The monster must be stopped, but how?

Every year a celebration is held in honor of the monster’s opening day. This annual event features many festivities, including a walk and run across the bridge, which is normally unavailable to pedestrian traffic. The mayor and other dignitaries from the waterside city are always in attendance to honor the very thing that has brought life and prosperity to the area. Tens of thousands, locals and travelers, always attend the event, the vast majority blissfully unaware of the slumbering concrete crocodile beneath their feet. It is a sleep that is only temporary, as once the crowds disperse and the bridge is turned back over to vehicular traffic, the hunt begins again. People come and go, traveling back and forth across the water. Most are vacationers and some are commuters, but a few will come from afar and settle into town permanently. One of these new residents will be drawn by an opportunity of employment, eager to make a good living in this bustling locale. But eventually, this person will notice things, and begin to connect the dots. She will ask questions and attempt to delve into why the venerated monster is the site of so many apparently self-inflicted deaths. The natives will say nothing and obfuscate her queries, and some will warn her to leave the monster’s dark history alone. Some of them know all too well what happens when someone tries to thwart or expose the rapacious monster.

Sometimes the well meaning – and oblivious – try to rescue apparent “jumpers” from ending their lives on the monster’s span. Such would be saviors might grab a victim from the clutches of the monster and pull them off the edge to safety. The grateful victim is saved, but is thus deemed to have tried to do themselves in and is treated accordingly. At least they are free from the invisible grip of the monster, for now. The towering concrete and steel terror might relinquish its prey, at least temporarily, if interrupted in the process of making a kill. But other times, it does not end well for the rescuer in the moment. Sometimes they meet the same fate as the intended victim, and both are dashed to death upon the base of one of the bridge piers. However, sometimes the monster chooses a more insidious end for the interrupter, especially if said person must return again across the bridge in order to leave. It is then that the monster becomes like a lion that has had its dinner stolen away by a pack of hyenas. The rescuer, feeling good for having saved a life, now becomes the target of a beast out to eliminate its competitor.

Eventually, a crossing must be made, and it is then that the monster strikes. It arrests its victim at the highest point of the span, perhaps by means of a flat tire or engine problem. Something that will force a stop at the top of the bridge. Then the rescuer is inexplicably dragged to the edge, made to climb over and then to suffer the grisly ending planned for the intended victim. Locals are quite wise to these sorts of events, and know to never interfere with the monster’s acquisition of its prey. Even members of law enforcement respect the monster. Everyone knows that they and their loved ones will be spared from the appetite of the blood splattered structure as long as they respect it.

The monster only takes a life to further its own existence; it is not malicious nor diabolical. It only takes what is necessary, like most flesh and blood predators. The concrete and steel killer selects out the easy prey, as predators tend to do. It seizes the loner, the traveler far from home, and anyone who is separated from the larger group. Just as the wolf culls the weak and infirm from among the herds. Death comes quickly, as the monster is an efficient and practiced killer. The locals tolerate this occasional bloodshed, as they know it is a small price to pay for the prosperity brought about by the bridge.

The newcomer continues to investigate, but is warned by some of the locals. Why has the state and the city chosen to cover up and ignore the murderous monster’s killing spree? How many have died on or around the bridge? The more questions she asks, the more suspicious people become. The monster must be stopped, but how? How can something that apparently is not alive come to slay and literally taste the blood of its victims? What about the monster’s designer, builder and construction workers who actually built it? The monster’s history is obscured, and how it came to be what it is may never be known. Might the newcomer be able to stop the killings? Or might she end up selected by the monster, doomed to a gruesome end?