Antiheroes

Chapter 25: Alcohol

Dream POV.

“Get me another beer.” I told the bartender firmly, glaring at him as I did. The bartender was a big stocky man with a bushy brown beard. Looks can clearly be deceiving though, since although he seemed like he could be a threat, the man was unusually quiet, doing everything in his power to avoid pissing me off, although I guess that makes sense because of who I was.

“Are you sure Mr Dream.. uhh sir?” He questioned, fiddling with his hands while avoiding eye contact with me. “You have had a lot to drink already.”
I slammed my fist into the counter, causing him to jump back cowardly. “If I tell you to make me a drink then you fucking make it! Do you understand?”

“Of course! I was just… looking out for your health and safety.” The man defended, quickly taking the glass he had been refilling for the past couple of hours and putting it under a bar tap to fill up with more alcohol.

He passed me the now full glass and I took it without another word, beginning to drink it quietly while he just watched me, because he had nothing else he could do. When I had come in here, everybody else had left, and over the past hour he had tried to avoid me for as long as he could, wiping the tables, and cleaning the glasses by hand, and mopping every floor.

The only reason I had spent so long here, wasting away with drinks was because of the small, miniscule, chance that I would get drunk enough to forget about what had happened tonight. It just sucks that one of the powers I had been given all those years ago in that shitty experiment was an immunity to alcohol, and drugs.

I was just holding on to the hope that not all of my humanity had been stripped away from me because of all of that wrong place, wrong time bullshit. That at the very least I could feel normal for once and that alcohol would make me mad, or dizzy, or feel like jumping up and singing.

But nope. If anything, the alcohol I was drinking made my mind clearer. In a fit of frustration I slapped the glass over, sending it shattering to the floor, spilling the foul smelling liquid over the wooden floorboards. It seemed that the bartender was only too keen to run off and grab a mop as I stared straight ahead.

All I could think about was how shit my life was. I mean, I had heard all about how heroes and villains had terrible origin stories, but why did I… did I do something to deserve having to live my life this way?

My parents never cared about me, no matter what I did they always ignored me. The closest people I had to family were my friends Wilbur and Techno, their little brother Tommy, and their father Philza. One day, Techno and I were hanging out before being kidnapped, and forced into experiments. Kids around us were killed everyday and we were the only survivors.

When we finally were rescued, Philza came up with the idea to train us to fight crime. He meant well, he wanted to save everyone. But he worked us to the bone to do so, and so I ran. Wilbur realised why I had done that and ran off too, a couple of years after I did. His family were more desperate to hunt him down so I had to help him get out of the city.

Then I made two other allies, Sapnap and Skeppy. I found someone who finally didn’t hate me, or wasn’t repulsed at the sight. And we had plans for Wilbur, helping him back home, and he betrayed me less than a month later. Now in the last twenty four hours I found out the one person who cared for me, and the two people I almost considered as friends all turned on me.

I sighed loudly as I walked around to grab myself another glass, pouring myself another drink which I didn’t plan on throwing to the floor this time. As I had another sip of the alcohol, the door swung open, causing my gaze to snap over in that direction as someone walked in, seemingly oblivious to the fact a criminal was standing in sight of the door.

They walked over to the bar wordlessly, a hood pulled over their head and they didn’t even bother to look up at me. Part of me wondered if they were blind, I have nothing against that obviously, but who would willingly walk into a bar when a dangerous criminal was the only person inside. He or she can’t have seen me.

“Get me a glass of anything,” they said in a low voice, their tone not shifting once during the sentence. I almost scoffed at the thought that they had told me what to do, before crossing my arms at him.

“You’re really asking me for a drink?” I was shocked over the fact that they willingly told me to do this. But at least something was happening to lift my mood. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”
“I seriously don’t care. Get me a glass of literally anything.” They repeated, slamming a fifty dollar note in front of them.

“It’s past midnight. I’m not one for rules but this bar is meant to close in an hour,” I hummed, wanting to give this guy one last chance, but this gutsy little asshole just replied telling me that he’ll stay until closing time. Fine then. If I get pissed and end up shooting this guy, it is not my fault since I gave them a decent chance to leave..

I poured a drink for them, followed by one for myself and handed him his, before taking the note in return and pocketing it. As I stood facing the hooded figure, we drank in silence. My glass was about half empty when the bartender returned, clutching a mop tightly in his hands and trying to hide his shaking.

From the way he was moving so slowly it was clear he had probably been taking his time to avoid me, something that is both annoying (on a night like tonight), and pitiful. Annoying because I was in the middle of a silent rant in my head about how I hated people who were scared of me, and pitiful because it shows he was weak.

The bearded man seemed even more terrified when he saw a hooded figure beside me, and I took a moment to lower my glass and stalk over to where he was standing. I grabbed the fabric of his shirt and easily dragged him back into the room he came from, with his mop and all.

He was a couple of inches taller than me, but shrank back against the wall trying to make himself look smaller and probably weaker. I couldn’t help but smile at that as I leaned closer to him. “I want you to leave,” I told him firmly, pointing to a fire exit that was on the back wall. “Then you can come back in the morning and this will all seem like a bad dream, alright.”

It seemed the bartender was eager for an opportunity to slip out of this situation, and he smiled at me before suddenly realising what he was doing and running out of the room. I scoffed lightly before turning my attention back to the strange hooded figure in the bar as I walked out of the room.
_________________________________________
1281 words