Becoming Human

intro

The warehouse used to be abandoned. It's not anymore, that much is obvious. There's a pile of bodies in the middle of the floor, completely still. It would look like they were sleeping, if not for all the blood. The sound of sobbing echoes in the air.

There's a girl, alone, standing with her back to the man, he can't see her face, but she too is covered in blood. There's a second man in the room, this one bigger, meaner looking, with a gun and fedora.

With shaking hands he raises the gun towards the girl, who can't be any older than 16. The look on his face is hard, no remorse, no regret, just determination. His hands stop shaking.

Without thinking, the first man throws himself between the two, providing a human shield for the girl. He's staring at the other man, searching for his eyes under the brim of his hat, but he doesn't see the gun fire. Bam. Bam. Bam. He feel three bullets hit him in quick succession, but it feels wrong somehow.

He falls to the floor, and waits for death to take him as his vision slowly blurs. At the edge of his peripheral he can vaguely see a pair of heavy leather boots. Two more gun shots. The boots have blood on them now. He watches it slowly slosh onto the ground as the large man crumples and falls. There's two bullet holes, nearly on top of eachother, right where the smaller man guesses his heart may have been.

He breafly makes eye contact with the larger man, the fedora having fallen off. The action feels like it lasts hours, when in reality it is closer to seconds. Both men, staring into each other's souls, as their lives fade before them.

The smaller man watches as the light fades from the larger man's eyes, and he finally realizes what had felt so wrong when he got shot. He hears the clack, clack, clack, of high heeled boots on concrete walking into his fading field of view as his final thoughts drift through his head. The bullets had come from behind him.