Hot off the press in New York came word of another child murder committed by an anonymous perpetrator. After a recent spree that left 5 children dead, the latest victim was a young girl named Kora Miller. Her body was found by a fisherman who spotted the body in a narrow grave on the shoreline. She had marks around her neck implicating that the killer had strangled the life out of her. The other victims had also been young girls ranging from the ages of 12-14. The girls were speculated to have been lured prior to their deaths as it was given, they had vanished oftentimes while returning home from school.

Barry Smith awoke one Monday morning having slept in his clothes from yesterday. Yawning, Barry rubbed the sleep from his eyes before stretching his arms. He got up from his bed and walked towards his cabinet; pulling a drawer open, he pulled out a large book on which it said "Memories." He chuckled deeply to himself about the contents of the book. Opening it revealed a few photos of the girls described as being the victims of the city's serial killer. He reached into his shirt pocket producing a picture of Kora. He was given a missing person flyer when he was buying groceries at the store.

"Welcome to your new home, Kora," he laughed. He flipped the photo over and licked it before pressing it on a blank page of the memory book. From there, he went about his daily life: he'd go to his favorite table at the city bar and drink to his heart's content when the news about his killings blared out on the television. He was laughing in a decidedly loud tone of voice. This earned him some looks of disgust from other customers. Two large men in black leather coats, greased back hair, and tattoos.

"You got a problem, sick fuck?" one of the men yelled.

Barry scoffed at the two men. "I'm just here havin' a good time. I do not appreciate you two bozos coming in and killing my buzz!"

The man gritted his teeth. "Well, we do not appreciate you laughin' your ass off at some poor girly's death!"

Barry ignored the two men and reached for his cup. The second tattooed man smacked it out of his hand, and it shattered on the floor. Barry looked at the two men in irritation. "What the fuck, guys!?"

"Better get the fuck out of this bar if ya know what's good for ya," the first man said.

Barry sighed. "Alright, alright, the message is clear." He slowly got up from his seat. "Just let me pay the tab, and I'll be on my…"

He suddenly took a shard of the broken glass and attacked the second crony in savage fashion. He slit his throat and kicked him squarely in his groin. The other man initially had little time to react, but he became unfazed and tackled the glass shard out of Barry's hand. He held him firmly in a neck hold. "Now you die, son of a whore!"

Barry was losing consciousness quickly from the larger man's grip. His vessels were rupturing in his eyes making them bloodshot. With his face turning a purple hue, Barry impulsively bites his assailant's arm. The man yelped and released his grip of him. Barry scurried for the door only to get knocked back down by a chair.

More men had come to lay a beatdown on him. He was overpowered and outnumbered. Like a pack of wolves, they attacked him breaking him down slowly. One stomped on his ribs until they cracked underneath his weight. Two others pulled his arms up and firmly held onto him so two men could take turns kicking him repeatedly in his stomach. They left him with a couple of broken ribs and a swollen over eye and missing teeth. To add insult to injury, one of the men picked him up by the seat of his pants and flung him out the door.

"And stay out!"

Barry found himself despondent, lying on the street with broken body parts. The pain was still unbearable; he was blacking out quickly. The blackness was filling his sights: before fainting, he could've sworn that he saw a tall woman with a hat walking towards him.

Upon awaking, Barry found himself in the woods. A few trailers were surrounding him with a bonfire in the center of it all. He looked down and saw that bandages were wrapped around his wounded body. He was slowly taking his surroundings in when he heard someone speak up.

"Good. You're awake now."

He turned around with a jolt. It was that same woman he saw prior to falling unconscious. With her were an older man and a bespectacled one. The woman had this weird appeal working for her: she was somewhat reminiscent of those women he's heard about from the Roaring Twenties – those flappers if he remembered correctly from his high school days – she was a lively woman, barefoot, and wearing a silk top-hat. She had a small smile on her face.

"Who the fuck are you guys?" Barry finally asked.

"Well, that's an insensitive thing to say after I saved your life," she pouted. She had her arms crossed to further the notion that she was offended. She crouched down at the bonfire and watched the flames dance around. "I'm Rose. Rose the Hat, by the way. The old man is Grampa Flick and the glasses man is Walnut."

"Well, I guess that's going too far," Barry acknowledged. He looked at the two men gathered around the fire as well. They shot daggers towards him, intimidating him. Rose held up her hand without looking up from the fire. They took the hint and eased their tension.

"Tell me more about that girl you killed."

Barry's eyes widened in shock. He was convinced that he was completely alone when he lured her into his car; tortured her for hours while blissfully aware that her parents were worried sick about her whereabouts. How he stepped on her body over and over making sure that her final moments were the most excruciating among doing other unsightly things to her before squeezing the last ounce of life within her with his bare hands. And yet, somehow these people somehow discovered his sins. Should he try to kill them all here and then so they wouldn't try to send him to the cops?

"Barry, you're thinking too hard on this," Rose said at last.

"I didn't even introduce myself yet," Barry said, "how did…"

She held her hand up again and walked towards him. He was still sore from his beatdown, but he tried to fend for himself under the assumption that she would do something funny to him. However, said trick never arose. Rose chuckled a bit at the confused man.

"We won't call the police," she said, "We feel that you can help us."

"How?" Barry inquired. Clearly, this bitch was crazier than he was he thought.

Rose leaned down looking at him directly in the face. "What if I were to tell you that I knew a way you could eat well and live a little longer?"

Barry's curiosity peaked. After some time, recuperating, Barry felt well enough to share some of his life story. He had a pretty bad upbringing with a father who beat him; a mother who up and left him one day to deal with his demon of a father. When he turned 16 was where it became more deplorable. He kidnapped and raped two girls before killing them and discarding their bodies. He was captured and spent a larger portion of his teenage life in juvenile detention. Upon getting out for "good behavior," he began to lure other victims.

"That's most of it," Barry said in disinterest, "I just hate children. Those little bastards have no idea what it's like to have to struggle to survive as I did. Self-absorbed, foolish, miserable miscreants."

Rose and the others tentatively listened. They were unaffected by the story Barry had told them. Which made sense because they had long forfeited their humanity for the sake of longevity. Barry felt somewhat happy to share his plights with the group. He could've come to see them as a family had it not been for his inability to understand emotions like "love" or "affection," but nevertheless, he was satisfied.

"So, Rose," Barry began, "tell me how you came up with this live forever bullshit?"

"I am over 100 years old and Grampa Flick and Walnut were two men I met during some of the nation's major events." She drew a cigarette out of her mouth and inhaled deeply. "Some children are more special than others. They have a special power that seldom possesses."

She blew the smoke into Barry's face making him cough. "It's called steam."

"Steam?" Barry asked tilting his head in curiosity.

"Take this," she said. She handed him a canister; he looked at it in curiosity and opened it. The steam began to come out through the holes in the lid. He was unsure of what to do next. "Breathe in," she said.

Barry did as he was told. He was suddenly keeled over in pain. His body was rapidly contorting and spasming. What the hell was this substance? Was what Rose gave him a type of poison and he was now being choked to death? But at the same time, he never felt more alive than he did. He heard Grampa Flick say some cryptic words about these beings known as the True Knots and Rose and Walnut chanting. Whatever drug he was on, he was flying high, convinced that nothing could take him down.

Rose smiled after the ritual ended. "And you can live as long as you can. But we need you to locate children for us." She dropped her hands to the side. "I'm afraid a lot of pain will play a part in acquiring more steam."

Barry could care less about torturing children as that was something he was already doing long before Rose came to him with the option. A wicked smile spread across his face. If it meant that he would become even more powerful than he could've hoped for, it was worth breaking a few eggs to make an omelet, or in this case, kill a few kids to become immortal.

"I'm in."