She said a silent prayer for the late detective as she scurried for the gun, her ears perked to any further sounds of movement outside. The smell of blood hit her strongly as she laid her fingers on the cool metal of the revolver. Warily she lifted her head and peered about the small, dusty room, recoiling slightly as she saw the shadowed mass on the floor...and the smaller lumps surrounding it.

She gagged at the combined stimuli of scent and sight, and covered her mouth to stave off being messily and noisily sick where she stood. Don't think about it, don't look at it, breathe, breathe, breathe! she frantically told herself, trying to put the horrific scene as far from her thoughts as possible. The arrangement of the pieces seemed sloppier than the photos from the detective's office, so likely the poor man had interrupted the killer in his grisly work.

She glanced back to the doorway, and Gary's body on the other side. It made more sense now, the way he had fallen, and the lack of any sign of struggle. He'd never had a chance.

And I'll never have a chance if I don't get out of here... she thought grimly, picking the revolver up gingerly in her shaking hand and squinting at it in the gloom. She knew how to hold a gun from seeing it done on TV, or in movies. The rest of it...well...she could only hope it was as easy as the actors made it look.

Better armed against whatever lay in wait for her, she crept towards the open window quietly, glancing back towards the doorway every few steps to make sure there was nothing slipping up behind her. If she could find someway down from the window, she may be able to escape while whoever it was outside came in through the door.

Heading over to the window she saw that it was a relatively short climb up to the roof from here. There was a drainage pipe for the roof a little more than arm's length from the window made of sturdy die cast metal. On various points along the wall stripes of metal cascaded over the pipe and it was these that had been drilled into the wall keeping the pipe in place.

Judging by the relative strength of the pipe and the various strips of metal crossing the pipe making up a plethora of hand holds and foot holds the climb down looked easy enough and probably fairly routine with those accustom to climbing.

For a brief moment she thought of acrobats on a trapeze though this was not nearly as high being only two stories up. She was unable to see the street from here though, the fog was that thick, and there had been one more thing that had captured her attention, the window sill had something on it. Blood, or at least it looked like blood from a foot print perhaps. No it was wrong for that. It appeared to be facing in, not out, if indeed it was a footprint at all though no one came in by it, she would have seen them, heard them or both ... from her vantage here on the second floor she could see all of the dimly light floor before her and there was only the former office here on the second and nothing looked out of place by her reckoning.

One hand clenching the gun firmly, she leaned out the window to survey the area. She was relieved to see the condition of the pipework around the window, relatively certain she could climb them if it became necessary. The only question was, should she climb up, or down? Down, and she could run as soon as her feet hit the cobbles, and try to lose her pursuer in the fog, should someone chase her. Up, and she'd be moving in an unexpected direction, and giving herself a better vantage point...at the cost of potentially trapping herself, if there was no other way down.

Then Anne's gaze lighted on the bloody footprint, and her heart nearly stopped in her chest. He's in here with me! was her first panicked thought...until a moment's reflection assured her there was no way anyone could have snuck in with her only a few feet away. Perhaps this was the way the killer had entered to murder whoever was in pieces on the floor behind her...in which case they obviously knew of this path, and could be climbing towards her even now! She was quickly running out of options.

Panicking she leaned out the window again, staring down and listening intently for the sounds of anyone trying to climb the metalwork. Fearfully, she glanced back at the doorway, listening for the creaky step on the stairs. This won't work at all! she whimpered in her mind, trapped between two paths she couldn't be sure were safe. With little choice left, she slid out the window as best she could and tucked the revolver in her blouse, hooking the cool metal through her simple white bra and giving her goosepimples from the chill. Her hands now free she grabbed hold of the pipe and tried to climb upward towards the roof as quietly as she could manage, pausing at times to look and listen below her for any signs of pursuit.

Upward she climbed her hands embracing the cold metal pipe and if not for her gloves the metal may have been too cold to bare. There were no sounds from inside though, no creek from the stairs as weight was put on it and the only sound in the streets she heard had been the sound of a dog barking somewhere in the distance.

Her fingers curled around the edge of the roof and it was then that it happened. Hands unexpectedly shot down towards her and would have frightened her off of her perch on the pipe had she not been surprised.

Gripped by the front of her coat something yanked her up from her perch with great strength to dump her on the roof. Not an immediate concern of hers there were bloody footprints her on the roof and near the edge of it was a bloody knife.

There, before her was a large man adorned in a black coat, his collar turned upward to conceal his neck while a wide brimmed hat adorned his head concealing his features in shadow. The man was smiling at her as he dropped her towards the roof and prepared to pounce upon her with nothing but his black gloved hands.

"Such a lovely catch, so hard to acquire ..." he mumbled in a low tone as he approached, the words utter lowly and barely audible as the larger man closed in on her ...

She was breathing heavy from the strain of the accent, her fingers aching from the unaccustomed workout of pulling her full weight (such as it was) upward along the building's facade. She let out a sigh of relief as she finally felt the edge of the roof, only to have the sound turn into a shriek as hands appeared out of the fog and grabbed her coat, jerking her up onto the roof.

"Hieeeee-ngh!" her scream cut off with a grunt as she was unceremoniously dumped onto the hard roof. Her eye widened as she stared at her assailant and the evidence of his identity came clear. The bloody knife, the footprints...he had come up here after leaving in the first place!

Frantically she turned over onto her hands and knees and tried to scramble away, looking for anything to put between herself and the man. She sobbed with fear as she heard his footsteps crunch in the gravel of the roof, whimpering as he mumbled his words.

"L-leave me alone! S-s-stay away from me! H-help, s-someone help m-me! Please!" she screamed at the top of her lungs, hoping that even the two bit criminals she had seen earlier would come to her aid, or at least call the police. The gun in her bra was a cold reminder that she wasn't quite defenseless, but she didn't want to have to fight at all if she could help it.

The only thing that her eye readily fell upon was a chimney of brick about ten feet from her position but she judged that she would not make it that far as his large frame loomed over her. No response to her initial cries for aid though she recalled the low life's moving away from the sound of earlier screams.

Had any of those gone to the authorities? If they had then they had not arrived by now but seeing that the station she had been guided to by the begger was a few minutes back that was not a huge surprise seeing that even if someone left immediately to get them then they were still on their way back, and then they would have to pinpoint the warehouse in the fog and even then figure out that she was on the roof. No, it became safe to assume that she was on her own her at least for the next few minutes.

A thick forearm came across the small of her back and with the mamoth weight behind it she felt herself being pinned down to the roof. A meaty hand began to caress the right side of her body rubbing against her ribcage.

"Mmm ... yes, yes, I love it when you stutter. It's so cute."

She could feel the hard planes of his body poking her against the ass as she was groped. The only advantage here was that her assailant didn't seem or possibly didn't care, that she was in fact armed.

The hand against her ribs sank lower, fingers squirming beneath her body as they headed towards the front of her pants, his fingers digging beneath the a little as he groaned out virtually into her right ear as he was partially leaning over her shoulder there.

She might have gotten a better look at him then or even seen him out of her peripheral vision had it not been for the fact that she was blind on that side.

She felt every jolt of her knees and palms scraping against the gravel roofing as she scrambled away, wincing at each barely muted bolt of pain. She had to believe someone would be getting the police or she'd completely give in to despair. Just hold out until they get here... she consoled herself, glancing fearfully over her shoulder at her pursuer.

"Haagh! G-get off of m-me!" she squealed as his arm dug into her back, forcing her down against the hard surface beneath her. She flailed and kicked her feet backwards, trying to get a boot up between his legs, to push his shins away, anything to get him off of her. She went rigid with shock and horror as she felt his hand run along the side of her body, feeling the thick lines of his fingers rubbing across the covered ridges of her scars. She bucked wildly, throwing all of her admittedly meager strength against him, trying to push him off of her.

"N-no! S-stop! P-please!!!" she screamed again, her voice strained from the volume of her screaming. His muttered taunting only served to make her fight harder, trying to jerk her head back and smash him in the nose. At the shifting of his hand down under her stomach, she bucked downward instead, trying to grind his fingers into the gravel and dissuade him. At this point she cared little about anything but getting this beast of a man off of her and getting away....and if she had the chance, she'd gladly put a bullet in him.

Fighting wildly beneath him she fhe ound that he was far stronger than she or was it the mere fact that he outweighed her heavily and so had been tough to shrug off. She could feel his fingers against her scars as they tried to creep lower still but she made that task difficult for him as she trapped his hand beneath her to the roof.

The fingers still breezed against her flesh though where they could touch anyway near her pussy just a hair short of it actually. She could hear him breathing heavily as she squirmed beneath him, the flared erection beneath his pants pulsing as it danced against her.

His other hand came off of her back figuring that he had enough weight on her to keep her pinned down with it alone his other hand rounded her face. She could see a nasty scar on his left forearm as it reached around her to grab at her by the throat and jerk her head up.

Fingers were digging into her neck as if the man was trying to suffocate her even as his bulk rocked against her backside. "Shut up!" He snarled this into her ear followed by an 'ooph' as his nose was smacked by her head.

His weight shift enough off of her as he rolled to the side, blood streaming from it and dribbling onto the roof as she hear a loud crunching sound at the impact that her head made with it. "BITCH!" he snarled as the hand around her neck retracted to his nose as if by instinct.

She whimpered breathlessly beneath the massive bulk of her assailant, squirming and kicking futilely. She shrieked as she felt his fingertips brushing over her lower belly, desperately trying to crush his hand against the roof to keep it from reaching any further. Her stomach clenched in revulsion at the feeling of his member hard against her rear.

She gasped and ineffectively tried to bite at the hand reaching around her face, only to choke and gag as the strong fingers wrapped around her throat. She wheezed in pain and horror as he bent her up and backward, then came her moment, her head finding his nose as she jerked backward. She sucked in a ragged breath as the man rolled to the side, and tried to ignore his blood splattering against her back.

Now, shoot him now! she screamed internally, ripping her own blouse open in her haste to free the revolver. Not trusting herself to stand, or aim effectively in her panic, she rolled onto her side, towards her stunned attacker. She tried to wriggle under his guard, between his arms, almost like a lover entering an embrace. Once she was as close as she could get, she pressed the hard muzzle of the gun into his sternum and frantically pulled the trigger as fast as she could, not intending to stop until the gun was out of bullets.

She acted with as much speed as she could muster ripping the revolver from her blouse as readily as possible. It had been ideal for her anyway that the weapon had no safeties, in this age it seemed less of an issue.

But as she rolled close enough to smell his rank breath she pressed the barrel of the revolver against him and pulled the trigger. CLICK. He was fast, damn fast for the second that the weapon grazed his chest he seemed to react with the haste of a viper striking prey.

His left hand came up toward the weapon but he made no attempt to deflect the weapon away from him which would have likely gotten him shot at the least or killed. Rather his gloved hand moved towards the hammer of the gun sliding between it and the firing mechanism, letting out a crudling howl of pain as the hammer came down on his hand the pain beat being shot by far.

His right hand came up to hit her forearm considering that it would have been easier for her to move the revolver or jerk it away. It was smaller anyway and harder to hit anyway, his hopes had been to hit her hand and dislodge the weapon from her grasp.

At this range she could see that his black coat, unbuttoned in the front, had been opened at the front revealing a dark shirt beneath. She could see some of his features as they struggled, just enough ... was it ... could it be ...

Yes, it made sense now. The bulk, the scar on his arm and sailors were known to have decent climbing skills in these older vessels. Could it be Lewis, the baker? Had she heard him following her after she left the butcher's shop? Had he turned away when they came across someone unexpectedly? Had he overheard her destination to the police station? Had he waited and followed her from there? Had he climbed up to the roof figuring that he would either get the drop on her from behind by entering the window? Had he baited her in coming back?

A plethora of questions. There was the fact that he had fingered Leather Apron as the culprit too to consider.

Why didn't it fire?! she screamed silently, sobbing as she felt his hand grab at the gun. His howl of pain was somewhat comforting, as she realized exactly what he had done. She saw his right hand coming to knock the gun from her hand and curled inward around her arm, taking the blow to her shoulder and back instead, grunting from the impact but refusing to release her only advantage.

Frenzied by adrenaline and raw, animal fear, Anne savagely struck at the man with her knees, trying to hit his stomach, his groin, anything to hurt him, make him distracted. She tried her most effective weapon so far again, and headbutted his arm as hard as she could, trying to bash it away from the gun. All the while she tried to twist the revolver closer to his chest, to grind the metal muzzle into his shirt and tangle it there, make it harder to remove.

It struck her in the life or death struggle that she recognized that scarred arm, the dark shirt under the coat. The baker, Lewis?! She had been face to face with the murderer already! Fury started to seep into the fear as she realized how long the man had been stalking her, harrowing her through the fog, hunting her like an animal...and killing the detective. How many others had he tortured, mutilated, killed? And now he wanted her?

"No no no no no! No more, not me, not like this!" she screamed with her head curled against his chest, shielding the gun from his grasp as best she could. Rage and terror coursing through her veins, she tried to bite the hand blocking the hammer of the gun, tried to pull it away and finish this monster for good.

A grunt had been her reward as knees came up to smash into him and while he had been fighting off the flood of pain he very well knew what it would mean to fail here. He endured it all as best as he could though he had been mildly surprised when she turned into his blow determined to hold onto the gun, just as he had been determined to get rid of it and make it a non factor here.

Jack ... Lewis ... whomever ... knew that she was no match for his raw physical strength and his weight alone could overpower her with ease. They ensued a struggle for the gun, her head on his chest made in difficult for him to use his right to grip the weapon and turn it aside or wrestle it from her grasp.

He tried nonetheless reaching beneath her head then up towards the gun that had been pressed up against him. He leaned forward into the barrel to prevent her from turning it into his chest. His left shoulder pressing against it as he grasped her right forearm in an effort to move her arm away and thus the gun.

Blood splattered over his face, his broken nose still gushing out his own ichor as his meaty fingers closed around her forearm though it had been then that he felt the painful sting of teeth baring down on his hand. He hollored through clenched teeth and loosened his grasp on her just a little, pain over taking him as he acted instinctively, his hand blocking the hammer of the gun slid aside just enough in an effort to shake her clenching mouth free of his appendage.

"You'll pay for that bitch!" He snarled as he jerked back his right hand out from under her intent on back handing her. He was quick about it but in the time that it would take him to reposition his arm then to lash out at her she had time to squeeze the trigger of the revolver again.

This time there was no click but the sound of a roar. Through her single eye she could see the flash at the end of the muzzle and here her assailant howl in pain, the recoil of the gun caused her arm to jerk backwards and Lewis' body to fling slightly away from here.

He came down on his side then rolled falling off of the roof where she could hear his body smack against the cobble stone street somewhere below ...

Her muscles screamed from the strain of holding her position, of fighting back against the much larger man trying to break her grip on the gun, to pull her away from his chest. Tenaciously, she clung to him like a tick, enduring his blows and foul breath with the frenzied strength of the utterly terrified. She knew if he managed to wrestle the gun from her it was over for her. There was no way she could fight him off without it, and escape seemed about as likely.

Fresh panic tore through her as she felt his arm slide up beneath her head, slowly inching up towards her blocking arm. She whimpered and pushed back as he shouldered her away from himself, giving him more leverage to pull her arm away. Then, feeling the warm blood from his face spattering on the back of her neck, she saw her chance. His effort to get under her guard had exposed his hand grabbing the gun! With a pitiful, half-sobbing growl she struck, biting down on the meat of his hand as hard as she could, determined to tear a chunk off of him if he refused to let go.

But let go he did, with a holler of pain and an expletive for her benefit. She flinched as she felt the fury shake the larger man, felt him rear back to really give her a wallop. Then, the hammer finally fell. With the gun cradled into the protective curl of her body, the report was like holding a grenade to her chest, the butt of the gun ramming back into her with the force of a horse's kick to her breastbone. Her eye was almost blinded by the muzzle flash, and her ears rang with the ferocity of the enclosed blast.

As much as the shot hurt her, it did far worse to her assailant, ripping him away from her and sending him skidding off the gravel roof and plummeting to the ground below. Not breathing, not thinking, she waited until she finally heard the -thud- of impact. Shot in the chest, and fallen from a three story building...surely he was dead....surely he was...

Groaning in pain from the kick of the gun, Anne forced herself to roll onto her hands and knees, gun cradled to her bared chest gingerly. She made herself crawl to the edge of the roof, commanded her aching muscles to pull her to where she could see her attacker, make sure he was dead. She'd seen far too many horror movies to just accept that she was safe just yet.

With the gravel crunching beneath her she moved towards the edge of the roof. The damn fog made it impossible to see much on the street level save for a few close by globes that shed a little light. But the firing of the gun did make a sound, one that would surely be reported right?

And the flash of the gun would pin point her location if anyone was close enough to her. Panting softly from the struggle as she gazed at the street below looking for his assailant. She did not see one though she could hear the foot steps of others at a running pace drawing closer.

The cavalry it seemed had arrived ...

Police had sealed off the crime scene, the girl was Alice McKenzie she was possibly a prostitute, and was murdered at about 12:40 a.m. on Wednesday 17 July 1889 in Castle Alley, Whitechapel. Like most of the previous murders, her left carotid artery was severed from left to right and there were wounds on her abdomen. However, her wounds were not as deep as in previous murders, and a shorter blade was used. Police Commissioner Monro and one of the pathologists examining the body, Dr Bond, believed this to be a Ripper murder, though another of the pathologists, Dr Phillips, and Robert Anderson disagreed, as did Abberline.

But it was all wrong. It was 1888, October 16th the day that the From Hell letter reached Mr. Lusk. Alice was killed about half a year later. And what of the other victims in between? And three murders back to back when there were the double murders but for the most part they were singular events.

Anne had been checked out by a physician and the roof had been investigated. The murder weapon had be recover but the Ripper was gone. There was blood in the streets where he impacted and some blood that trailed off into the fog that others followed.

For now, however, they had dealt with making sure Anne was alright and getting her account of what transpired here. Like the police of her day they ran over it a few times before releasing her with an armed escort, two officers this time.

Her gun was taken off her and her safety assured as the two men escorted her back to Mr. Lusk's office. The baker? Lewis? It seemed hard for them to believe though made a degree of sense but for the most part her escorts walked in silence keeping an eye out for anything amiss in the restricted visualblity of the fog.

But they reached the office without further incident as they expected a guy with a bullet in his shoulder had more things to worry about at this stage then Anne. There were the reprecussions of the fact that he was fingered as the Ripper, and even if he wasn't he was still a murderer and a dangerous individual.

So revenge wouldn't be on the fore of his mind even if he could shrug off the pain of a bullet wound and a naty fall to the street below.

She spent the long minutes waiting for the police to reach her on the roof huddled at the edge, staring down at the spot she believed the baker/murderer had fallen. She wasn't sure how she was supposed to feel...relieved? Distraught? Afraid? She didn't feel anything anymore...just numb. The adrenaline had left her system and taken the strength it had given her with it, along with the maddening fear that spurred it on. It was like she was outside of herself, watching the events unfold around her.

She gave no resistance to the officers who helped her down from the roof, and only took a moment to unlock the deathgrip her fingers had on the revolver. She barely had the presence of mind to hold her torn bodice shut before any of the men saw more than she wanted, scars and otherwise. Finally though, they managed to get her to the street, and to the care of a doctor on the scene, who gently examined her and treated her bruises and abrasions. After a few minutes observation, he declared her healthy enough, considering the ordeal she'd been through, and confirmed that she was suffering from a nervous breakdown(they called in shock in her time) in the wake of the extreme terror.

With her thoughts free of distracting factors like emotions or murderous bakers, she had plenty of time to consider the peculiarity of the situation. Nothing was adding up at all. The murders were jumbled together, the method and location was different, even the suspect was a complete unknown in modern theories. Something was very wrong here...

A brief spike of panic punctured her bubble of apathy when she saw that Lewis had in fact survived the gunshot and the fall. He's still alive and out there! she screamed internally, nearly collapsing in the street. Only the presence of her two armed escorts spared her a complete panic attack, each keeping a hand on her elbow or back to catch her in case she showed signs of another fit.

And so it was in this thoroughly bedraggled state that she found herself once again at the office of George Lusk, miserable and huddled against the chill fog as she slowly climbed the steps to his door and knocked. I want to go home... a small, weary voice whimpered in her mind, ...and I don't even have one to go to....