Icarus

Fire

"He vanished in a flash after we finished playing, racing off the stage first. We thought he would be here but he's been acting all weird today, you know... you've seen him at the hotel."

"You're right...he did have some attitude earlier," Cassie replied reflectively.

"But he is always acting weird," Tate frowned, he is always acting weird especially lately... he thought to himself, knowing just how serious the issue involving Mac just might turn out to be.

➳

Petra's eyes were stone cold coal black under the moonlight. He was looking better than he did before, but his stare was still brimming with hate. He had slipped into a disturbed state like some psychopath.

"Help me!" Mac yelled, "please...HELP!"

He moved his hands desperately and with every tug the rope around them burned and but into his wrists.

"Awe...don't even bother...nobody can hear you up here."

The festival music was so loud it carried to where Mac was being held, but not so loud that it drowned out the more delicate sounds coming from the hills with its animals moaning, the wind howling, the leaves rustling, and the branches being broken each time Petra took a step closer to him.

"So... Mac..." he began calmly, "here is the thing...you didn't do what I told you to do."

"I—"

"You didn't separate Tate and Cassie, now, the way I see it—they seem to be even closer than when I last talked to you, isn't that right?"

"Well—"

"We both know it's true," He raised his finger. "I promised to give you everything you wanted but since turned your back on me, our arrangement is over."

"Alright...alright...but then why did you drag me here? What do you want now?"

"It's not what I want...Mac!" Petra shouted, and coughed into his fist to clear his voice, "It's what I need..." he whispered, "Or what I don't need, in any case."

"And what is that?" Mac said faintly, feeling his whole body shiver.

"You!"

Mac didn't care his wrists were now bleeding, he needed to escape so he continued to struggle forcefully, but the ropes wouldn't come off and he was tied tightly to a tree.

"Give me a reason why I shouldn't kill you right now." Petra got closer to him.

"Because I was your friend...remember...anyway, you can't kill me!"

"Wrong answer."

"Do you—" his voice broke as his eyes widened. Mac looked down, his shirt tainting with blood, his blood. Petra had a knife in his hand, and Mac caught a glimpse of a smirk of the satisfaction of retribution on Petra's face before falling over...dead.

Petra wiped his knife on his shirt. He made a mental note to get a sword next time. After all was said and done, he sighed upon seeing his once dear friend no longer breathing. He continued talking like he could hear.

"You may ask if this death was necessary.." he said taking a little glass jar out of his pocket and stepping closer to him, "But oh Mac, you were a living time bomb, you could have given my name to Tate at any moment. I didn't trust you but I thought that at least you could have accomplished the simple task I gave you." Petra kneeled besides him and cut his shirt with the sharp blade, slowly pressing the jar on his skin for the blood to fill it. 

"Now that Cassie knows I'm in charge of her mission, and she will probably tell him, there was no point for you to live in fear of being assassinated." He put away the little jar and got up, before leaving he looked over his shoulder. Mac was still there, with his eyes half open and his back leaning against a tree. " I didn't want you to live like that."