawnmower in the backyard getting yelled at to “hurry his ass up.”
Sometimes she doesn’t even try to kill you. Just watches you run, hide, try to talk to her. Maybe she’ll play a bit, you’re walking through an alley trying to hide and suddenly her hand is making its way up the opposite end ready to take you as her fingers tap along the too clean asphalt. Or you’re stuck in one of the high rises with the offices that never end. Empty department stores that have huge mannequin parts that react to her presence outside like some kind of extension of her will.
Neat concepts really.