American Devil

Chapter 4 - A Date with a Hostage

He still remembers the first time he had seen „The Bull". His first victim had been a woman who had just gone out to buy some extra groceries. People said she had gone out too late, it had been too dark, she shouldn't have been alone. But none of it was on her. He shouldn't have killed her. He shouldn't have butchered a woman and dumped her behind the grocery store. It was all on him.

She had been the first but certainly not the last, name after name, woman after woman, all at the wrong place at the wrong time. Targets to an insane man. And this man has been evading the authorities for quite a while, has been wanted for several years now. So yeah, Kyro isn't feeling very generous. Not when he knows that his actions can prevent new names from being added to the man's victims list.

Time starts flowing faster and faster and by the time it reaches normal speed, Kyro has pulled out the knife. The driver can barely widen his eyes in fear before Kyro is stabbing it into his throat. Kyro grabs at the gun, directing it upwards as it violently goes off to the alarm of the women in the vehicle. There is no mercy in Kyro for this man, so he pulls it right back out. The blood spurts instantly, paints the inside of the car red, sprays all across the windshield and the wheel. It creates the second gruesome murder scene, he has seen today. The man gurgles for a second, fingers of one hand grasping at the wheel, while the other drops the gun instead choosing to clutch at his throat, like that can save him. It doesn't last very long.

Soon enough, the body slumps sideways into the door, lifeless, eyes still open, forever frozen in fear. Kyro grabs the steering wheel so they don't end up in an accident, thinking about what to do now. The man is dead, but the police are still after them, slowly catching up. They must have decided to finally make their move after hearing the gun shot, predictable but also at the most inconvenient time for Kyro of course.

He needs to get out of their sight first, before he can do anything. There's only one way to achieve that quickly. In the next moment, the car swerves off the road and into the forest, away from the police.

The two women in the back scream in terror at the sudden shift. "The road" becomes a jerking experience as Kyro barely manages to swerve clear of incoming trees, and drives the car through the shrubbery. So Kyro doesn't blame them, he himself would be screaming if it wasn't for the amount of adrenaline pumping right now. He can only imagine what they think is happening.

Steering a car through a forest is not an easy task, especially with the windshield all bloodied, and the audible sounds of screams dampening your focus but somehow Kyro manages to keep going. Taking the vehicle deep into the forest, the sirens grow distant, until eventually there is nothing more than the light echoing of the emergency vehicles in the distance too afraid to follow after him. A perfect opportunity to give Kyro just enough time to get rid of any evidence and deal with the women.

There's no more use for this car, letting go of the wheel and letting the car roll out of the control. He leans between the front seats and grabs the two women by the arms. They both flinch at the sudden grip and try to tear themselves away, but Kyro doesn't have time to explain, just holds on tight before teleporting them out. The car crashes loudly into a tree as the three of them reappear several feet away from it.

Marie instantly falls to her knees, shaking. She must be dizzy. Kyro's never teleported blindfolded before, but he might test it out now, just to see how it feels. Charon, on the other hand, even though she looks a bit wobbly herself, her knees buckling under her own weight, as if they will soon fail at any second.

After a second those legs strengthen and straighten with convention, she puts herself in between her daughter and where she assumes Kyro is. Kyro can respect that devotion to protecting her own. He knows that same devotion resides in him. He spares a brief thought towards Vanessa, who he knows is probably digging a hole in the floor at the office with her pacing, probably thinking up all the ways he could mess this up. He decides to hurry.

Kyro approaches the two but he steps on a branch and they both recoil in fear, Charon almost tripping backwards over her daughter who is still on the ground behind her. Charon holds her binded arms upwards looking to strike out at him if he dared move closer. He stops moving, instead opting to speak in the hopes of calming them down. "Hi. So, I'm not the guy that kidnapped you. I'm actually the one that just got you out. So, I'm not going to hurt you. But it would be really great if you would let me untie you. Then you'd be able to see and move freely. But to do that, I have to come to you. Can you nod if that is okay with you? I just want to help." He tries to gentle his voice as if he is talking to a spooked animal, which isn't too far off from the truth.

Charon hesitates, shivers, says nothing for so long that Kyro thinks she might not even let him help. But then she gives him a minuscule nod, one he would have missed had he not been watching her intently waiting for her to make a move first. Even though he has permission, he still takes his time approaching her, making his footsteps loud enough that she can follow where he is. Despite that she tenses in fear as he nears her, seeing up close he can see the bruises on her. The bruise against her temple. His rage once again rises with a breath he relaxes.

"I'm going to cut the ropes first, and you can pull the blindfold off yourself. Is that okay with you?" He questions her one more time and she nods again, more firmly this time. Her hands tremble as he takes hold of them and cautiously cuts through the rope tying them.

He takes a step back as she scrambles to get the blindfold off. Her eyes widen as they stare at the blank expression that marks his white mask, despite being just rescued she looks ready to strike out at him out of sheer fear. The paralysis of fear however doesn't hold her down for long, her eyes darting over to her still crounched daughter. She slowly moves toward Marie, ensuring that she doesn't show her back fully to Kyro, keeping him in her peripheral vision. A smart woman, probably learnt from her mistakes with Nathan.

Charon pulls Marie's blindfold off first and Marie looks at her mother with tearful eyes, filled with so much comfort at seeing her mother again. Charon yanks and pulls at the ropes around her daughter's wrists, no matter how much she tugs it won't loosen. Her hands begin to shiver and she begins to swear as she fruitlessly yanks at the constraints. Kyro moves toward them, ensuring to make sure he stays in her view.

"Hey." He gently calls out to them, and two sets of startled eyes fall back on him. He lifts his hands up to indicate that he means no harm, shakes the bloodied knife loosely held in the right one. „Here." He throws it to the ground in front of the mother, nodding for her to take it. She stares at it for a second, as if debating if the knife can somehow attack them from the ground on its own. Or maybe debating if Kyro is going to hurt them despite relinquishing the weapon. He could, but that isn't what he wants nor intends to do. He came to save them, but he doesn't blame the woman for her suspicion. She did just witness a man randomly show up in a moving car and then teleport them out of said car, even if she didn't actually see it happening.

Kyro nods at the knife once more, keeping his hands up in the air. „You should use that to cut up those binds. It's going to be way easier, and I'm sure your daughter would appreciate being free."

The woman looks at her daughter whose eyes are still filled with tears. She goes to take a step towards it, but Kyro shifts too, so she stops dead in her tracks. "Before you do this, I have to make sure that if anyone asks, you will tell them that you found the knife on the back seat. That man was clearly in a rush and in one careless moment he just forgot it in the back. It was your best chance to escape so you used it. You didn't want him to kill you so you killed him yourself. It was just self-defense and you were protecting your daughter from a known criminal."

She stares at him with wide eyes as he speaks, and he sees understanding grow in them. The car crashed close to them but not close enough for her to see the mess on the front seat. She must know what happened, however. What he did to save the two of them. When she stares at him too long, and the police sirens start to sound uncomfortably close, he points at the knife still on the ground. "I was not here. You didn't see anything suspicious. Other than the kidnapper, of course. Go free your daughter. And remember our deal."

She nods at him, face set in determination, before grabbing the knife. She makes quick work of the rope this time. Once her daughter is free she clutches her in a hug, and feels Marie's hands grip just as tight. They are safe because of the masked man. Charon turns to thank him, but the man is gone.